Fifteen years ago, Paul Lukas came into possession of school records for 395 students who attended the Manhattan Trade School for Girls in the 1920s. The records are more than just grades; they are snapshot of what like was like for young women in New York at the time, mostly daughters of poor immigrants.

Students did not receive their diplomas until they demonstrated a proficiency in their trade. The school helped them achieve this by establishing a job placement office that arranged employment for the girls after they finished their training. The girls were instructed to report back to the schoolabout their work experiences, and the employers were encouraged to report back on performance of the girls, and all of this information was recorded in the card packets. So these aren't just scholastic records—they're also employment records. Much like the teachers' assessments, comments from the students' employers run the gamut from encouraging ("Thank you for sending me such a smart little girl—she is all I would desire and does your school credit in every way") to heartbreaking ("Terrific odor of perspiration, have to lay off").

Lukas is in the process of finding the families of the women to share the information. In the first article of a series at Slate, he gives an overview of the records and the story of how he got them. Future installments will tell the stories of twelve of the women in the records. Link

United Nuclear is always a fun place to shop for high voltage equipment, chemicals, and radioactive supplies (you know, mad scientist stuff). Here's something to impress your guests -colored flames! The kit contains boric acid, calcium nitrate, lithium carbonate, copper chloride, and copper acetate, along with complete instructions for creating a rainbow in your fireplace or campfire. http://unitednuclear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=29_54&products_id=856 -via @LettersofNote

What do Maurice Sendak, Dr. Seuss, and Shel Silverstein have in common? Yes, they all wrote bestselling children's stories and they all have new books coming out soon, but the secret to their success is that their writing was once considered inappropriate for children!

Once upon a more staid time, the purpose of children’s books was to model good behavior. They were meant to edify and to encourage young readers to be what parents wanted them to be, and the children in their pages were well behaved, properly attired and devoid of tears. Children’s literature was not supposed to shine a light on the way children actually were, or delight in the slovenly, self-interested and disobedient side of their natures.

Seuss, Sendak and Silverstein ignored these rules. They brought a shock of subversion to the genre — defying the notion that children’s books shouldn’t be scary, silly or sophisticated. Rather than reprimand the wayward listener, their books encouraged bad (or perhaps just human) behavior. Not surprisingly, Silverstein and Sendak shared the same longtime editor, Ursula Nordstrom of Harper & Row, a woman who once declared it her mission to publish “good books for bad children.”

Read more about it at the New York Times. Link -via @Marilyn_Res

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The train station in Osaka, Japan has a computerized fountain that spells out the time, announcements, and pictures in falling water. If you spend too much time waiting for the clock to display, you'll realize what time it really is ...time to find a restroom! See more pictures and video at the uploader's site. Link -via Everlasting Blort

There is a light bulb at the fire station in Livermore, California that has been burning for 110 years. It has only been turned off for short periods, but unlike every other incandescent bulb, the filament has not burned out. The bulb burned at 60 watts when it was first used in 1901, and now is a 4-watt night light. Today, this light bulb is available to everyone on a round-the-clock webcam that updates with a new photo every 30 seconds (although it's kind of hard to tell). Link -via a comment at reddit Previously: Livermore's Centennial Light

You expect junk food to have movie tie-ins, but this one goes the extra mile for silliness. Hostess has two new color schemes in their snack cake line for Transformers 3: the pictured Snoballimus, colored like Optimus Prime, and Chocwave, which resembles Shockwave (if the character was a cupcake). http://www.tekyu.com/2011/09/15/transformers-3-this-time-theres-cupcakes-and-snowballs/ -via @johncfarrier

The following is an article from Uncle John's Supremely Satisfying Bathroom Reader.

Here at the BRI, we're huge fans of Richard Zak's books. They're great bathroom reading. He has a new book coming out: The Pirate Hunter-The True Story of Captain Kidd. Here's a teaser from his masterpiece, An Underground Education.

WORKIN' FOR THE MAN While the popular image of buccaneers is peg-legged, eye-patched rascals, the ultimate anti-authority free agents, roving the seas, plundering ships, raping women, and brawling, the reality is much worse. They did all that and worked for the government. Prior to 1856, it was standard operating procedure for western nations either to commission privateers directly or to wink at the actions of freelance pirates, so long as those thieves were preying on the commerce of other nations. Piracy was often state-supported economic terrorism. Captain Kidd, for example, was no Joan of Arc, but he was no "Captain Kidd," either.

