"Tell Me Something I Don't Know": Trivia & Fact Thread

[Bastet]

18 hours ago, Ancaster said:

We all (I think!) know that baby kangaroos are called joeys, but today I learnt that all marsupial babies are called joeys - koalas, wombats, etc.  Makes sense, but seems like it could be a good Jeopardy! question.

I can't find a "Marsupial babies are called this" clue in the archive, but they have acknowledged that fact on the show:  There was an entire "Joey" category once, and the correct responses were wombats, kangaroos, gliders, and bandicots (one clue didn't ask for the animal; it was about marsupial anatomy).

[Blergh]

I recall in my youth that the term 'joey'  when used for non-adult kangaroos as per the contemporary dictionaries was supposed to have been a word from an Australian Aboriginal language (but which of the 900+ known languages was not specified). Now it has 'unknown' origins so I'm wondering if perhaps the early English settlers might have asked a local Australian Aborigine what they called non-adult kangaroos and the individual responded- but whoever the first English speaker to use it might not have bothered to ask which TRIBE the Australian Aborigine informant came from.

One thing I'm sure  that EACH surviving Australian Aboriginal language has individualized terms for non-adult wombats, kangaroos, gliders and bandicots! Just like each European language has individualized terms for non-adult dogs, cats, horses, cows and sheep- instead of just terming them 'puppies'!

BTW, 'kangaroo' IS somewhat documented as having been first recorded in 1770 from a Northeast [Queensland] Australian tribe and I guess that a British mariner wrote it down and it would be used from that point on (which is better than just having them being called 'pocket-hoppers']!

[Blergh]

OK, I talked about FDR's somewhat force-of-nature mother Sara Delano Roosevelt but I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about the parents of his wife Eleanor (1884-1962)- Elliott (1860-1894) and Anna Rebecca Hall Roosevelt (1863-1892). Yes, they both would die quite young when their daughter was still a child but they'd have lifelong impacts on her.

Elliott had been sent west to Texas for adventure then became one of the first US Americans to explore India and the Himalayas while Anna not only came from a prominent old family but was a stunning beauty- to the extent that many decades after her death, her daughter would describe her as 'one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen!' and their 1883 marriage was considered to be THE match of the season. Alas, they weren't to live happily ever after. For one thing, Elliot had started to develop an alcohol problem and Anna had had to somehow help her widowed mother Mary keep the family from going under after her own father's death when she just seventeen. Then, in February,1884, Elliot's mother 'Mittie' and his sister-in-law Alice Lee Roosevelt  both fell mortally ill which got the somewhat highstrung Elliot to declare to his elder brother Theodore that their house was cursed with Theodore having to run between floors to tend to his dying mother and wife -barely consoled that their daughter Alice somehow was born healthy two days before her mother's death. Neither Theodore or Elliott ever got over this double tragedy. Though Elliot seemed quite grateful when his own young wife Anna safely bore their firstborn child eight  months later and doted on her from the start. Alas, Anna seemed somewhat put out that this daughter had not inherited her beauty and early on tagged her 'Granny' because she considered the child to be 'so old-fashioned'!  Anna did care for Eleanor -urging her to become educated but even she couldn't  completely overlook her daughter's comparative plainness saying 'you certainty aren't a beauty so you'd better be smart!'. Elliott also wanted Eleanor to be well-educated but he wasn't without his own faults- including one time leaving the six-year-old girl who'd he'd taken on a walk  to wait outside a 'private club' while he was to pop in 'for a few minutes' but wound up drinking himself unconscious and only when the staff was in the process of carrying him home did they notice little Eleanor still waiting outside in the cold- six hours later  after which a doorman deposited her back home!

In 1889, Elliot severely broke a leg in an accident and would be prescribed morphine which he soon became addicted to along with the alcohol. Not surprisingly Anna became alarmed at his sudden decline and herself would develop severe migraines which Eleanor would help her mother through by messaging her temples.

After 1891, both the Roosevelt and Hall families decided that Elliott had become too unstable to be relied upon to provide for Anna and her children and fully supported Anna's decision to separate herself from him while he was exiled in the mountain resort of Abington, Virginia.

