Béla is a street performer in France whose cats are the real stars of the show. His grandfather tamed tigers for the circus, and Béla carries on the tradition with house cats. And he is very protective of his cats when the occasion calls for it. This documentary by Paul Trillo has English subtitles when necessary. Link

A monument featuring a relief of soldiers stands in Sofia, Bulgaria to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Soviet takeover of Bulgaria. This weekend, street artists altered the scene with paint. Now the figures resemble Superman, Ronald McDonald, Santa Claus, the Joker, and other pop culture icons! See more pictures at io9. Link

Saxophonist Clarence Clemons of Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band has died from complications of a stroke he suffered last weekend.

Clemons played on such classic hits as "Born to Run" and "Thunder Road" and is widely credited with helping to shape Springsteen's sound.

He passed away at a hospital in Palm Beach, Florida, where he had stayed ever since suffering a stroke last Sunday, said a spokesperson for Springsteen and the E Street Band. He was surrounded by members of his family, including his wife, Victoria, according to the spokesperson.

Standing at more than 6 feet tall, Clemons was affectionately known as the "Big Man" to fans. He published his autobiography "Big Man: Real Life & Tall Tales" in 2009 and suffered some health problems in recent years.

In addition to his career as a musician, Clemons also worked as an actor, appearing in the TV shows "The Wire" and "The Simpsons" as well as the films "Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure" and "New York, New York."

Clemons was 69 years old. Link to obituary. Link to a video tribute.

Make magazine asked its readers for advice and tips from their dads. The collection they published for Fathers Day is eclectic, to say the least.

Whenever I’d got overwhelmed, my dad would say: “You know how to eat an elephant, Kevin? One bite at a time.” -Kevin Devaney

“Don’t tell your mom.” -Gary Sanders

If you ever have to shoot someone, make sure you empty the gun. That makes it look like you were scared. -Sam Murphy

If it can’t be fixed with a pair of pliers and baling wire, it can’t be fixed. -Wade Erickson

Dad: “son, hand me a wrench”
Son: “what size wrench you want Dad?”
Dad: “Doesn’t matter, I’m gonna use it as a hammer!” -Jon Oxford

Read the rest at Make. Link -via Boing Boing

The following is an article from the book Uncle John's Ahh-Inspiring Bathroom Reader. For the beginning of the history of professional wrestling, see the previous post, The Man in the Mask.

If you like professional wrestling you've probably heard of The Rock, The Iron Sheik, and Hulk Hogan. But have you heard of Gorgeous George? He was TV's first big wrestling villain. TV made him a star, and in many ways, he made television. Here's his story.

IN THIS RING, I THEE WED

In 1939, a 24-year-old professional wrestler named George Wagner fell in love with a movie theater cashier named Betty Hanson and married her in a wrestling ring in Eugene, Oregon. The wedding was so popular with wrestling fans that George and Betty reenacted it in similar venues all over the country.

With the sole exception of the wedding stunt, Wagner's wrestling career didn't seen to be going anywhere. After ten years in the ring, he was still an unknown, and that was a big problem: Nobodies had a hard time getting booked for fights.

THE ROBE OF A LIFETIME

Wagner might well have had to find something else to do for a living had his wife not happened to make him a robe to wear from the locker room to the ring before a fight, just like a prizefighter. Wagner was proud of the robe, and that night when he took it off at the start of his fight, he took such care to fold it properly that the audience booed him for taking so long. That made Betty mad, so she jumped into the crowd and slapped one of the hecklers in the face. That made George mad, so he jumped out of the ring and hit the guy himself. Then the whole place went nuts.

"The booing was tremendous," wrestling promoter Don Owen remembered.

And the next week there was a real big crowd and everyone booed George. So he just took more time to fold his robe. He did everything to antagonize the fans. And from that point he became the best drawing card we ever had. In wrestling they either come to like you or hate you. And they hated George.

Neatorama presents a guest post from actor, comedian, and voiceover artist Eddie Deezen. Visit Eddie at his website.

On February 9, 1964, The Beatles made their American television debut on The Ed Sullivan Show. (For those of you unfamiliar, The Ed Sullivan Show was a hugely popular, legendary variety show which ran in America from 1948 to 1973. If you can imagine American Idol or Dancing with the Stars, and multiply it times 20, that was how popular The Ed Sullivan Show was in the 1960s. Pretty much everyone watched the show.

The Beatles had been seen in clips and recorded interviews before this, but this was their actual performance debut on U.S. television. The show was watched by an all-time record (at the time) of 73,000,000 people. The show remains a landmark in television history and is an indelible memory to any of us who watched the historic performance.

