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1. Better known as the original Captain Kangaroo, Bob Keeshan was also the original Clarabell the Clown on the Howdy Doody TV show (1947 - 1952. Verified
2. Bob Keeshan was fired twice from the Howdy Doody Show.  Read More
3. HOWDY DOODY had 48 freckles on his face, one for each state--at that time.
4. William Shatner (of Star Trek fame) played the short-lived role of Ranger Bob in 1954 on Howdy Doody.  Source
5. The last episode of the children's show "Howdy Doody", ends with the only words ever spoken by the clown Clarabell Hornblow: "Goodbye, kids."
6. The 1st US federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King, Jr. was in 1986.
7. The 1st US federal legislation prohibiting narcotics (opium) was enacted in 1909.
8. The 1st US federal penitentiary building was completed at Leavenworth, Kansas in 1906.
9. The 1st US Minimum Wage Law was instituted in 1938. The minimum wage was 25 cents per hour.
10. The ancient Egyptians slept on pillows made of stone.
11. The Black Death reduced the population of Europe by one third in the period from 1347 to 1351.
12. The Colosseum has long been known as a site of Christian martyrdom. It was converted into a shrine as early as the sixth century and still serves as the venue for the Vatican's Good Friday services. However, there is no evidence that Christian persecutions ever took place in the Colosseum.
13. The dollar was established as the official currency of the US in 1785.
14. The Emperor Caracalla--a tyrant remembered for slaying his brother and building the extravagant Baths of Caracalla--was murdered by his own guards while he was relieving himself. That may be where the phrase "caught with your pants down" comes from.
15. The first coin minted in the United States was a silver dollar. It was issued on October 15, 1794.
16. The first country to abolish capital punishment was Austria in 1787.
17. The first losing candidate in a US presidential election was Thomas Jefferson. He lost to John Adams. George Washington had been unopposed.
18. The first modern Olympiad was held in Athens in 1896. 484 contestants from 13 nations participated.
19. The first US Marines wore high leather collars to protect their necks from sabres, hence the name "leathernecks."
20. The first-known contraceptive was crocodile dung, used by Egyptians in 2000 BC.
21. The House of Lancaster, symbolized by the red rose, won England's 'War of the Roses.'
22. The Hundred Year War actually lasted 116 years (1337 to 1453).
23. The influence of ancient Rome on architecture is all around us. The Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C., is almost a dead-ringer for the Pantheon. And the original Penn Station in New York was modeled on the Baths of Caracalla.
24. The longest reigning monarch in history was Pepi II, who ruled Egypt for 90 years; 2566 to 2476 BC. The second longest was France's Louis XIV, who ruled for 72 years, 1643 to 1715.
25. The Miss America Contest was created in Atlantic City in 1921 with the purpose of extending the tourist season beyond Labor Day.
26. The name of the first airplane flown at Kitty Hawk by the Wright Brothers, on December 17, 1903, was Bird of Prey.
27. The only repealed amendment to the US Constitution deals with the prohibition of alcohol.
28. The peace symbol was created in 1958 as a nuclear disarmament symbol by the Direct Action Committee, and was first shown that year at peace marches in England. The symbol is a composite of the semaphore signals N and D, representing nuclear disarmament.
29. The quarries where the Romans extracted travertine for the Colosseum and other great structures are still being mined today.
30. The Republic of Israel was established April 23, 1948.
31. The seven wonders of the ancient world were: ... 1. Egyptian Pyramids at Giza ... 2. Hanging Gardens of Babylon ... 3. Statue of Zeus at Olympia ... 4. Colossus of Rhodes - or huge bronze statue near the Harbor of Rhodes that honored the sun god Helios ... 5. Temple of Artemis at Ephesus ... 6. Mausoleum at Halicarnassus ... 7. Lighthouse at Alexandria.
32. The shortest war on record was fought between Zanzibar and England in 1896. Zanzibar surrendered after 38 minutes.
33. The shortest war on record, between Britain and Zanzibar in 1896, lasted just 38 minutes.
34. The standard U.S. railroad width (4 feet, 8.5 inches) is directly derived from the width of Roman war chariots. This is because the English expatriates who designed the U.S. railroad system based their measurements on the pre-railroad tramways built in England. Those tramways were built using the same tools used to build wagons, which were also that width. The reason wagons were built to that width is because otherwise, they would break during long treks across the old English roads. Those roads--built by the Romans--were full of ruts carved out by Roman war chariots. All Roman chariots were built to a standard width of 4 feet, 8.5 inches, and so English wagons were built so that their wheels would fit into those ruts.
35. The supersonic Concorde jet made its first trial flight on January 1, 1969.
36. The Titanic was the first ship to use the SOS signal. It was adopted as the international signal for distress in 1912, and the Titanic struck the iceberg in April of that year. False
    In reality, another ship, a Cunard liner named Slavonia, first broadcast the SOS signal on June 10, 1909, a full 3 years before the Titanic. Also, the SOS became the official distress signal in 1906, replacing the old CQD code.
37. The total number of Americans killed in the Civil War is greater than the combined total of Americans killed in all other wars.
38. The Union ironclad, Monitor, was the first U.S. ship to have a flush toilet. Read More
39. The US federal income tax was first enacted in 1862 to support the Union's Civil War effort. It was eliminated in 1872, revived in 1894 then declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court the following year. In 1913, the 16th Amendment to the Constitution made the income tax a permanent fixture in the US tax system.
40. The USSR set off the largest nuclear explosion in history, detonating a 50 megaton bomb (2600 times the Hiroshima bomb) in an atmospheric test over the Novaya Zemla Islands, October 30 1961. Verified
41. The very first bomb dropped by the Allies on Berlin during World War II killed the only elephant in the Berlin Zoo.
42. The White House, in Washington DC, was originally gray, the color of the sandstone it was built out of. After the War of 1812, during which it had been burned by Canadian troops, the outside walls were painted white to hide the smoke stains.
43. The worldwide "Spanish Flu" epidemic which broke out in 1918 killed more than 30 million people in less than a year's time.
44. There are more statues of Sacajewa, Lewis & Clark's female Indian guide, in the United States than any other women. Read More2
45. To raise public revenue, Emperor Vespasian--who built the Colosseum--was the first to introduce pay toilets in the city of Rome. When his son and successor Titus protested that the toilets were raising a stink with the poor, Vespasian held a coin up to his nose and said, "money doesn't stink." Today, Romans still refer to public toilets as vespasiano.
46. Until Sunday, September 3rd, 1967, driving was done on the left-hand side on roads in Sweden. The conversion to right-hand was done on a weekend at 5 p.m. All traffic stopped as people switched sides. This time and day were chosen to prevent accidents where drivers would have gotten up in the morning and been too sleepy to realize 'this' was the day of the changeover.
47. Vermont, admitted as the 14th state in 1791, was the 1st addition to the original 13 colonies.
48. Wyoming was the first state to allow women to vote.
49. Yellowstone is the world's 1st national park. It was dedicated in 1872.

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