In 1892, Anna would die from complications of diphtheria at the young age of 28 leaving her children to be cared for by her mother Mary.  In the meantime, Elliott would occasionally visit Eleanor and her surviving baby brother Gracie 'Hall' Roosevelt and write letters promising a future of travel with her making a home for him (and she would consider her baby brother to be their child). While  Elliott would claim to greatly mourn Anna to Eleanor in his letters to her, he didn't mourn alone.  It turned out that he'd gotten a German-born servant  Katy Mann in the family way and she'd stay his companion the rest of his life.

Alarmingly, Elliott became so distraught  between his addictions and his painfully wonky leg that hadn't been set right that he attempted suicide at 34 by leaping out a 2nd floor window. He survived the fall but would die of a seizure the next day.

After this, his brother Theodore visited his troubled late brother's 'love nest' and,to his shock, discovered that Elliot had plastered it with photographs of his late wife- including one right over the very bed he and his mistress had slept in!

Eleanor would choose to only focus on Elliot's attentiveness to her and lessons he gave her rather than his glaring shadowside. In fact, she not only saved his letters to her but she'd take them with her on countless journeys to all corners of the world -somehow making sure they were never lost or damaged -rereading them before going to sleep almost every night for the rest of her life.

In spite of her birth parents' flaws, Eleanor WOULD have a positive maternal love from an unexpected source: from the ages of 15 to 17, Eleanor would be sent to a boarding school in England run by an aging French headmistress named Marie Souvestre (1830-1905)who not only taught her to speak fluent French but, more importantly, encouraged Eleanor to expand her intellect and gain self-confidence! Alas, against the protests of both Eleanor and Mlle. Souvestre, her maternal grandmother (and legal guardian) Mrs. Hall insisted that Eleanor return back to New York  to make her formal debut in Society (which,not surprisingly, Eleanor considered a disaster)  instead of staying the last year to complete her coursework . However, Eleanor would never forget Mlle. Souvestre's kindness and encouragement and would keep a portrait of her on her desk in her homes the rest of her own life.

 

[Blergh]

OK, here's a little translation trivia.

 

While it's well known that Coca-Cola got marketed to the People's Republic of China just two days after the United States diplomatically recognized that government in 1976, it had to overcome a language barrier.

Namely back in the 1920's through the  1940's, they'd made the mistake of phonetically translating the name to Chinese characters which, among other interpretations wound up being 'Bite the Wax Tadpole' (which somewhat guaranteed that few besides teen boys on  dares would want to attempt to consume it).

Anyway, by 1976, the company rectified their earlier mistake by simply calling it 'Drink that Makes Your Mouth Happy'! And, needless to say, it's been a big seller in that land of over 1.5 billion potential customers ever since!

[Anduin]

13 minutes ago, Blergh said:

Namely back in the 1920's through the  1940's, they'd made the mistake of phonetically translating the name to Chinese characters which, among other interpretations wound up being 'Bite the Wax Tadpole' (which somewhat guaranteed that few besides teen boys on  dares would want to attempt to consume it).

I'd heard 'Bite the Wax Tadpole', but never looked up where it came from. That is interesting.

[tearknee]

During his "Vegas years", Howard Hughes saw a commercial for Baskin-Robbins and decided to try some ice cream. An employee was dispatched to the local 31 Flavors to bring back 31 scoops — one of each current variety. Hughes sampled them all and chose Banana Nut as his favorite. Thereafter, no matter what he had as a meal, he'd be served a scoop of Banana Nut for dessert.

This went on until one day when a staffer noticed their supply was running low. A runner was sent to buy more but he reported back that Baskin-Robbins had rotated the flavor off its current list. Someone called the ice cream manufacturer and asked when it would be back. The answer was, "Sometime next year." None of Hughes' employees wanted to go in and tell the old man that they couldn't bring him the Banana Nut ice cream he loved…so they asked the company if they could make up a special batch for Mr. Hughes. The Baskin-Robbins people said they'd be glad to, but the minimum order was a thousand gallons.

Again, no one wanted to bring bad news to the billionaire…so they ordered the thousand gallons. They also rented refrigerated trucks to transport the order from the Baskin-Robbins plant in Southern California to Vegas and ordered the kitchen manager at the Desert Inn to find space in their refrigerators for a thousand gallons of ice cream. This required several days of work and the purchase and installation of several new freezers.

