Let the buyer beware of magic stones
The famous legal phrase caveat emptor (“let the buyer beware”) entered common law because of a 17th century dispute over a magic bezoar stone.
Category: History
Mario’s surname
The Nintendo video game character Mario has gone through a number of name changes throughout the years – including, controversially, whether he has a surname or not.
Honorary whites
In apartheid-era South Africa, the government sometimes designated specific people or whole ethnic groups as “honorary whites.” But not everyone accepted it.
Calypso queen
From 1939 until 1977, the winner of the annual Trinidad calypso competition was crowned the Calypso King. In 1978 Calypso Rose won the title, so they had to change the name.
Statue graveyards
When politicians’ historical crimes catch up with them, what happens to their statues?
Longest elevator fall
In 1945 an Air Force bomber crashed into the side of the Empire State Building. An elevator cab carrying Betty Lou Oliver fell 75 floors straight down; she, incredibly, survived.
Space probe software bug
NASA lost contact with the space probe Deep Impact in 2013 because of a single software bug.
The last smallpox survivor
In October 1977, Ali Maow Maalin was the last person to contract naturally occurring smallpox. He died thirty six years later while coordinating a polio vaccination drive.
Texas mess
“Don’t mess with Texas” is an iconic expression of state pride, but it began as an anti-littering ad campaign.
Animal helmets
The Vikings may not have worn horned helmets, but the ancient Greeks had helmets covered in boar tusks and the Dayak of Borneo had helmets covered in fish or pangolin scales.
Who was the real Betty Boop?
A 1932 lawsuit attempted to answer the question “who was the real Betty Boop?”
The Yale blackboard rebellion
In 1830, nearly half of the mathematics class at Yale was expelled for refusing to use a blackboard in their exams.
Castaway rabbits and cattle
Rabbits and cattle were introduced to a remote island near Antarctica as food for shipwreck survivors; they bred there in isolation for more than a century.
Siberian monstrators
When is a protest not a protest? In Russia, when it’s a performance art parody of a protest. But that still didn’t stop the Russian government from overreacting.
The search engine of 1896
In 1896 Paul Otlet set up a bibliographic query service by mail: a 19th century search engine.
Samoan constitutional crisis (Part 2)
The 2021 Samoan constitutional crisis came to a head with a face-off between the old prime minister who wouldn’t leave, the new prime minister who couldn’t start, the head of state, the Supreme Court, the Attorney General, and the Speaker of the House. [2 of 2]