The United States Navy ordered a computerized bookkeeping system that was to have cost $33 million. As the project was being built the price climbed steadily higher. Finally, the price grew so high, the Navy gave up without completing the job. The Navy spent $230 million of our money and got absolutely nothing.
In a similar case, the Internal Revenue Service spent $187 million just to decide if they should buy a $1.8 billion computerized tax return system. They decided no.
Why was it illegal to buy more than three pairs of shoes during the 1940’s? Leather was needed for the war effort. Most shoes at that time were made almost entirely from leather, yet today many are made from cloth, plastic and synthetic rubber.
One of Leonardo da Vinci’s less known but very effective inventions was a weapon – stink bombs mounted on arrows.
General John Burgoyne who participated on the British side of the American Revolutionary War, had great respect and obedience from his soldiers. His method of punishment was different. If a soldier misbehaved, he had the man wear his coat inside out.
A military technique was used sixteen hundred years ago that should still be used occasionally today. Java and Malaya both wanted the territory of Sumatra, so the generals each selected one buffalo. The buffalo were pitted against each other and no people participated in the battle.
Liechtenstein used to have the world’s smallest army. There was one soldier. He served his country until his death at age 95. Then the country no longer had an army.
Before testing the first atomic bomb, some of the scientists working on the Manhattan Project did their best to calculate what might happen. They estimated there was a three percent chance the bomb would set the entire world’s atmosphere on fire, instantly killing us all. They went ahead and tested the bomb.
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Noting that after military battles the weather frequently turns rainy, early scientists tried to recreate the effect. The cause of the rain after a battle is that droplets form around the smoke and dust particles in the air. But the early rain makers thought it was because the sky was shocked by the explosions. So they tried to make it rain by shooting cannons into the air or carrying explosives aloft in balloons. Their attempts were horrendously noisy, but mostly unsuccessful.
Nicholas Alkemade’s airplane was totaled in an air raid over Nazi Germany and he had to bail out from more than 3 miles up, without a parachute. As he fell, his speed accelerated to 120 miles per hour. He landed in a snow-covered pine forest and was completely uninjured.
Although most people know that many people were tragically killed by an atom bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan (141,000 people), most don’t know that 140,000 people were also killed in one day in Tokyo by conventional bombing. Throughout the war, 220,000 Japanese people were killed by the two atom bombs (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) and 600,000 were killed by ordinary bombs.
Before The US dropped the atom bombs on Japan, the allies had already destroyed over two million buildings.
Japan actually surrendered a couple of days before the first bomb was dropped, but because they had faked surrenders before, American politicians did not believe this surrender was real.
When scientists were preparing to test the first atom bomb, they calculated there was a three percent chance they’d set the atmosphere on fire, and kill everyone and everything on earth. They went ahead and ran the test.
If it had not been for the Civil War, the United States Cavalry might have been riding camels. Shortly before the war, Secretary of War Jefferson Davis imported 81 camels for testing in Texas. There were some problems. Ordinary horses were terrified of the camels, and so were many of the soldiers. On the other hand, in some ways the camels were excellent. They could go for several days without water, they could carry a half-ton, and walk 40 miles a day. The military was generally impressed and were ready to start switching to camels in large numbers, but then the war developed and there was no time to deal with camel importation.
You can be mad at your neighbor, or your neighbor’s pig in this case, but overall it is best to really think about possible repercussions, even remote, before taking any drastic action.
It is possible that a single pig caused the War of 1812. This pig was always getting into the neighbor’s yard and eating up prized shrubs and flowers. Finally the neighbor got mad and killed the pig with a pitchfork. The pig’s killer was a congressional candidate who lost the election by one vote. This was the vote cast against him by the late pig’s owner presumably because he was upset about the loss of his pig. When the matter of deciding about the war was voted upon, the issue passed by one vote. This was the vote of the candidate who had won the election by one vote.
During WW II, farmers were paid to grow marijuana because good rope could be made from it. The rope made from marijuana, called hemp in this case, is stronger and more rot-resistant than all other natural fibers.
Fifteen million Americans joined the armed forces during WWII. One out of every 50 people in the military were women (300,000). Since so many men were participating in the war, many women who stayed home did jobs that had previously been considered men’s work. It was not uncommon to find female welders, garbage collectors, truck drivers, and general laborers during the early 1940s.
One out of every six draftees for World War II were disqualified due to mental illness.
Paul Revere, a silversmith, never completed the ride for which he is so famous. Soon after he started, he was asked to turn around and go home by a British soldier. Paul Revere had 16 children.
Paul would have not tried his famous (but incomplete) ride, had he not been paid to do so. He was a mercenary.
In the mid 1770’s David Bushnell, an inventive guy, created the world’s first attack submarine. Using whiskey barrel technology, he made a watertight clam shell shaped vehicle with barely enough room for one man. The thing, nicknamed the Turtle, was placed in New York Harbor one night Continue reading Bushnell’s Turtle
