Read Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Wise Up! Online
Authors: Bathroom Readers’ Institute
Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Wise Up! (22 page)
TELETHONS.
After writer Damon Runyon died of cancer in 1946, his friends in the entertainment industry established the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation. The charity held its first big fund-raiser in April 1949—an unprecedented 16-hour television broadcast to solicit donations. This “telethon” (“television” plus “marathon”) was the idea of NBC executive Sylvester Weaver, who thought big TV events would entice people to buy television sets. That first telethon wasn’t much different from today’s telethons: a big star (Milton Berle) hosted; an on-screen bank of phone operators accepted call-in donations; and stars of movies, TV, and Broadway performed and pleaded for money. The broadcast raised $100,000 for cancer research.
TREE-SHAPED AIR FRESHENERS.
In 1951, in his garage laboratory, a New York chemist named Julius Sämann created the world’s first air freshener made just for the car. Made of a material similar to a disposable beer coaster, Sämann’s prototype was pine-scented…so he cut the freshener into the shape of a tree. Sämann got a patent and opened the Car-Freshener Corporation. Today, Little Trees are the top selling air fresheners in the world. And all of them are tree-shaped, even the top-selling “New Car Scent.”
READER’S DIGEST.
In 1914, DeWitt Wallace suffered injuries fighting in World War I and was sent to a French hospital to recover. He was incredibly bored and wanted something to read. That gave Wallace an idea: a pocket-size anthology of short articles on many topics, written in basic, easy-to-understand English. When he got back to the United States after the war, he approached several publishers with his idea. They all rejected it. So in 1922, he printed 5,000 copies of his magazine himself. All of them sold, and the popularity of
Reader’s Digest
grew quickly. By 1926, the magazine had a circulation of 40,000. Today its readership is 38 million.
Helen Keller could identify her friends by their odors.
An Australian man named Simon Robinson holds the record for the loudest scream: 128 decibels—almost as loud as a jet engine.
On his debut album,
For You
, Prince played 27 different instruments.
Franz Schubert had a great memory. He wrote versions of his song “Die Forelle” from memory for his friends.
Born in 1795, Miranda Stuart from England posed as a man to attend medical school and become a doctor. She was one of the most successful of her era, and her gender wasn’t discovered until she died in 1865.
England’s King James I was thinking ahead; he wrote about the health hazards of smoking in his 1604 treatise “Counterblaste to Tobacco.”
Muhammad Ali had a hit single on his 1963 album
I Am the Greatest
—a cover of “Stand by Me.”
The father of the early 20th-century Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. discovered the adrenal gland.
Trick-shot golfer Wedgy Winchester could chip a coin into a golf hole from 20 yards.
Most successful song by a solo female artist: Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You.”
Marie Tussad, who was suspected of royalist sympathies and arrested during the French Revolution, was sentenced to die on the guillotine, but was spared because of her wax-sculpting talents.
At 16, Rick James went AWOL from the U.S. Navy, fled to Canada, and joined a band with Neil Young.
First recorded appearance of a garden gnome in England: 1840. (They were first made in Germany.)
In Lancashire, in 1617, King James I knighted a piece of steak Sir Loin, thus coining the term. Why? He thought it was especially tasty.
According to studies, married people in England spend about 25 minutes per week kissing.
Nine percent of the people in England drink neither tea nor coffee.
A 2006 study found that the average white middle-aged Briton was healthier than the average white middle-aged American.
Fifty-eight percent of the London Underground, the city’s transit system, is actually above-ground.
There are 66 cities in the United Kingdom: 50 in England, five in Wales, six in Scotland, and five in Northern Ireland.
In the United Kingdom, about 50 instant lottery tickets are sold every second.
Nine U.S. presidents never attended college: George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Harry S. Truman, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson, and Grover Cleveland.
Former British prime ministers John Major and Tony Blair once worked for London’s power company.
Shortest time in office for a Canadian prime minister: John Turner, 79 days in 1984.
Said Musa—prime minister of Belize from 1998 to 2008— wore jeans and a T-shirt to his inauguration.
U.S. president Woodrow Wilson couldn’t read until he was 10 years old.
Mexico’s president Felipe Calderon (who took office in 2006) once told MTV that he “regretted not having more fun as a child.”
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter’s English teacher introduced him to
War and Peace
when he was 12. He was disappointed to learn that it wasn’t about cowboys and Indians.
In 2007, the magazine
Vanity Fair
listed French president Nicolas Sarkozy as number 68 on its 100 best-dressed list.
Vaclav Havel, former president of the Czech Republic, is a huge fan of both Frank Zappa and Lou Reed.
U.S. president James A. Garfield could write Latin with one hand and Greek with the other—at the same time.
British journalist Carol Thatcher, the daughter of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher, won the 2005 season of the UK reality show
I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!
You can use pinecones to forecast the weather: when rain is on the way, the scales close.
Technically, a drizzle is 14 drops of rain per square foot per second; a light rain is 26 drops.
The first type of umbrella was invented by the ancient Egyptians as a sun shield.
According to weather forecasters, “scattered showers” means a 10 percent chance of rain.
In 1823, Charles Macintosh patented the waterproof cloth later used to make raincoats.
A whistle sounds louder just before it rains.
Average life span of an umbrella: 1 ½ years.
According to the U.S. Weather Service, one-day forecasts are right 75 percent of the time.
The Chinese invented the first waterproof umbrella using wax and lacquer.
A lightning bolt can travel at a speed of 60,000 miles per second.
James Earl Jones, who was the voice of Darth Vader in the
Star Wars
series, used to stutter. When he was in high school, the stuttering was so severe that he rarely spoke to anyone.
Before he became famous, Sylvester Stallone cleaned lion cages.