The show is, quite possibly, the single most important moment in the history of rock and roll. Like September 11, 2001 or the day President Kennedy was assassinated, no one who witnessed this show will ever forget where he or she was at the time.

(YouTube link)

A Series of Three

Although this appearance is thought of by almost everyone as "The Beatles' appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show," the truth is, The Beatles appeared on the show nine times. On February 9, 1964, on the afternoon of the historic appearance, the boys actually taped an appearance as well, to be broadcast two Sundays later. They sang three songs before a frenzied studio audience, and this taped set was broadcast on February 23rd, making it their third Ed Sullivan Show appearance, even though it was taped first. (For these three-Sundays-in-a-row appearances, the Feb Four was paid the not-quite-munificent salary of $10,000, plus expenses.)

The Beatles' manager, Brian Epstein, had made sure in his negotiations that The Beatles would "get top billing" on the show. One can only imagine the bizarre irony of The Beatles being billed below the immortal comedy team of "Brill and McCall" (read on).

by Martin Melchior
Stream Ecologist
Lake Mills, Wisconsin, USA

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Many have treated this as a philosophical question, with little to show for their efforts. I, on the other hand, see it as a practical question that can be answered by careful observation and measurement. With the help of an assistant and several sub-assistants, I have answered the question.

The research was conducted in the Chequamegon and Nicolet National Forests, in the state of Wisconsin.

My results show two things. First, that if a tree does fall in the forest, and no one hears it, it does indeed make a sound. Second, that while out-of-state recreationalists mispronounce the name “Chequamegon” in 75% of cases, Wisconsin residents mispronounce the word in only 62% of cases. I also learned the scores of some hockey games. Here are the details.

Large Woody Debris
Large woody debris (LWD) plays an important role in stream habitat, for fish, macroinvertebrates and other forest dwellers. A fairly thorough search of the scientific literature turned up no existing data concerning the sound of falling LWD in forests.

Gathering the Sounds
I used directional microphones, professional electronic audio recording equipment, personal observation, and some very inexpensive young assistants, to monitor the accumulation of large woody debris in old-growth forests of northern Wisconsin from June 1999 through July 2001.

I hired an impoverished undergraduate student to collect nearly 20,000 hours of audio/video tape in scenic areas in the Chequamegon and Nicolet National Forests. Video footage was collected with a Hitachi Z900 video camera and audio data was collected using a Shure SM58 microphone and three Shure DM 25 directional microphones with parabolic collector dishes. Recordings were made on a Tascam 850 8-track digital recorder and Yamaha 16-channel mixing board.

I made this impoverished undergraduate watch all of the tapes and make a record of every instance in which large woody debris fell to the forest floor.

(Image credit: Flickr member Gavin Golden)

The following is an article from the book Uncle John's Ahh-Inspiring Bathroom Reader. Classical "Greco-Roman" wrestling can trace its roots all the way back to the ancient Greeks and romans. But what about "professional" wrestling -the kind where costumed buffoons hit each other with folding chairs? How old is that? Older than you might think.

WORLD-CLASS WRESTLING

In 1915 some fight promoters organized an international wrestling tournament at the Opera House in New York. A rising star named Ed "Strangler" Lewis headlined a roster of other top grapplers from Russia, Germany, Italy, Greece, and other countries. These were some of the biggest matches to be fought in New York City that year. There was just one problem: almost nobody went to see them.

HO-HUM

Wrestling, at least as it was fought back then, could be pretty boring for the average person to watch. As soon as the bell rang or the whistle was blown, the two wrestlers grabbed onto each other and then might circle round ...and round ...and round for hours on end, until one wrestler finally gained an advantage and defeated his opponent. Some bouts dragged on for nine hours or more. Wrestling could also be hard to understand, which made it even more boring. In baseball, an outfielder either caught a fly ball or he didn't. In football, the person with the ball either got tackled or they didn't. Wrestling was different -when two grapplers circled for hours, who could tell at any point in the match who was winning? Did anyone even care?

Ed "Strangler" Lewis Even by wrestling standards, 1915 was a particularly boring year because the world's youngest and best wrestlers were all off fighting in World War I. Those that were left were often past their prime and not very entertaining. Not surprisingly, the organizers of the tournament at the Opera House were having trouble filling seats. For the firs day or two it looked like they were going to lose a lot of money. For the first day or two.

