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FACT-OF-THE-DAY ARCHIVE
"Our life is what our thoughts make it."
- Marcus Aurelius

NOV 2010


Previous Archives

DATEFACT OF THE DAY
11/1/10     On April 16, 1947, America's worst harbor explosion occurred in Texas City, Texas, when the French ship Grandcamp, carrying ammonium nitrate fertilizer, caught fire and blew up, devastating the town. Another ship, the Highflyer, exploded the following day. The explosions and resulting fires killed more than 500 people and left 200 others missing. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/2/10     In 2008, American plastic surgeons performed 12.1 million cosmetic procedures; 1.7 million of those procedures were surgical. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/3/10     The galaxy we live in is called the Milky Way. The sun is just one of millions of stars in this huge disk-shaped area and our galaxy is just one of the millions scattered throughout the universe. Our galaxy is about 100,000 light-years across and about 1,000 light-years deep, meaning that a beam of light would take about 100,000 years to shine from one end to the other. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/4/10     Charles Lindbergh's plane was called The Spirit of St. Louis in honor of the St. Louis Chamber of Commerce, his sponsor. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/5/10     Within one month of the January 2010 earthquake that devastated Haiti, the American Red Cross had raised $255 million for the relief and recovery effort. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/6/10     A telegram containing the 16,543-word Nevada State constitution, sent from Carson City to Washington, DC, in 1864, is thought to be the longest ever sent; sending it cost $4,303.27. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/7/10     The Spanish Flu of 1918 is the most deadly in recent history. Twenty to 40 million people worldwide died from the disease. More than 36,000 people die from influenza each year in the U.S., and 200,000 others are hospitalized because of the illness. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/8/10     Between 1939 and 2003, Volkswagen produced more than 21 million of its original 'Beetle' design, which made the car the most produced vehicle model of all-time. - Provided by The World Almanac 2011
11/9/10     Only 146 people had successfully climbed both Mount Everest and the world's second-highest mountain, K2, as of July 2009. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/10/10     The Hungarian government issued the highest denomination currency note ever in 1946, the Hungarian 100 million B-pengoe (that's 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 pengoe). The note's value was around 20 cents. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/11/10     In 2009, there were 21.9 million military veterans in the United States. - Provided by U.S. Census Bureau
11/12/10     Iceland is made up almost entirely of volcanic rocks like those found on the ocean floor. It gradually built up above sea level through intense and prolonged eruptions. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/13/10     No one in Greece can choose to not vote. Voting is required by law for every citizen who is 18 or older. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/14/10     Government corruption cost Greece about $1 billion in 2009. Currently Greece's national debt is larger than the country's economy. Its credit rating, or its perceived ability to repay debts, is the lowest in the euro zone. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/15/10     If Facebook were a country, it would be the fifth-largest country in the world, after China, India, the U.S., and Indonesia. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/16/10     One ton of grapes makes about 60 cases of wine, or 720 bottles. One bottle of wine contains about 2.8 pounds of grapes. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/17/10     Mothers who eat junk food while pregnant or breast-feeding have children who are prone to obesity throughout life. The children are also more prone to diabetes, raised cholesterol, and high blood fat. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/18/10     Only recently, and mainly in Western countries, has smoking been seen as a serious health hazard. Smoking rates in the United States have dropped by half since 1965, from 42% to 26% of adults. Smoking in developing countries, however, is rising. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/19/10     Basketball, racquetball, and volleyball were all invented at YMCA facilities. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/20/10     The U.S. Dept. of Agriculture finds that a middle-income family with a child born in 2009 can expect to spend about $222,360 ($286,050 if inflation is factored in) for food, shelter, and other necessities to raise that child over the next 17 years. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/21/10     More than 45.2 million Americans were enrolled in Medicare in 2008. - Provided by The World Almanac 2010
11/22/10     The most popular cookie in America is the chocolate chip cookie, which is attributed to Ruth Wakefield circa 1933. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/23/10     At its core, the sun's temperature is about 15 million degrees Celsius (about 27 million degrees Fahrenheit). - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/24/10     Aztecs and Zunis domesticated the turkey for food, sacrifice, and feathers; not raised for meat on a wide scale until after World War II. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/25/10     The number of turkeys expected to be raised in the United States in 2010 is 242 million. That's down 2 percent from the number raised during 2009. The turkeys produced in 2009 together weighed 7.1 billion pounds and were valued at $3.6 billion. Source: USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service
11/26/10     The National University of Mexico was founded in 1551 by Charles V of Spain and is the oldest university in North America. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/27/10     There are more than 600 individual skeletal muscles in the human body. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/28/10     Humans produce about 10,000 gallons of saliva in a lifetime. Saliva is required for taste - until food is dissolved by saliva, we cannot taste it. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/29/10     By the end of the twentieth century, over 300 motion pictures were made about vampires, and over 100 of them featured Dracula. Over 1,000 vampire novels were published, most within the past 25 years. - Provided by RandomHistory.com
11/30/10     The largest baby ever born weighed in at over 23 pounds but died just 11 hours after his birth in 1879. The largest surviving baby was born in October 2009 in Sumatra, Indonesia and weighed an astounding 19.2 pounds at birth. - Provided by RandomHistory.com


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