The caravan of trucks arrived just in time. The day it all got there was the day they served Mr. Hughes the last remaining scoop of Banana Nut ice cream from the old supply. He finished it off and announced, "That was great but it's time for a change. From now on, I want French Vanilla."

[Blergh]

Having some delicious grilled salmon as part of my T-Day largesse, it got me to thinking of what remarkable creatures they are who not only make great efforts to swim from the open ocean upstream to the very same stream or creek from which they were spawned - then use that to spawn their own eggs but also  via their postmortem contributions.

It turns out that soil in the Pacific Northwest of the US and Canada would be very poor and unable to support much plant life under normal conditions. However,  in addition to being great treats for bears and humans,etc., enough of their remains become part of the soil to enrich it so that it has the capacity to support a very diverse temperate rain forest! It seems having spent almost their entire adult lives in the oceans, those salmon are able to eat enough nutrients to eventually use to enrich the forests' soil!

[Blergh]

In the Grand Tetons of Wyoming, there's a unique waterway called North Two Ocean Creek that flows somewhat south at the Continental Divide but that's not what makes it unique.

In a somewhat swampy area, it abruptly divides into two channels in a spot called Parting of the Waters with one channel being called Pacific Creek and the other being called Atlantic Creek. Oh and yes, each creek's waters DO eventually flow into the namesake oceans on the opposite coasts of the US! What's also interesting is that due the Parting of the Waters being in such a swampy area at least one species of fish (the Yellowstone cutthroat trout) is believed to have actually crossed there   from the Pacific to Atlantic watersheds.

Edited December 1, 2024 by Blergh

[tearknee]

The movie that Howard Hughes famously liked to watch over and over was "Ice Station Zebra", the 1968 movie that starred Rock Hudson, Ernest Borgnine and Patrick McGoohan. According to one report, Hughes would run it at least three times a week and would occasionally get on a kick of watching his 16mm print over and over, back-to-back, several times a day. He had a "Graflex" brand film projector with an add-on sound system that allowed him to crank the volume up to almost deafening levels because of his poor hearing. He had a whole library of films that he ran over and over including "The Sting" and the "James Bond" films that starred Sean Connery. It is not known if he had any particular reaction to "Diamonds Are Forever", which was set in Vegas and featured the actor Jimmy Dean in the role of a Hughes-like billionaire.

The story I love about Hughes' movie watching is that he got hooked on the late-night movies being run on KLAS, which was the local CBS affiliate. Just as he'd ordered his staff to have Swanson change the contents of their TV dinners, he sometimes told them to call the station and have them run a particular movie he wanted to see. To make it easier for this to happen, he soon bought the station…and thereafter, he didn't need the 16mm projector much. He'd have his crew phone the station and tell them what movie Mr. Hughes wanted to see next…and that's what would be broadcast to all of Vegas without advance announcement or commercial interruption. Once in a while, he got bored with a movie and he'd have them stop a film in the middle and start a different one. This is very similar to what NBC did with "Celebrity Cooking Showdown".

One of the technicians who worked at the station later told the story of getting a call late one night informing him that Mr. Hughes wanted to see an episode of "Sugarfoot", the old western series starring the actor, Will Hutchins. The technician replied that he'd be glad to thread one up, but that the station didn't have any reels of "Sugarfoot" in its library. The voice on the other end of the line said, "We'll get you one." A few hours later, a film print of a episode of "Sugarfoot" arrived. It had been flown in from Los Angeles by one of the airlines that Hughes owned, probably on an otherwise-empty plane since there were then no scheduled LAX-LAS flights after midnight. Back before the domestic VCR was popular, home video could be kind of expensive :)

[Blergh]

On 12/10/2024 at 9:02 AM, tearknee said:

The movie that Howard Hughes famously liked to watch over and over was "Ice Station Zebra", the 1968 movie that starred Rock Hudson, Ernest Borgnine and Patrick McGoohan. According to one report, Hughes would run it at least three times a week and would occasionally get on a kick of watching his 16mm print over and over, back-to-back, several times a day. He had a "Graflex" brand film projector with an add-on sound system that allowed him to crank the volume up to almost deafening levels because of his poor hearing. He had a whole library of films that he ran over and over including "The Sting" and the "James Bond" films that starred Sean Connery. It is not known if he had any particular reaction to "Diamonds Are Forever", which was set in Vegas and featured the actor Jimmy Dean in the role of a Hughes-like billionaire.