MYSTERY MAN

Things were about to change, thanks to one spectator. He was huge, but he didn't stand out just because of his size -he stood out because he was wearing a black mask that covered his entire head. There was no explanation for what the man was doing there or why he was wearing the mask. He just sat there watching the matches each day, and when they ended he left as silently as he came. Then, a few days into the tournament, the masked man and a companion suddenly stood up and loudly accused the promoters of banning the masked man from the tournament. He was the best wrestler of all and the promoters knew it, they claimed. That was why he was being kept out of the tournament, and they demanded that he be let back in. Security guards quickly hustled the pair out of the building, but they came back each day and repeated their demands, generating newspaper headlines in the process. By the end of the week, much of New York City was demanding that the masked man be allowed into the tournament.

I know you are familiar with this picture of workers on the Brooklyn Bridge, taken in 1914 by Eugene de Salignac for the city of New York. But wait... why is the guy on the right so much bigger than the others? He's not. Rob at the What Is It? Blog altered the picture to make it an optical illusion!

A few weeks ago I saw this old picture on the web of the Brooklyn Bridge painters and thought it was perfect for the classic perspective optical illusion, I made an exact copy of the person on the left of the photo and placed it on the right.

Pretty neat, wouldn't you say? -Thanks, Rob!

When Spider-Man starts inspiring court rules and world-renowned chemists begin taking cues from Donald Duck, you know it's time to look at the funny pages a little more seriously...

1. Superman Defeats the Ku Klux Klan

In the 1940s, The Adventures of Superman was a radio sensation. Kids across the country huddled around their sets as the Man of Steel leapt off the page and over the airwaves. Although Superman had been fighting crime in print since 1938, the weekly audio episodes fleshed out his storyline even further. It was on the radio that Superman first faced kryptonite, met The Daily Planet reporter Jimmy Olsen, and became associated with “truth, justice, and the American way.” So, it’s no wonder that when a young writer and activist named Stetson Kennedy decided to expose the secrets of the Ku Klux Klan, he looked to a certain superhero for inspiration.

In the post-World War II era, the Klan experienced a huge resurgence. Its membership was skyrocketing, and its political influence was increasing, so Kennedy went undercover to infiltrate the group. By regularly attending meetings, he became privy to the organization’s secrets. But when he took the information to local authorities, they had little interest in using it. The Klan had become so powerful and intimidating that police were hesitant to build a case against them. Struggling to make use of his findings, Kennedy approached the writers of the Superman radio serial. It was perfect timing. With the war over and the Nazis no longer a threat, the producers were looking for a new villain for Superman to fight. The KKK was a great fit for the role. In a 16-episode series titled “Clan of the Fiery Cross,” the writers pitted the Man of Steel against the men in white hoods. As the storyline progressed, the shows exposed many of the KKK’s most guarded secrets. By revealing everything from code words to rituals, the program completely stripped the Klan of its mystique. Within two weeks of the broadcast, KKK recruitment was down to zero. And by 1948, people were showing up to Klan rallies just to mock them.

2. Popeye Helps America Survive the Great Depression

Everyone knows Popeye’s secret. Whenever the cartoon sailor is on the verge of losing a fight, he squeezes open a can of spinach, pours the greens down his throat, and uses his supercharged muscles to pummel opponents. But fewer people know that the U.S. government is directly responsible for his dependence on canned vegetables.

In the 1930s, America was mired in the Great Depression, and the government was looking for a way to promote iron-rich spinach as a meat substitute. To help spread the word, they hired one of America’s favorite celebrities, Popeye the Sailor Man. It was a smart plan. In all of the comic strips to that point, Popeye’s superhuman strength had never been explained. But with the government’s campaign in place, Popeye was suddenly more than willing to share the secret to his strength. Sure enough, soon after Popeye took up spinach, American sales of the mighty veggie increased by one-third. Better still, American children rated it their third favorite food, right after turkey and ice cream.

But it wasn’t just spinach the government was endorsing. They were also pushing the merits of canned food. U.S. officials wanted Americans to know that cans were the perfect way to stock up on emergency rations.

While Popeye should be applauded for persuading a nation to eat its greens, he did mislead people a bit. The government’s enthusiasm for spinach was based in part on the calculations of German scientist Dr. E von Wolf, who’d discovered in 1870 that spinach contains iron. When calculating the results, he misplaced a decimal point, thereby making it “official” that spinach had 10 times more iron than it actually did. Not until years later were these figures rechecked. But by then, everyone was downing their spinach, hoping to be as tough as Popeye.

