CROCKETT CRAZE BOOSTS DEMAND FOR COONSKINS

The Davy Crockett craze of the 1950s boosted the demand for genuine coonskin caps to such an extreme that the price for raccoon skins skyrocketed from 25 cents a pound to nearly $8.

Americans take so many products for granted. Take alphabet soup, for instance. What does it look like in other countries? Does the product use the Cyrillic alphabet in Greece and Russia? What about France? Is there an accent over the e? Public relations staff at Campbell’s Soup report that no such issue exists because Campbell’s Alphabet Soup is only sold in North America.

Beavers are excellent loggers, but they can’t match a human’s ability to fell a tree in any particular direction. Instead, beavers gnaw a V-shaped notch completely around the tree. Eventually, the tree falls. Sometimes, it falls on the beaver.

Australian Aborigines use honey for a variety of ailments, including burns, lung complaints, sore eyes, vomiting and diarrhea.

Historians claim that the celebrity scientist Isaac Newton probably suffered from mercury poisoning in the later years of his life. Newton’s many letters reveal that he was suffering from severe insomnia, a loss of appetite, delusions of persecution, extreme sensitivity to remarks he viewed as implied criticisms and a loss of memory.

FRENCH HAIR MERCHANTS

In the late 17th century, French fashion demanded such large and complicated coiffures that hair stylists often had to add already-cut hair to the heads of their clients. Hair merchants sent professional cutters all over Europe to bring back pounds of human hair, all of which had to be 24 inches long. The Dutch were said to produce the finest hair. And the color of choice in France was ash-brown. Top-quality tresses fetched the equivalent of $7,500 per pound.

Disney’s “Toy Story II” reveals that Woody — the Western action figure who speaks in the voice of Tom Hanks — is actually a rare collectible from the 1950s. The movie stresses that Woody, in his hand-stitched vest and polyvinyl cowboy hat, is a perfect, museum-quality specimen of a 1950s toy. But there is one problem with this premise. In the movie, Woody’s holster is empty. No self-respecting 1950s boy would accept a toy cowboy without its corresponding gun.

Mockingbirds borrow material from other birds in order to expand their song vocabulary. Ornithologists have found that some male mockingbirds can perform up to 200 unique tunes. But these copycats don’t limit themselves to songs stolen from cardinals and Carolina wrens. They also impersonate washing machines and car alarms.

HOW LONG DOES A DOG LIVE?

A Danish study of 3,000 dogs found that the average dog can expect to live about 10 years. The most common cause of death, affecting 1 in 5 of the canines studied, was old age. The second most common cause of death was cancer, affecting 14.5 percent. Bernese Mountain dogs were the most cancer-prone with 34.4 percent succumbing to terminal cancer during the study.

Massachusetts was the first state to enact compulsory education laws. Children in that state must begin school by age 6 and may not leave school until age 16. Washington D.C. (1864) was second. Vermont (1867) was third. The last three states to require free, public education were Georgia (1916), Mississippi (1918) and Alaska (1929).

Many high school athletes have dreams of entering the pros, but competition is fierce. Only about 1 out of every 25 high school football players will play on an NCAA team in college. Of those, only 1 in 30 will get drafted. Once drafted, there still remains a 50 percent chance that the player won’t make the final cut for a professional football team.

Elected President in 1796, John Adams — a relatively short, fat man — was often referred to by political opponents as “His Rotundity.”

PROFESSIONAL SPORTS TEAMS COPE WITH WAR

A number of athletes were called up for duty during World War II, leaving professional teams with short rosters. In order to solve the problem, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles combined forces in 1943 to become the Phil-Pit Steagles. But the agreement only lasted a year. Pittsburgh switched over to the Cardinals in 1944, becoming the Card-Pitts.

When San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge opened for business in 1937, the one-way vehicle toll was only 50 cents with an additional 5 cents charged if there were more than three passengers. That toll fell to 25 cents in 1955 but has since risen to $5. The larger toll — set in 2002 — only applies to southbound traffic, however. Northbound traffic is free.