The story I love about Hughes' movie watching is that he got hooked on the late-night movies being run on KLAS, which was the local CBS affiliate. Just as he'd ordered his staff to have Swanson change the contents of their TV dinners, he sometimes told them to call the station and have them run a particular movie he wanted to see. To make it easier for this to happen, he soon bought the station…and thereafter, he didn't need the 16mm projector much. He'd have his crew phone the station and tell them what movie Mr. Hughes wanted to see next…and that's what would be broadcast to all of Vegas without advance announcement or commercial interruption. Once in a while, he got bored with a movie and he'd have them stop a film in the middle and start a different one. This is very similar to what NBC did with "Celebrity Cooking Showdown".

One of the technicians who worked at the station later told the story of getting a call late one night informing him that Mr. Hughes wanted to see an episode of "Sugarfoot", the old western series starring the actor, Will Hutchins. The technician replied that he'd be glad to thread one up, but that the station didn't have any reels of "Sugarfoot" in its library. The voice on the other end of the line said, "We'll get you one." A few hours later, a film print of a episode of "Sugarfoot" arrived. It had been flown in from Los Angeles by one of the airlines that Hughes owned, probably on an otherwise-empty plane since there were then no scheduled LAX-LAS flights after midnight. Back before the domestic VCR was popular, home video could be kind of expensive :)

While Mr. Hughes had a horrible self-wrought end winding up having nothing despite his billions, sometimes in his earlier life he'd actually do unexpected good.

Long short is that years after his romance with Lana Turner was over. Miss Turner had remarried and had suffered a life-threatening miscarriage which prompted her mother Mildred to fly cross country to be with her. Mrs. Turner was surprised that at the flight's speed which, it turned out broke a commercial airline speed record but as she was deplaning, she saw that none other than Mr. Hughes himself had piloted that TWA flight JUST so she could be with her daughter- and never said a word to her before they parted ways!

[Blergh]

Both Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) and his wife Mary Todd Lincoln (1818-1882) had rather . ..complicated bonds with their respective original families. President Lincoln had grown up destitute and had been somewhat neglected after his mother Nancy Hanks Lincoln's death when he was about nine and  felt his father Thomas (1778-1851) had considered him little more than a workhorse. However, he supposedly was instantly charmed by his stepmother Sarah Bush Johnston Lincoln (1788-1669). Whatever the future President's feelings were, he did not heed the summons to his father's deathbed in 1851 and, for whatever reasons, never introduced his own sons to their paternal grandfather or stepgrandmother even when they lived in Springfield, Illinois about 90 miles away from the elder Lincolns' home in Coles County.

As for Mary Todd Lincoln? She had been born into a very wealthy Lexington, Kentucky family  and one of fourteen children sired by Robert Smith Todd (1791-1849)but also had lost her own mother Elizabeth Parker Todd (1794-1825) when she was only six. Alas, she did not get along with her stepmother Elizabeth Humphries Todd  (1800-1874) who Robert married the next year and didn't always have the smoothest dealings with her many half-sibs by the 2nd Mrs. Todd. Three of Mrs. Todd's sons would join the Confederate Army and two of her daughters would marry Confederate generals while Mary was the First Lady of the United States which was at war with the Confederate States! Kentucky itself had become a Border State which meant that they technically stayed part of the Union but allowed slaveholders to legally keep their slaves- as long as they went to the nearest county courthouse and swore an Allegiance oath to the United States! Well, few of the Todd half-siblings bothered  with that.Amazingly enough President Lincoln tried to keep peace with his in-laws -including his Confederate supporting stepmother- and sibs-in-law- to the degree of even inviting Mary's half-sister Emilie Todd Hardin (1836-1930) to the White House shortly after losing her husband who'd been a Confederate general.

Of course, after President Lincoln was assassinated, Mary not only flatly refused to venture back to her home state of Kentucky but she refused to have anything more with her stepmother or those  half-sibs who'd been Confederates- believing them to have contributed to the President's death via having supported the opposing  government!

There was a popular saying about the egos of the  Kentucky Todds in the 19th century. 'God spelled His Name with one 'd' so that's why the Todds spelt their name with two d's!'

