How did Israel end up where it is? The British government had the idea to create a Jewish homeland roughly where the Land of Israel used to be. To do that, they had to break up Palestine. The UN adopted the plan and Israel declared statehood on May 14th, 1948. The name “Israel” was chosen […]
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What are the Queensberry rules? They are the rules for boxing published in 1867 and endorsed by the 9th Marquess of Queensberry. People have fought each other for as long as there have been people. Over time, fighting turned into a sport. The Romans had their gladiators and many other societies turned out in their
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What caused the Great Depression? There are many causes. Some of them are the investment bubble, the Wall Street Crash, the credit boom, the collapse of world trade due to the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, bank failures, and the gold standard. Let’s look at these. First, what exactly was the Great Depression? In begin in 1929, the
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Who painted the Isleworth Mona Lisa? This is a difficult question. It is either completely painted by Leonardo da Vinci, partially painted by him, or not painted by him at all, depending on what expert is asked. However, it does appear unlikely that this painting is by da Vinci. Let’s try and break it down.
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What was the Great Stink? It happened in Central London during June and August 1858, when the smell of the River Thames was unbearable. The city of London grew up at the point where the River Thames was narrow enough to bridge. There was a ford across the river before the first bridge was ever
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During his career, Maurice Hilleman developed over 40 vaccinations. It is thought that his vaccinations save over 8 million lives every year. However, he was not interested in making a name for himself, only that his vaccines helped people. For this reason, despite having received his vaccines, very few people have ever heard of him.
#859 Maurice Hilleman – microbiologist specializing in vaccinology. Read More »
Christiaan Huygens was a mathematician, physicist, engineer, astronomer, and inventor. He was responsible for many discoveries during his lifetime. He discovered a new way to make more accurate telescope lenses by grinding and polishing them differently, and he used those lenses to find the first moon of Saturn, Titan, and to observe the true shape
#846 Christiaan Huygens – inventor of the pendulum clock and the balance spring. Read More »
When were photographs first used in newspapers? The first photograph was published in a newspaper in 1848, but they didn’t become common for a long time after that. Depending on the type of paper, modern newspapers have a lot of photographs. The percentage and the size of the photographs may vary depending on whether the
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When we think about important figures in the history of aviation, Orville and Wilbur Wright obviously spring to mind. However, they probably wouldn’t have been able to fly without the work of Otto Lilienthal, a German aviator, who was known as the flying man. Lilienthal wasn’t the first person to build heavier than air flying
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On the Shoulders of Giants #1 Euclid was an ancient Greek mathematician. He is most famous for his book “The Elements”. He probably lived in the City of Alexandria in about 300 BC, but there is not much reliable historical evidence for his existence. All of the records about him were written several centuries later.
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