When women received a constitutional right to vote in 1920, it wasn’t as revolutionary as it seemed. New Jersey’s state constitution had allowed women to vote as early as 1776. But it didn’t last. The state legislature rescinded woman suffrage in 1807.

The world of fashion, it seems, is not a place for equality. Experts say that women’s shoes, for instance, generally last only one or two years. But men’s shoes of reasonably good quality can be expected to endure at least three years of regular use.

CAMELS HAVE LESS BRAINPOWER

The brain of a camel weighs only about half as much as the gray matter of an adult human.

The Sargasso Sea has no coastline. That’s because the gold-flecked, blue waters lie in the center of the North Atlantic, surrounded by currents that move in a clockwise direction, defining its boundaries.

Marilyn Monroe’s classic skirt-blowing scene in “The Seven Year Itch” was first filmed on the corner of Manhattan’s Lexington Avenue and 52nd Street. But the footage wasn’t used. Director Billy Wilder found that he could get a better result, re-staging the scene in the studio.

The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise estimates that there are 5.8 million Jews in the United States, almost a million more than are in Israel.

The Lincoln Memorial sits on more than 100 acres of Potomac Park, in Washington, D.C. But early supporters had hoped to see the monument built in Gettysburg, Pa., with a highway, linking the memorial to the nation’s capital.

A news organization compiled a list of first names among tennis professionals and found that the most popular names for male players are David, John and Michael. Female players are more likely to be called Andrea, Elena or Maria.

With a diameter of 680 feet, the Louisiana Superdome is the world’s largest such structure.

EVERYTHING BUT THE OINK

No part of a domesticated pig goes to waste. The animal’s bones and skin are used for glue, pigskin garments, gloves, shoes and footballs. Its hair is used for artist's brushes, insulation and upholstery. Fatty acids and glycerine are used for insecticides, floor waxes, weed killers, water-proofing agents, cement, rubber, crayons, cosmetics, chalk, antifreeze, plastics, putty, cellophane. Not only that, but pigs are a source of nearly 40 drugs and pharmaceuticals such as insulin.

The Federal Communications Commission reports that the average American child sees about 20,000, 30-second television commercials each year.

Historians claim that King Louis XIV owned 413 beds.

In ancient Babylon, it was common practice for the bride’s father to supply his new son-in-law with all the mead or honey-beer that he could drink for a month, following the wedding. Many amateur etymologists have made the claim that this is where we get the word “honeymoon,” but the word doesn’t even show up in print until Richard Huloet’s 1552 publication of “Abecedarium Anglico Latinum” in which he refers to the gentle diminishing of married love over the first lunar month, following the wedding.

President Theodore Roosevelt declared Devil’s Tower in Wyoming, the nation’s first national monument. The United States now has more than 70 such monuments.

CABLE CARS PREVENT ACCIDENTS

Andrew Smith Hallidie created San Francisco’s cable cars after witnessing a horrible accident. A team of horses had trouble keeping its footing while pulling a streetcar up a particularly steep slope. The weight of the vehicle, combined with wet cobblestones, dragged the five horses to their deaths. Hallidie immediately started work on his idea and by 1873 — only four years later — San Francisco had its first cable car.

The U.S. Census Bureau reported in 2003 that roughly 12 percent of the nation’s population is foreign born. These residents are most likely to live in the South and least likely to live in the Midwest.

A national boat graphics firm has been compiling lists of the most popular boat names since 1991. Last year, the most-requested name was “Aquaholic,” followed by “Island Time” and “Hakuna Matata.”

If you were to spell out numbers, you wouldn’t find the letter “A” until you reached 1,000.

When DuPont introduced its Kevlar fabric in the 1970s — now commonly used in bulletproof vests — the company intended the invention as a replacement for steel belting in vehicle tires.

The average honey bee makes about 1-1/2 teaspoons of honey in a lifetime of work. But the average American consumes more than 1.3 pounds each year.