[tearknee]

Jerry Jacobson was the head of security at Simon Marketing, the company who oversaw the printing of the McDonalds Monopoly cards in America.  However, despite being under constant surveillance by McDonalds, his own firm, and an independent third party, between 1987 and 2001 he managed to steal pretty much all of the winning tickets and sell them off.

Overall, he stole over 24 million dollars' worth and netted himself a 3 million dollar cut.

The scam eventually became unstuck, and Jacobson was arrested in late August 2001.  It became worldwide news, and the McDonalds corporation was facing one of the biggest PR disasters in history.

Luckily for McDonalds something happened a few days after the news broke that wiped any mention of it off every single news outlet in the world.

[Anduin]

7 minutes ago, tearknee said:

The scam eventually became unstuck, and Jacobson was arrested in late August 2001.  It became worldwide news, and the McDonalds corporation was facing one of the biggest PR disasters in history.

Luckily for McDonalds something happened a few days after the news broke that wiped any mention of it off every single news outlet in the world.

And did the case go to trial? You can't hold back the end of the story!

[tearknee]

Frederick Barrett was a leading fireman aboard RMS Titanic. After discovering his wife's infidelity, he felt called to the sea. He joined Cunard as a stoker and served on several ships. In 1912, he signed on as leading stoker aboard the White Star Line ship Titanic, where he oversaw Boiler Room 6. Conditions in the boiler rooms were appalling, but not unique. Temperatures reached about 49°C. Each of the 163 stokers worked in shifts of four hours on and eight hours off. They were paid £6 a month for their work, which is about £850 today.

At 11:40 on April 14, 1912, Barrett was in Boiler Room 6 and talking to Second Engineer John Henry Hesketh, as they were due to increase speed the following day. At that moment, a red light came on and the engine telegraph ordered full stop. He shouted for his crew to close the dampers on the boilers. That's when a jet of ice-cold water burst through the hull as Titanic collided with an iceberg. The stokers continued to work to ensure the boilers were vented. Otherwise, they might have exploded in contact with the ocean water.

Barrett moved to Boiler Room 5 to help with the ultimately futile effort to pump out the water which was coming in at 7 tons a second. Around 1am, the bulkhead collapsed, accelerating the sinking. One of the engineers fell into a manhole but ordered Barrett to leave him and save himself. By the time he arrived on the boat deck, only two lifeboats were left on the rear starboard quarter. Thanks to his fortunate timing, First Officer Murdoch called for more oarsmen for Lifeboat 13 and Barrett volunteered.

As the boat hit the water, a condenser pump, which was still trying to pump out water from within the ship, discharged and forced 13 back. At that moment, Lifeboat 15 began to be lowered. 13 drifted underneath 15 and was in danger of being crushed. Shouts to stop lowering from both lifeboats weren't heard from the deck. Barrett took out a knife and feverishly cut the falls, getting the boat away with just inches to spare.

Barrett later testified at both the US Senate and British Board of Trade inquiries. As one of the few crewmembers who survived from within the bowels of the ship, his testimony proved crucial at reconstructing events following the collision. He died in 1931. 

[Blergh]

Hearkening back to President Lincoln. ..

It's well known that he was born in a tiny log cabin in Kentucky in 1809 but by the time anyone actually tried to seek it out (after his assassination), they found a ramshackle ruined cabin in a spot in the vicinity where it was believed to have stood. .so an exhibitor wasted no time dismantling that particular cabin to exhibit in the latter part of the 19th century.

Guess who else had been born in a log cabin in Kentucky? The Confederate President Jefferson Davis in 1808 in a spot about 100 miles from the US President's possible birthplace.

Anyway, it soon came to pass that someone got the idea of displaying these two cabins side by side. Since these two cabins were on tour, they had to be taken apart then put back together quite a few times but, as anyone who has ever played with Lincoln logs knows, it's not so easy to keep track of WHICH logs go into which parts of a cabin,etc.- and no one had thought to actually MARK the individual logs before taking them apart the first time.

Anyway from 1906 onward, the cabin that has been claimed as the purported birthplace of Abraham Lincoln has had a permanent home sheltered beneath a much larger  building in the style of Greek temple. The irony is that it's a virtual certainty that at least SOME of its logs came from Jefferson Davis's birthplace log cabin!

[fastiller]

Recent Lincoln-related posts by @Blergh has me thinking of Robert Todd Lincoln and his association/connection to not just the assassination of his father, but also those of Garfield and McKinley.

