Americans are largely ambivalent about Columbus Day. In my childhood, American history always started with "Columbus discovered America." But of course, there were plenty of people already here, and he was far from the first European to visit the New World. Some communities instead celebrate Indigenous People's Day as an alternative holiday. Others mark October 9th as Leif Erikson Day. Most are just low-key about the holiday, but hardly anyone rejects having a day off work on the Monday nearest October 12th. If you have a long weekend, you'll want to spend some time catching up on what you may have missed this week at Neatorama.
Update: Muzition points out that Monday is Thanksgiving in Canada. Happy Thanksgiving!
Elvis Meets the Beatles. It only happened once, and Eddie Deezen gave us a vivid description of that day in 1965.
Friday, we brought you a roundup of the ways people use Van Gogh's masterpiece in Starry Night is Everywhere!
Mysterious Rappings was the story of the hoax that started the spiritualist movement. It started off a month of special Halloween-themed articles from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.
The Annals of Improbable Research asked the question Which Came First — The Chicken Or the Egg? And then answered it by experiment!
We had another gallery of awesome images on the Neatorama Spotlight Blog from the Nikon Small World microphotography competition. The latest collection is called Making the Ordinary, Extraordinary.
Mental_floss magazine gave us The World’s 10 Messiest Food Festivals.
In the What Is It? game this week, the pictured object is an early TV remote control. This one is really neat in that it doesn’t need batteries! Read more about it and see a video at the What It It? Blog. Yes, it was an easy one this week, and our first commenter, Benjamin Abbitt, had the right answer (but did not select a t-shirt). Most people guessed TV remote, but a few went for the funny answer. A t-shirt goes to Ceri for this one: “It’s Captain Kirk’s first phaser, an early version, before the design was more refined. The buttons are for tickle, shake, stun and kill” She was one of many to make jokes about Star Trek's phasers -you should go read them all!
Then there was a Tokyo Flash Treasure Hunt, which pops up when you least expect it. Congratulations to the winners, listed in this post.
If that's not enough, check out the Best of Neatorama. Use the slider at the top to access articles from the past six years. And with Halloween coming up sooner than you think, you'll want to get your orders in for costumes, accessories, party supplies, and more from the Halloween Store at the NeatoShop!
Update: Muzition points out that Monday is Thanksgiving in Canada. Happy Thanksgiving!
Elvis Meets the Beatles. It only happened once, and Eddie Deezen gave us a vivid description of that day in 1965.
Friday, we brought you a roundup of the ways people use Van Gogh's masterpiece in Starry Night is Everywhere!
Mysterious Rappings was the story of the hoax that started the spiritualist movement. It started off a month of special Halloween-themed articles from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.
The Annals of Improbable Research asked the question Which Came First — The Chicken Or the Egg? And then answered it by experiment!
We had another gallery of awesome images on the Neatorama Spotlight Blog from the Nikon Small World microphotography competition. The latest collection is called Making the Ordinary, Extraordinary.
Mental_floss magazine gave us The World’s 10 Messiest Food Festivals.
In the What Is It? game this week, the pictured object is an early TV remote control. This one is really neat in that it doesn’t need batteries! Read more about it and see a video at the What It It? Blog. Yes, it was an easy one this week, and our first commenter, Benjamin Abbitt, had the right answer (but did not select a t-shirt). Most people guessed TV remote, but a few went for the funny answer. A t-shirt goes to Ceri for this one: “It’s Captain Kirk’s first phaser, an early version, before the design was more refined. The buttons are for tickle, shake, stun and kill” She was one of many to make jokes about Star Trek's phasers -you should go read them all!
Then there was a Tokyo Flash Treasure Hunt, which pops up when you least expect it. Congratulations to the winners, listed in this post.
If that's not enough, check out the Best of Neatorama. Use the slider at the top to access articles from the past six years. And with Halloween coming up sooner than you think, you'll want to get your orders in for costumes, accessories, party supplies, and more from the Halloween Store at the NeatoShop!
Also, there is a community (the entire country where I come from) who celebrates their Thanksgiving on October 9. :)