MEET CAPTAIN KIDD William Kidd (c. 1645-1701) was a plain-speaking, high-tempered Scotsman who had made his fortune as captain and ship owner, trading goods in the colonies. In 1696, the 51-year-old Kidd was a prosperous New York businessman, comfortably settled with his wife and family. That year, Kidd and his friend Robert Livingston connived with the newly-appointed governor of New England, Richard Coote, Earl of Bellamount, the King of England's cousin, to receive an unusual privateering commission. In times of war, wealthy investors routinely funded privateering vessels to attack the enemy's merchant ships and divvy the plunder. This was an English naval tradition dating back to Sir Francis Drake. But what was extraordinary about this commission was that it also entitled Kidd to attack pirate ships of all nationalities and keep their booty -no questions asked. It was an amazing financial opportunity.

SMART INVESTMENT Kidd's royal commission -secured by Bellamount- did, in fact,

give and grant full Power and Authority to Captain William Kidd, Commander of the ship Adventure Galley ...to apprehend, seize and take into Custody the said Thomas Too, John Ireland, Tho Wake, and William Maze, and all other Pirates, Free-booters and Sea-rovers, of what Nation whatsoever, whom he should find or meet with, upon the said Coasts or Seas of America, or in any other Seas or Parts, with their Ships and Vessels, and all such Merchandise, Money, Goods, and Wares as should be found on board of them.

The mission began as an attempt by Britain to crack down on four colonial pirates, but was cunningly expanded so that Kidd would have maximum leeway to capture "prizes" -non-English ships. In addition to Livingston and Lord Richard, four of the most powerful men in England secretly invested the £6,000 it would cost to outfit the ship. The prospect of profit from this legal larceny was dizzying. If Kidd captured two large ships, the backers could easily received a hundredfold return on their investment in a year. In the official contract with Kidd, four obscure merchants were listed as the investors, but they were shills.

The real backers were John Somers, Lord Chancellor of England; Sire Robert Wadpole, Earl of Orford, First Lord of the Admiralty; and two secretaries of state, the Earl of Romney and the Duke of Shrewsbury. The king was to receive 10% of the booty as well, "chiefly to show that he was a partner in the undertaking," according to The Real Captain Kidd- A Vindication, by Sir Cornelius Dalton. Kidd and Livingston stood to receive 7.5% each, while if the haul totaled more than £100,000, Kidd was to be allowed to keep the ship.

Erik Martin, better known as Electron Boy, the super hero who saved Seattle, succumbed to liver cancer on Friday. Neatorama featured his story last year, and again just last week in a link about the Make-A-Wish Foundation. In addition to his Seattle exploits, Electron Boy will also be remembered for the boost he gave to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

The story of his big wish went viral on the Internet. The foundation was swamped by people pledging money and offering to help other children with life-threatening illnesses see their dreams come true.

"Erik's wish just cast this net and brought them into the mission" of the Make-A-Wish Foundation, said spokeswoman Jeannette Tarcha. "People just wanted to be part of it."

A group of independent comic-book creators inked and published a real comic book of his exploits. And the "Fans of Electron Boy" page, still active on Facebook, drew thousands of members — today, its fans number nearly 12,000.

Erik's superhero deeds were recognized on the floor of the U.S. House by Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Auburn. The boy, who is a foster child, became a hero to the Make-A-Wish Foundation and to cancer patients and foster families alike.

Martin was 14 years old. Link -via Fark

Arrgh, ye scurvy mates! Monday is Talk Like a Pirate Day, and ye best be preparin' to celebrate it with us here! Read up on this little holiday, learn the truth about pirates, find out where some believe Blackbeard's treasure is hidden, or get the lowdown on Disney's pirates. You can learn a lot of about pirates here at Neatorama! Then you'll be ready with your best pirate talk on Monday.

Meanwhile, for folks who worked all week and might have missed something, here's our features from the past week you can now catch up on.