The younger Lincoln was at the Sixth Street Train Station when Garfield was shot (he was Garfield's Secretary of War).  He was also at the Pan-Am Expo (not in the immediate vicinity, but within the Expo's footprint) when McKinley was shot.

[Blergh]

Names can have some unexpected origins.

Take for example of the time when the Phoenicians decided to explore and set up trading ports on the Mediterranean's western most extreme landmass now known as the Iberian peninsula.

Anyway, at that time (c. 800 BC) the place was covered by a very thick and dense forest which was teeming with rabbits. So many rabbits that they termed the area 'land of rabbits'. ..which,as per most scholars would become the root for the name of the eventual nation of Spain!

[Blergh]

Deep in a remote part of the steep Peruvian jungle, there's an extraordinary body of water called Shanay-timpishka ['boiled by the heat of the sun' in the local indigenous language]which eventually flows into the main headwater stream of the Amazon River.

Anyway, it's better known by its nickname of 'The Boiling River' since the last four miles of its nine mile course, the water has temperatures up to 203 Fahrenheit or 95 Celcius which means that no fish can live there and it's deadly for anyone to fall in it!  It's also hundreds of miles from the nearest magma deposit so scientists still aren't sure WHY this section of river is so scalding hot.

Lastly, it was in such a remote spot that it was unknown to anyone besides the indigenous communities until as recently as the 2010's- yes even with all those visual and heat detecting space satellites orbiting the Earth!

Alas, the surrounded forest is in danger of being clearcut for lumber so that can't be helpful to  the riverbed's stability.

Edited December 26, 2024 by Blergh

[PRgal]

I was TODAY years old to learn that Ontario schools are funded by grants from taxes and not directly from property taxes like American schools.  This doesn't mean that all schools do just as well, however.  There are other factors that determine this such as whether kids speak English at home, whether they live in two parent households, education level of parents, etc...

More info here: https://peopleforeducation.ca/public-education-in-ontario/how-education-is-funded/

[Is Everyone Gone]

Here's something I did not know:

In the old days, newspapers used to have these coded euphemisms for things.

"He never married" or "confirmed bachelor" = gay

"Accidentally died while cleaning his gun" = suicide

"Tired and emotional" = extremely drunk and disruptive

"Hospitalized for exhaustion" = rehab or nervous breakdown

"The death is not treated as suspicous" = suicide or overdose

[PRgal]

6 minutes ago, Is Everyone Gone said:

Here's something I did not know:

In the old days, newspapers used to have these coded euphemisms for things.

"He never married" or "confirmed bachelor" = gay

"Accidentally died while cleaning his gun" = suicide

"Tired and emotional" = extremely drunk and disruptive

"Hospitalized for exhaustion" = rehab or nervous breakdown

"The death is not treated as suspicous" = suicide or overdose

Henry Higgins in Pygmalion/My Fair Lady is a "confirmed bachelor."  :D 

[Absolom]

They used to use those in police reports also just in case they fell into the "wrong hands" - according to my father.  He gave me the translations when I was around 14.  

[Is Everyone Gone]

24 minutes ago, PRgal said:

Henry Higgins in Pygmalion/My Fair Lady is a "confirmed bachelor."  :D 

Henry Higgins seems to have been a stand-in for GB Shaw, who most people think was gay.

Higgins and Pickering are pretty gay-coded.

ETA: even in Walter Isaacson's bio of Steve Jobs, Tim Cook was described as a "confirmed bachelor." That was like 13 years ago. And "tired and emotional" was used by Buckingham Palace for something with Prince Harry way back when.

Edited January 14 by Is Everyone Gone

[PRgal]

10 minutes ago, Is Everyone Gone said:

Henry Higgins seems to have been a stand-in for GB Shaw, who most people think was gay.

Higgins and Pickering are pretty gay-coded.

ETA: even in Walter Isaacson's bio of Steve Jobs, Tim Cook was described as a "confirmed bachelor." That was like 13 years ago.

Wasn’t Tim out by then anyway?  I thought everyone knew.  

[Is Everyone Gone]

Just now, PRgal said:

Wasn’t Tim out by then anyway?  I thought everyone knew.  

He wasn't officially out then. Everyone knew. Now he's out.

[PRgal]

2 minutes ago, Is Everyone Gone said:

He wasn't officially out then. Everyone knew. Now he's out.

