Fact
Extractor: News You’ll Never Need to Know
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In
this issue of Fact Extractor:
- Hucksters,
Humbugs, Hoodwinks & Hogwash: Harebrained Hoaxes
& Hullabaloo
- Fact
or Fable?
- The
Quick Quirk Quiz Question
- Shameless
Self-Promotion & Flagrant Advertising
- Two
Cents About Roller Coasters
- Miscellaneous
Stuff
Hucksters, Humbugs, Hoodwinks &
Hogwash: Harebrained Hoaxes & Hullabaloo
Sarah
Bixby Smith was an artist in the late 1800s and early 1900s.
When the critics gave her work a poor review because it
"was not in touch with the modern trends", her
husband, a writer named Paul Smith, got mad and decided to
give those critics a taste of Modern Trends. He took his
wife's oldest tubes of paint and her worst brushes and
spread them at random on a canvas. The result was a figure
that looked a little bit like some kind of a savage woman
holding up a banana. "I really intended it to be a
starfish," said Paul. The painting was hung in the
living room as a family joke. But then the art critic for
the local paper came to dinner. He loved the painting, and
asked for more information about the artist. Paul said it
had been painted by Pavel Jerdanowitch, who painted in the
Disumbrationist style. Later he entered the painting in a
major art exhibit. Not only was it accepted, but a critic
wrote about it for a Paris art magazine. Suddenly everyone
wanted to know about this new painter. Paul made up a
complete biography about the mysterious unknown Russian
painter, saying he was born in Moscow but emigrated to
Chicago. He took a picture of himself wearing a fake beard
and submitted it as a picture of the artist. Later he
created a second painting entitled "Aspiration",
which sort of depicted a large woman washing clothes. It was
published in "Art World" magazine. The next year,
two more paintings by Jerdanowitch/Smith received high
praise in a show in New York. After pulling the wool over
the critic's eyes for three years, Smith revealed the hoax.
In 1927, a Boston museum exhibited the Jerdanowitch
paintings and thousands of people showed up to see what had
fooled the experts.
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YOUR schemes & screams to: HHHHHHH@TriviaQueen.com
Fact
or Fable?
A
blind chameleon will still change color. FACT or FABLE?
(Answer below.)
Quick Quirk Quiz Question:
Off
the coast of Louisiana there's a place called Avery Island.
A family named McIhenny owned the island and ran the
nation's first successful salt mine there. In 1862 in the
midst of the Civil War, Union troops invaded the area. The
troops needed salt to preserve their meat, and soon overtook
the island. Mr. McIhenny took his family and fled to Texas.
When he returned after the war, he found the salt factory
and his plantation ruined. All that was left was a crop of
hot peppers, which the soldiers had no taste for. The
peppers were particularly hot because the soil was so salty.
McIhenny was determined to turn the peppers into profit and
began experimenting. He devised a new sauce using his own
peppers combined with the island's salt, along with vinegar
and spices. After pouring it into empty cologne bottles, he
sent off samples to wholesalers. In 1868 he sold 350 bottles
of the sauce. In 1870 he sold over 1,000. Two years later
demand was so great he had to open a London branch. Today
McIhenny's factories on Avery Island produce 200,000 to
300,000 bottles of this sauce each day-- as well as a
million and a half tons of salt annually. What sauce is it?
To
find out, go to http://www.triviaqueen.com/enewsletters.htm
and scroll all the way to the bottom of the page for the
answer. While you’re scrolling, be sure to take a look at
the trivia you could be reading while you’re there! Read
our current issues of the Two Bit News for free, or check
out our back issues for only 25 cents each! We’ve got
trivial trifles, treasures, and treats for every appetite so
cough up your quarters and learn a lot of news you never
needed to know!
Answer to Last Week’s Quick Quirk
Quiz Question:
Clarence,
who invented a way of flash-freezing food which
revolutionized the food industry, was not named Clarence
Stouffer, Clarence Swanson, Clarence Gordon, or Clarence
McCain. His name was Clarence BIRDSEYE.
Nothing You Need to Know about ROLLER COASTERS
The
roller coaster called the Bobs
at Chicago’s Riverview Park was at one time listed in the
Guinness Book of World Records, not for speed or height or
length, but simply for the number of lost earrings collected
by groundskeepers: over 7,000 by the time it closed in 1967.
The
odds of being injured on an amusement park ride are 1 in 23
million. According to the US Consumer Products Safety
Commission, in 1999 over 600,000 people were injured on
bikes, just under 100,000 on trampolines, nearly 50,000
while using golf equipment, while 7,260 were injured on
amusement park rides, and only 138 of those people needed to
be hospitalized. Most injuries are due to people failing to
follow rules rather than equipment failure.
Normal
earth gravity has a g force of 1. Astronauts in orbit float
around in zero g’s. Jet pilots black out at 10 g’s. On a
roller coaster, g forces decrease on the way down a hill
(making you feel lighter) and increase on the way up (making
you feel heavier). At 3 g’s a 100-lb person feels like
they weigh 300 lbs. On the way down a hill riders may feel 0
g’s, although most coasters only go down to about .2
g’s, making a 100-lb. person weigh 20 lbs. A typical
roller coaster offers a maximum of 3.5 g’s. More than that
makes the ride too much. That’s about the same g forces as
astronauts feel during a space shuttle launch. Three
coasters outside the US generate over 6.5 g’s.
Discover
the world’s fastest (and most expensive) roller
coaster...Learn about the roller coaster that straddles two
states...Hear about the stinkiest roller coaster in the
world...Find out where to sit to get the very best
ride...The world’s first roller coaster marriage...The
world record for roller coaster riding... and much more!
Just click on this link to get your Two Bits about Roller
Coasters for free!
Fact
or Fable:
FACT.
A blind chameleon still changes color.
DID
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Next
week, we’ll be hearing all about GARLIC so stay tuned to
the Fact Extractor!
Remember our motto, stated in the immortal words of
Max Beerbohm, “Good sense about trivialities is better
than nonsense about things that matter.”
Janet Spencer, Trivia
Queen of the Universe
Royal Ruler of Useless Information
Master of Arcane Knowledge and Extraneous Lore
Keeper of Forgotten Facts and Startling Statistics
Freelance Hysterics - Creative Profanities - Quantum
Perplexities
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