It’s already shaping up to be an eventful election year. Among the candidates for governor of Minnesota is Jonathon “The Impaler” Sharkey, a self-proclaimed vampire and satanist.
If elected, Sharkey promises to impale terrorists and pedophiles on the grounds of the state capitol. His Vampires, Witches, and Pagans Party is officially recognized by the United States Federal Election Committee, and he announced his candidacy on Friday, Jan. 13.
His campaign slogan is “A New Deal for Minnesota.”
Charles Osmond Frederick was a mild-mannered British engineer at the British Railway Technical Centre in Derby in the 1970s.
Or so everyone thought. Earlier this year, patent researchers discovered that in 1973 Frederick had designed a nuclear-powered space vehicle for intergalactic travel, and even got the British Railways Board to patent it. Apparently no one was paying attention.
When the plans resurfaced, a group of nuclear scientists examined them and declared them to be unworkable; Michel van Baal of the European Space Agency said, “I have had a look at the plans, and they don’t look very serious to me at all.”
But if you like, you can try them out yourself — the patent lapsed when the Railways Board neglected to renew it.
What do these writers have in common?
All drove ambulances during World War I.
The Langdell Law Library at Harvard University contains a book bound in human skin. Practicarum Quaestionum Circa Leges Regias Hispaniae, a treaty of Spanish law, contains this inscription on the last page:
The bynding of this booke is all that remains of my deare friende Jonas Wright, who was flayed alive by the Wavuma on the Fourth Day of August, 1632. King btesa did give me the book, it being one of poore Jonas chiefe possessions, together with ample of his skin to bynd it. Requiescat in pace.
The Wavuma were an African tribe in what is now Zimbabwe.
Too much optimism is a bad thing. In 1897, Swedish engineer S.A. Andrée planned to reach the North Pole in a leaky and untested balloon, steering only by dragging ropes. He and two companions lifted off from Svalbard in July, drifted north and disappeared for 33 years.
It wasn’t until 1930 that their last camp was discovered — they had crashed after only two days and spent three freezing months trying to walk home.
“Morale remains good,” Andrée had written before his diary became incoherent. “With such comrades as these, one ought to be able to manage under practically any circumstances whatsoever.”
“Chess is as elaborate a waste of human intelligence as you can find outside an advertising agency.” — Raymond Chandler
There are only two books in the Bible that do not contain the word God.
They are Esther and Song of Solomon.
The average guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns cuts his hair, shaves twice, and spends eight hours preparing his uniform for each day’s work. (Thanks to MysticWolf for this one.)
At its peak, during World War II, Fort Knox held enough pure gold to make 90 Statues of Liberty.
On the original Star Trek, many sets include pipes and tubes marked “GNDN”.
That’s an in-joke among the set designers — it stands for “Goes Nowhere, Does Nothing.”