Same with Anderson Cooper.  Everyone knew but he didn’t officially come out until what, 2017?  2018?  

[Is Everyone Gone]

3 minutes ago, PRgal said:

Same with Anderson Cooper.  Everyone knew but he didn’t officially come out until what, 2017?  2018?  

And Brian Boitano didn't come out till 2013! 

I wonder if back in the day people called J Edgar Hoover a "confirmed bachelor."

[Is Everyone Gone]

The "died accidentally while cleaning a gun" is STILL being used.

I just found this article from 2023.

I have read that when families have a life insurance policy and want to cash it they ask police to write that.

[Blergh]

2 hours ago, Absolom said:

They used to use those in police reports also just in case they fell into the "wrong hands" - according to my father.  He gave me the translations when I was around 14.  

Well, it makes sense that, if there wasn't firsthand confirmation, that these euphemisms were used so that the papers couldn't be sued for slander on the off chance that the claims they made were NOT true!  One example would be that Warren Beatty didn't marry Annette Benning until he was 55 in 1992 yet was known to be quite the  hetero . ..rogue before then. Hence  one could have noted  he was ' a confirmed bachelor' before that marriage and be factually correct even though, to the best of public record, he was NOT gay. Imagine if a publication had leaped to the conclusion that Mr. Beatty was gay via the mere fact that he had never married up that point while ignoring his dating history!

Speaking of euphemisms though, one of my faves has to be the British way of describing someone who has been arrested as 'detained at His/Her Majesty's pleasure'- as though the individual in question had been such a charmer to the monarch that the ruler insisted he/she had to stick around the palace after the wing ding was over!
😄

[ebk57]

1 hour ago, Is Everyone Gone said:

I wonder if back in the day people called J Edgar Hoover a "confirmed bachelor."

That would have been the nicest thing he was called.

[DrSpaceman73]

I watched a history of all the us presidents like 15 years ago or so. Several of them from the 19th century were described as being 'something of a dandy', which i took to mean they were probably gay

 

Cheater Arthur was described that way in particular,  though he was married and not a lifelong bachelor. 

Buchanan was a 'confirmed bachelor'  and something of a dandy too.  Also he was by far the worst president did nothing to stop the civil war, not that they're related. 

[Is Everyone Gone]

2 hours ago, DrSpaceman73 said:

Buchanan was a 'confirmed bachelor'  and something of a dandy too.  Also he was by far the worst president did nothing to stop the civil war, not that they're related. 

Buchanan also had a "companion," another old euphemism for "gay lover."

[EtheltoTillie]

15 hours ago, Blergh said:

Well, it makes sense that, if there wasn't firsthand confirmation, that these euphemisms were used so that the papers couldn't be sued for slander on the off chance that the claims they made were NOT true!  One example would be that Warren Beatty didn't marry Annette Benning until he was 55 in 1992 yet was known to be quite the  hetero . ..rogue before then. Hence  one could have noted  he was ' a confirmed bachelor' before that marriage and be factually correct even though, to the best of public record, he was NOT gay. Imagine if a publication had leaped to the conclusion that Mr. Beatty was gay via the mere fact that he had never married up that point while ignoring his dating history!

Speaking of euphemisms though, one of my faves has to be the British way of describing someone who has been arrested as 'detained at His/Her Majesty's pleasure'- as though the individual in question had been such a charmer to the monarch that the ruler insisted he/she had to stick around the palace after the wing ding was over!
😄

We lawyers in NYC call them "guests of the state." 

[PRgal]

Just now, EtheltoTillie said:

We lawyers in NYC call them "guests of the state." 

My son recently asked what people ate in jail because we saw a guy get into a fight with security outside of a mall.  I didn't know, but my husband looked it up and it sounds like prison food is similar to hospital stuff.  Apparently they don't give them citrus or grapes because you can make alcohol with it.  

[EtheltoTillie]

Speaking of codes for confirmed bachelors, when I was a kid in the sixties, we used to read Walter Scott's Personality Parade every Sunday in Parade Magazine.  People would write in questions about closeted gay celebs, and the column would say "he's very kind to his mother." 

Edited January 14 by EtheltoTillie

[Bastet]

16 hours ago, Blergh said:

so that the papers couldn't be sued for slander

Since this is the thread for learning things: If defamatory, it would be libel, not slander.  Libel is written, slander is oral.

