A Brief History On February 13, 1981, an incredible 13 miles of sewers and streets in Louisville, Kentucky blew up, the explosion caused by the detonation of hexane gas vapors. Even more incredibly, no people were killed, although 4 were injured. The Louisville Sewer Explosion is exactly why we cannot trust industry to “do the right thing.” Digging Deeper Hexane gas is not your normal sewer gas that you might have heard referred to in the past, but the product of industrial waste illegally dumped by giant feed and animal food company Ralston-Purina. The Ralston-Purina plant located in Louisville processes…
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A Brief History On February 10, 2007, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for President in the 2008 Presidential election. Born in 1961, Obama was only 45 years old when he made his announcement. He would go on to win the Democratic nomination and then win the US Presidential election, sworn in as President of the United States on January 20, 2009 at the age of 47. Compared to our current President, age 73 at this time and potentially 74 years old if he is sworn in for a second term in January of…
A Brief History On February 9, 1941, during World War II, a giant naval artillery shell dropped on the Cathedral of San Lorenzo in Genoa, Italy (usually just called The Genoa Cathedral) failed to explode, sparing the church from destruction. Fired by the British battleship HMS Malaya, the 15 inch armor piercing projectile was mistakenly fired at the wrong target, and incredibly, the shell remains in place to this day! Today we take a look at some instances when a bomb or other explosive failed to either detonate at all or detonate without achieving its intended purpose of destruction. As…
A Brief History On February 8, 1837, the United States Senate elected Richard Mentor Johnson of Kentucky as the incoming Vice President of the United States, the only time in US history that the Senate was required to make such an election due to the failure of any Vice Presidential candidate to garner enough Electoral votes to get elected. The 12th Amendment to the Constitution, which went into effect starting with the Presidential election of 1804, is the basis for the Senate being tasked with electing a Vice President in the absence of a majority Electoral College votes for a…
A Brief History On February 4, 2020, we have had a couple days to digest the array of highly expensive television ads pertaining to Super Bowl LIV (played and aired on February 2, 2020). Among those television commercials were a few in particular that really seem out of place with a sporting event geared toward entertainment. We take a look at these ill-considered ads… (Note: If you are wondering what sort of Super Bowl ads we actually approve of, think about Dachshunds wearing hot dog outfits running toward Ketchup and Mustard and Relish. Or cute horse and dog Budweiser commercials. …