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Posts Tagged ‘cool facts’

Magical Things

Posted in Entertainment, Other, Science!, tagged , , , , , , , on August 2, 2025| Leave a Comment »

I enjoy the fact that there is always something new to learn. Some things are big, like the latest on asteroid deflection from NASA’s DART program, and some are small, like the fact that Dan Aykroyd had a cameo in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. (Did you know that? I didn’t, until last night when I did a double take and said, “Wait, the guy with the mustache and the British accent. Was that Dan Aykroyd?” It was!)

Of global importance or not, these facts are all interesting reminders that there is always something new around the corner, if you keep looking.

And that, I think, is magic.

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Photo by Matthias Müllner on Unsplash

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Curious Horses Change History

Posted in Other, Writing, tagged , , , , on February 24, 2025| Leave a Comment »

Last night, we watched the original Ghostbusters, which is always fun. Coincidentally and just in time to inspire this post, today I ran across this article from Dan Lewis at Now I Know that opens with that film and evolves into a fascinating discussion of why firehouses have poles.

Curious horses, that’s why!

How Horses Created Firehouse Poles – Now I Know

…in the late 1870s, “David Kenyon of Company 21, an all-African-American firehouse in Chicago [. . .] reached the ground by sliding down a wooden pole normally used to bale hay for horses.” Kenyon realized that this could be made into a permanent feature…

Read the whole thing for more on why poles were not just a good idea, but critical for firefighters. Spoiler alert, it’s not just because sliding down poles is fun!

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Photo by Thiago Rocha on Unsplash

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