What was the Royal African Company? It was a British slaving company that ties the British royal family to the slave trade. Britain started kidnapping African people as slaves in 1562. It didn’t start out as a national policy, but it quickly became one. John Hawkins is credited as being the “pioneer of the English […]
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Why are university degrees called a bachelor’s, a master’s and a doctorate? They were named after the people who were trying to get those degrees. Universities have been around since the 9th century. The University of Al-Karaouine in Morocco is considered to be the first university in the world. Some people say that this university
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How wild was the Wild West? Not as wild as Hollywood would like us to believe. The Wild West was the American frontier. It wasn’t called the Wild West until after the American Civil War. The general consensus is that the period of the Wild West lasted from the end of the Civil War to
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What was the first insurance company? Hamburger Feuerkasses in 1676, followed closely by Nicholas Barbon’s Insurance Office in 1680, was the first insurance company. Insurance goes back to the point where early humans stopped being hunter-gatherers and settled down. Once people started to farm a barter system arose because it makes more sense for people
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How did Galileo realize that the Earth orbits the sun? He realized it when he observed the orbit of Venus. Galileo was born in 1564 in Pisa, Italy. Galileo is famous for saying that the Earth orbits the sun rather than the sun orbits the Earth, but he was not the first person to come
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How was the Great Pyramid at Giza built? There are several theories, but no one knows for definite. The Great Pyramid of Giza is the largest of the three pyramids in Giza and it was the first to be built. It was the oldest of the original seven wonders of the world and the only
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When was the first subway built? The first subway was the Metropolitan Railway line in London, opened on January 10, 1863. The city of London mostly sprung up when the Romans settled it in about 43 AD. They made their capital city in Colchester (Camulodunum), and London (Londinium) was a convenient place for them to
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When were glasses invented? The first wearable glasses were invented in Italy in the 13th century, but the Romans were using spheres of glass for magnification thirteen hundred years earlier. There are two types of eye problem that require correction with glasses. These are myopia (near-sightedness) and hyperopia (far-sightedness). When you are myopic, the light from
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Why do we say “born to the purple”? What is Tyrian purple? We say that someone who is born into a royal or powerful family is “born to the purple” because Tyrian purple was an incredibly expensive color that only wealthy and powerful people could afford. The dye for Tyrian purple was made from the
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When did people start using glass for windows? The Romans were the first people to have glass in their windows, but it wasn’t a common practice to have glass windows until the 17th century. There have been window holes since there have been houses because it is necessary to let the light in during the day.
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