3. Captain Marvel Jr. Saves the Bad-Hair Day

Tomorrow is Fathers Day! It's a day to show your appreciation by giving dad gifts, a great meal, or time sharing his favorite activities. I have an additional suggestion from the perspective of a parent with several teenagers. Their father and I are trying to teach them what they need to live their lives, but it seems to fall on deaf ears -sound familiar? If you are lucky enough to still have your dad, you can please and honor him by letting him know how you remember and use the lessons he taught you about life. If your father has passed, you can honor him by telling your children of those memories. One day, I hope to find that my efforts didn't go completely in one ear and out the other. Let your father know his teachings stuck with you.

Stuff you don't want to miss at Neatorama this past week includes Jill Harness' post 8 Delightfully Geeky Wedding Proposals.

We had two contributions from Eddie Deezen: Elvis Presley and His Animals last Sunday and What Groucho Ate on Friday.

The Annals of Improbable Research gave us a poem in the style of Dr. Seuss with Horton Sees a Pluto.

Keith Moon, Bathroom Bomber came to us from Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

And from mental_floss magazine, we learned The Surprisingly Cool History of Ice.

In the What Is It? game this week, the object in question is a salt pulverizer, for breaking up salt in a shaker. You can see several more patent sketches for it at the What Is It? blog. Strangely, no one guessed the correct answer. But a t-shirt from the NeatoShop goes to theoneoneandonly, who posited that this was for hurting parents’ bare feet before Lego bricks were produced for the same purpose. Wrong, but funny, so it's a winner!

Check out these Fathers Day classics from The Best of Neatorama: Life Lessons my Dad Taught Me and 12 Impressively Active Animal Fathers.

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 in real time. Thanks for spending time with us at Neatorama!

Recent news reports about a predicted decline in the sun's magnetic activity pose the question, asking if the earth will be cooling off because of it. Let's ask the Bad Astronomer, Dr. Phil Plait.

The answer — spoiler alert! — is almost certainly "no". I want to make sure that’s clear, because I will bet essentially any amount of money that some climate change denial sites will run with this story and claim that we don’t need to worry about global warming. That’s baloney, and what follows is why. The reasons take a minute to explain, but of course that’s where the cool stuff (haha!) is. So let’s take this one step at a time. And if you have the attention span of an E. coli bacterium, you can skip down to the conclusion section.

What follows is a pretty comprehensive but simply written explanation of the sun's magnetic cyle and its effect on Earth's temperature. Link

Have you ever aspired to be a fortune cookie writer? Most of us who ever received a lame fortune have contemplated it for a short time. However, there aren't many of these positions available. Donald Lau is the vice-president of Wonton Food, Inc. in Queens, New York. In addition to his financial work, he has written many cookie fortunes.

At first, the writing came easily. Finding inspiration in sources ranging from the I Ching to the Post, Lau cranked out three or four maxims a day, between scrutinizing spreadsheets and monitoring the company’s inventory of chow mein. “I’d be on the subway and look up at the signs and think, Hey, that would make a great fortune,” he said. (One such adage: “Beware of odors from unfamiliar sources.”) “I’d keep a small notebook and jot down whatever came to me. I don’t think I ever sat in front of the computer and said, ‘I am going to write ten fortunes right now.’ It has to come naturally.”

And yes, Lau sometimes must deal with writer's block. Read more about this strange job at the New Yorker. Link -via J-Walk Blog

(Image generated by Jelly Muffin)

The Long Now Foundation is building a clock that is supposed to last 10,000 years, and chime with a different song every time it sounds. Danny Hillis invented the clock in 1995, saying

I want to build a clock that ticks once a year. The century hand advances once every 100 years, and the cuckoo comes out on the millennium. I want the cuckoo to come out every millennium for the next 10,000 years.

The 200-foot tall clock will be installed under a Sierra Diablo mountain on Texas land owned by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. Right now, a robot is carving steps inside the mountain, and some of the larger clock components are being assembled. Read more about it at The Technium. Link to story. Link to website. -via Laughing Squid

The city of Lille, France had a beautiful municipal swimming pool. It was an Art Deco masterpiece built between 1927 and 1932 by the architect Albert Baert. But over the years, the support underneath the pool was weakened, and it was declared unsafe in 1985. Instead of abandoning the building, the city undertook an extensive renovation project, turning the facility into a museum called the La Piscine-Musée d'Art et d'Industrie André Diligent. The locals just call it La Piscine. See more pictures of this beautiful building at Kuriositas. Link

(Image credit: Flickr member graham chandler)