History

Bizarre Fact #181:
Did you know...
Leonardo DaVinci painted the Mona Lisa on a piece of pinewood, 77 x 53 cm (30 x 20 7/8 in) in the year 1506.

Bizarre Fact #182:
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Limelight was how we lit the stage before electricity was invented. Basically, illumination was produced by heating blocks of lime until they glowed.

Bizarre Fact #183:
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Louis XIV had forty personal wigmakers and almost 1000 wigs.

Bizarre Fact #184:
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Louis XV was the first person to use an elevator: in 1743 his "flying chair" carried him between the floors of the Versailles palace.

Bizarre Fact #185:
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Louisa May Alcott, author of the classic "Little Women," hated kids. She only wrote the book because her publisher asked her to.

Bizarre Fact #186:
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Many hundreds of years ago when the well-known style of Irish dancing began in the country side of Ireland, most houses of the poor - and that means most houses - only had a dirt floor which was not a lot of use for dancing on if you were holding a ceildh (pronounced kay-lee and meaning party - more or less). So in order to make the dancing easier the owners of the house which was holding the party would take the doors off their hinges and lay them on the floor. There was just enough room on each door for two people to dance, providing they did not fling their arms about - hence the original name for Irish dancing - Door Dancing.

Bizarre Fact #187:
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Marco Polo was born on the Croatian island of Korcula (pronounced Kor-Chu-La).

Bizarre Fact #188:
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Minna Braun, a nurse in Berlin, Germany, was pronounced dead from an overdose of sleeping pills and, as was customary in suicides, was buried in an open grave (The next day the coffin's nailed lid was opened to permit identification of the body), and the girl was found to be alive. She recovered and returned to her nursing duties. (Oct. 28, 1919)

Bizarre Fact #189:
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More than 5,000 years ago, the Chinese discovered how to make silk from silkworm cocoons. For about 3,000 years, the Chinese kept this discovery a secret. Because poor people could not afford real silk, they tried to make other cloth look silky. Women would beat on cotton with sticks to soften the fibers. Then they rubbed it against a big stone to make it shiny. The shiny cotton was called "chintz." Because chintz was a cheaper copy of silk, calling something "chintzy" means it is cheap and not of good quality.

Bizarre Fact #190:
Did you know...
More than 5,600 men died while building the Panama Canal. Today, it takes more than 8,000 workers to run and maintain the canal. It takes a ship an average of 33 hours to travel the length of the canal.