On his business cards, Verne Troyer, who played Mini Me in the
Austin Powers
movies, calls himself “the biggest little guy in the business.”
Oscar-winning movie stars live longer than those who don’t win.
French artist Henri Rousseau—famous for painting exotic jungle scenes—never left the city of Paris.
Track and field star Jackie Joyner-Kersee suffers from asthma.
After only three months in school, seven-year-old Thomas Edison was sent home for constantly asking “Why?” His frustrated teacher sent a note home to Edison’s parents claiming that the boy was slow.
Sting wrote the Police song “Every Breath You Take” on Noel Coward’s piano.
Neil Sedaka composed “Oh! Carol” for Carole King in 1959. She later recorded “Oh! Neil.”
Cole Porter’s original lyrics to “I Get a Kick Out of You” referenced the Lindberghs: he changed them after the couple’s baby was kidnapped.
Carl Perkins wrote the song “Blue Suede Shoes” on an old potato sack.
Willie Nelson wrote “Crazy” for country singer Billy Walker—and Walker turned it down. (Patsy Cline didn’t.)
Songwriter Jim Weatherly wrote “Midnight Train to Georgia” in the 1970s after a conversation with actress Farrah Fawcett, in which she said she had to run to catch a “midnight plane to Houston.”
The melody for Nat King Cole’s 1954 hit “Smile” was composed by Charlie Chaplin.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow never actually saw the 53-foot waterfall Minnehaha that he wrote about in his 1853 poem “The Song of Hiawatha.”
Barry Manilow didn’t write “I Write the Songs”—Bruce Johnston did…and it was about Beach Boy Brian Wilson.
Kris Kristofferson, Janis Joplin’s former boyfriend, penned her hit single “Me and Bobby McGee.”
The John Fogerty song “Centerfield” plays continuously at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.
John Lennon’s inspiration for the 1967 song “Good Morning, Good Morning” was a cereal commercial.
During a conversation, women make eye contact 15 percent more often than men do.
In 2008, there were 140,000 stay-at-home dads in the United States, up 64 percent from a decade before.
According to the
Boston Globe
, the estimated salary for a stay-at-home parent is $138,000.
Women look at other women more often than they look at men.
At age 21, women are more likely than men to be enrolled in college.
Almost twice as many women as men buy gifts for Mother’s Day.
Thirty-five percent of teenage girls who use the Internet write blogs; only 20 percent of teen boys do.
Men who have a heart attack in a public place often walk outside when they start to feel ill, but women are more likely to go into the bathroom.
Men can read smaller print than women can, but women can hear better.
Men are more likely than women to be left-handed.
Studies reveal that men prefer classical music while on hold; women prefer light jazz.
More women than men talk to their cars.
* * *
“Have you noticed that all the people in favor of birth control are already born?”
—Benny Hill
The U.S. Treasury began printing paper money in 1862 because there was a coin shortage.
There are $171 million worth of pennies and $2.6 billion worth of dimes in circulation.
The paper for U.S. currency is made exclusively by the Massachusetts-based Crane & Company.
There are 26 states named on the back of a $5 bill.
In 1792, the United States established the dollar as its official currency.
It costs about 1.2 cents to mint a penny.
At the end of the Civil War, 33 percent of U.S. paper currency was counterfeit.
Eighteen percent of U.S. coins are contaminated with the
E. coli
bacteria.
The three people shown on today’s U.S. currency who weren’t presidents: Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, and Sacagawea.
Who’s on the $500 bill? William McKinley. The $1,000 bill? Grover Cleveland.
U.S. paper currency is fluorescent under UV light.
The only First Lady to have her image used on U.S. currency: Martha Washington, on a silver certificate in 1886.
Original gold coins included $10, $5, and $2.50 values.
About half of the U.S. currency printed are $1 bills.
The U.S. Mint once considered producing doughnut-shaped coins.
Alabama’s state quarter spells Helen Keller’s name in Braille.
According to statistics, about 7,000 people a year are injured by falling off of chairs.
Most dangerous cheerleading moves: the “pyramid” and the “basket toss.”
What recreational activity causes more bone fractures than any other? Aerobic dancing.
Hot drinks cause more injuries than lawn mowers do.
About 2,000 people are injured every year from trying to pry frozen foods apart.
More people die while playing golf than any other sport. Leading causes: heart attacks and strokes.
Deadliest weather phenomenon in the United States: lightning.
Cotton swabs cause more injuries than razor blades.
More than 6,000 Americans are injured every year by toilet seats.
Odds of being killed by fireworks: one in 615,488.
The inaugural 2000 season of
Survivor
is often credited as the beginning of the “reality television revolution.”
The fourth season of
Survivor
was supposed to take place in Jordan, but because of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the producers relocated to the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia.
The show’s host, Jeff Probst, is also an ordained minister.
All of the show’s contestants receive a stipend (between $2,500 to $100,000) for participating. The amount increases the longer they’re in the game.
Michael Skupin, who took part in the Australian season, fell into a campfire during filming and was evacuated from the set. Then, after he got home, members of the animal rights group PETA attacked him with pepper spray for killing a pig on the show.
British television producer Charlie Parsons came up with the idea and format for
Survivor
in 1992.
Tina Wesson, winner of the 2001 season, wasn’t originally selected to be on the show. The producers called her when someone else dropped out.
Oldest
Survivor
contestant: Rudy Boesch was 72 when he competed on the first season. Youngest: 19-year-old Spencer Duhm (season 18).
The first season’s winner, Richard Hatch, spent three years in jail for tax evasion. Why? He didn’t properly report his $1 million prize to the IRS.
The Australian season didn’t actually take place in the Outback. The camps were in a semiremote area about three hours from Cairns, a coastal city in the northeastern part of the country.