A Brief History On May 20, 2017, the entire planet is obligated to celebrate World Whisky Day, and if you have any questions about the legitimacy of this holiday, understand that there is a web site dedicated to this particular day! Digging Deeper Whisky, spelled without the “e,” is what we call the distilled malt alcoholic beverage from Scotland. In the United States of America, we call similar stuff “whiskey” with the “e,” but either way, you could call it hooch, firewater, liquor, spirits, moonshine, rot gut, white lightning, acqua vitae (water of life) or mountain dew (not the soda…
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A Brief History On May 19, 2017, the United States celebrates perhaps its most important holiday, National Pizza Party Day. Pizza has become such an integral part of American culture, that we choose to honor this day with interesting facts about our favorite food. Digging Deeper Pizza of course is of Italian origin, appearing first in records in the 10th Century. But wait! Tomatoes did not make it to Europe until after 1492 when Columbus first sailed to the New World, so whatever excuse for pizza Italy may have had, it was not what we would recognize as our favorite…
A Brief History On March 30, 1842, Dr. Crawford Long, an American surgeon, made the first known use of ether as a general anesthetic. Previous attempts at general anesthesia were not effective, and now for the first time major surgery could be accomplished without pain. Digging Deeper Before ether, people had used a variety of natural plant based poisons and drugs to dull pain, including Opium derived from the Opium Poppy. Alcohol was another popular attempt at easing the pain caused by surgery, but alcohol resulted in excessive bleeding and had minimal pain killing properties. Opium may have been used…
A Brief History On March 6, 1899, the German chemical and pharmaceutical firm, Bayer AG, (the people that brought us “Heroin”) trademarked perhaps their greatest product, and perhaps the greatest medicine ever invented, Aspirin. Digging Deeper Founded by Friedrich Bayer and Johann Weskott in 1863, the big breakthrough for the company was the production of acetylsalicylic acid, the refinement of an age old remedy made from the bark of willow trees. Salicylic acid and various salicylate compounds from willow and other plants had been used for millennia to treat fever and other illnesses. Frenchman Charles Gerhardt had invented aspirin in…
A Brief History On December 28, 1795, construction began on Yonge Street in York, Upper Canada (modern day Toronto). Yonge Street went on to fame as “The longest street in the world” according to The Guinness Book of World Records at 1178 miles long, running from Lake Ontario to Lake Simcoe and on to the Minnesota-Ontario border at Rainy River. Many other streets and roads across the world have achieved a measure of fame, and here we list 10 of those famous roadways. Is the list a little US of A centric? Yes, but that is to be expected with…