[fastiller]

Just now, Bastet said:

Since this is the thread for learning things: If defamatory, it would be libel, not slander.  Libel is written, slander is oral.

Now I've got this song in my head!!!

Quote

🎼🎶🎵🎶
It's the same old story
Everywhere I go
I get slandered, libeled
I hear words I never heard in the Bible

 

[Quof]

3 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

We lawyers in NYC call them "guests of the state." 

As a Canadian lawyer, I like to call it "being ensconced in His Majesty's Hostelry"

[Is Everyone Gone]

8 hours ago, EtheltoTillie said:

Speaking of codes for confirmed bachelors, when I was a kid in the sixties, we used to read Walter Scott's Personality Parade every Sunday in Parade Magazine.  People would write in questions about closeted gay celebs, and the column would say "he's very kind to his mother." 

And today I read that "enjoyed a wide circle of friends" was often a euphemism for gay too.

[Blergh]

Since I mentioned it in the History Nerds SubForum (and there is a bit of legend involved in this as opposed to strictly documented historical fact), I thought I'd talk about the other independent nation that's totally surrounded by the Republic of Italy-  the Republic of San Marino a mere 24 square miles/61 square kilometers with about 33,000 citizens but far from having unimaginative origins.

To begin with its namesake capital 'city' of San Marino is located on the summit of its highest point the three-peaked Monte Titano (at 2425 feet/739 meters) which got its name due to the legend of an attempt by the gigantic rebellious Titans who decided to build a gigantic hill to climb upon to attempt to storm the sky where the King of the Greek gods Zeus reigned supreme. Well, Zeus got wind of it and threw off the Titans then crushed the hill to the present size but it's still the most prominent peak overlooking the port of Rimini on the Adriatic Sea which is just  six miles (ten kilometers) away from San Marino border.

Anway, as per its official [if not entirely documented ] history, the Republic of San Marino was traditionally founded on September 3,301 A.D. as by a stonemason later called Saint Marinus who had converted to Christianity despite the Roman Empire's edicts, then fled up to the mountaintop to escape persecution.  Among other legends that have arisen about Marinus was how either after he returned home from visiting a Christian bishop OR was fleeing bandits, he found that his trusty donkey had gotten mauled and eaten by a bear! Rather than run away from this bear, Marinus actually TALKED to the bear and told the bear about how the bear's gluttony towards the poor donkey had made life harder for Marinus. .and the bear actually got guilt-tripped and agreed to take the donkey's place to pull Marinus's plow to sew his field AND even let Marinus put a saddle on him to give him rides (and, as per the bandit variation, gave the chasing bandits a scare to convert then joint Marinus's new refuge). Regardless, by the time of Marinus's death in 366 A.D. when he was about 90, a community of Christians had been established around the peaks of the mountain and, after he was declared a saint, they'd name it for him!  It may have been that the Romans seeing their Empire starting to fall apart at the seams might have simply decided not to enforce their rule on that mountaintop so they could concentrate on trying to stabilize their main ports and roadways.

Be that as it may, by the time the Roman Empire fell, San Marino had become a completely independent domain and evidently (with only a few interruptions down the centuries) would have a republican form of government from the beginning to the present day. It often  would play its larger neighboring territories (Venice and the Papal States,etc.)  against each other to maintain this independence over the centuries. In the early 19th century, Napoleon had a rare moment of sentimentality in deciding to preserve it despite his intent on conquering the REST of the Italian peninsula- even offering to have its domain expanded which the San Marinese authorities very politely but firmly declined. Then, after giving refuge to the founder of modern Italy (Garabaldi), Garabaldi himself proved grateful enough to his onetime sanctuary that, as soon as he had any power, he mandated that San Marino would always be a completely free and independent domain even though it was entirely surrounded by Italian territory! San Marino wisely declared itself neutral in both World Wars- despite being somewhat pressured by the Italian government especially under Mussolini. However it HAS stayed independent- although it has used the Italian lira and now the euro for its currency.

 

Tourism is its main economy - and among many other souvenirs for sale, one can buy t-shirts with the sky-blue and white striped national flag with its coat of arms in the middle AND even a teddy bear (hearkening back to the Saint Marinus's own bear) wearing a t-shirt with the national flag!