Jill Harness watched a lot of videos and brought us evidence of The 6 Weirdest Kid’s Shows Ever.

Eddie Deezen returned to his favorite subject to tell us How the Beatles Officially Ended -at Disney World.

The Annals of Improbable Research dug up The 374-Word Oath. Raise your hand and repeat after me.

What's So Funny About War? The comics it inspires, according to Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

Mental_floss magazine brought us the inside scoop on Grover Cleveland's Deadly Secret.

In this week's What Is It? game, the mystery object is a Civil War spar torpedo that was designed to be rammed into the hull of an enemy ship, and then detonated by a line from the torpedo to the submarine. The What Is It? blog has more about the origin of this particular torpedo, which is a replica of that used on Confederate submarine the H. L. Hunley. Berhard knew the correct answer right off! The funniest answer came from Richard, who went out into left field and said, “ummm, not sure what all these people are talking about, its is clearly just a metal chain, obviously keeping people from getting to that weird metal thing beyond the chain.” Both win a t-shirt from the NeatoShop!

Congratulations to the winners in our PostSecret giveaway! Lea Hinchcliff, Grace McGathey, and Molly Halim each won their favorite PostSecret book from PostSecret and Neatorama. Keep your eyes on this site, because you never know when your chance to win neat stuff willpop up!

Want more? Be sure to check our Facebook page every day for extra content, contests, discussions, videos, and links you won't find here. Also, our Twitter feed will keep you updated on what's going around the web. And it's not too early to look for a special Halloween costume, t-shirt, or party items (and check out the big selection of zombie stuff) from the NeatoShop!

This week, mental_floss is running a series about Abraham Lincoln's adventures as a young man, before he got into politics. In part one, we learn about a murder in  Illinois. What does that have to do with Lincoln? We find out in part two, in a story of a wrestling match between Lincoln and another young man that linked the parties together. In part three, Lincoln the lawyer argues for the defense in an unorthodox but memorable manner. What happened then? Find out how all of this affected Lincoln's political career, in part four.

An eBay seller has this photograph up for the "buy it now" price of a million dollars. It looks suspiciously like the star of Raising Arizona and Leaving Las Vegas.

Original c.1870 carte de visite showing a man who looks exactly like
Nick Cage. Personally, I believe it's him and that he is some sort of
walking undead / vampire, et cetera, who quickens / reinvents
himself once every 75 years or so. 150 years from now, he might
be a politician, the leader of a cult, or a talk show host.

This is not a trick photo, it's an original photograph of a man who
lived in Bristol, TN sometime around the Civil War.

No word on whether the watermark comes with it. Link -via Blame It On The Voices

Ray Basile of Zombie Wagon made zombie cupcakes for the opening of his zombie art exhibit. Then he posted the step-by-step instructions so you can make your own for a birthday party, Halloween party, or just because you like zombie cupcakes! Link

We know Florence Nightingale as the founder of nursing as a profession, but she was also an accomplished statistician and graph maker. More importantly, she used statistical graphs to push for social change, particularly for the use of hygiene to improve health. After the Crimean War, she published a series of graphs in different forms to show that more soldiers died of disease than from battle, and more soldiers than civilians died of disease in peacetime. The graph forms are referred to as "bat's wing", "Lines," and "coxcomb" or "wedge."

However, it is the last graphic – the successor to the “bat’s wing” which I will call the “wedges” – that Nightingale is most famous for.  Strangely enough, the name that many people give it is wrong.  This graphic is not what Nightingale referred to as the “coxcomb”! In this diagram, Nightingale resolved the problem of the “bat’s wing” by using areas to represent the variation in the death rate, instead of the length of radial lines.  The blue wedges, representing death by sickness, are far bigger than those representing wounds.  The message of this graphic is twofold: first, most of the fatalities during the war were from sickness and second, improvements in hygiene dramatically reduced the death rate.

Link -via Metafilter See the full-size 1858 graph at Wikipedia.

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Weird Al Yankovic nails it. This is for every internet citizen who has friends and relatives who use only email and feel everything they receive should be shared with everyone in their address book. -via raincoaster

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It all depends on how you define "continent," and that's where things get sticky. -Thanks, tom tom!