# Historical oddities **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 23, 2018, 9:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666 "2018-05-23T09:58:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![IvoryTowerDenizen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ivorytowerdenizen/32/17937_2.png) [@IvoryTowerDenizen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IvoryTowerDenizen)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/21 "2018-05-23T15:05:16Z")
> [@Jasmine](#): > > This has my vote as “most amazing”. Never in human history has there been so much change in such a short period of time. The difference between 1918 and 2018 is the kind of stuff that science fiction is made of. My favorite example is that Laura Ingalls Wilder traveled west in a conastoga wagon and flew in an airplane before she died. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/22 "2018-05-23T15:06:49Z")
Ho Chi Minh at one time worked as a cook and dishwasher in Harlem. In Boston, he worked at the same bakery that Malcolm X worked at about 30 years later. General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, victor at the Alamo, lived in Staten Island in New York after the Civil War for a time after being exiled from Mexico . ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/23 "2018-05-23T15:51:47Z")
Lorenzo Da Ponte, who wrote the libretti for Mozart’s operas _The Marriage of Figaro_, _Don Giovanni_, and _Cosi fan tutte_, later moved to New York, where he ran a grocery store. One of his New York friends was Clement Moore, author of “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” who helped him get a job as a professor of Italian literature at Columbia University. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/24 "2018-05-23T16:21:23Z")
Karl Marx was a regular correspondent and contributor to the _New York Daily Tribune_ Jean Paul Marat, the French Revolutionary (famously assassinated in his bath by Charlotte Corday) was also a scientist. He independently discovered the use of _shadowgraph_ imagery to detect and make visible air currents and convection, anticipating later _Schlieren_ imagery. He once demonstrated it by showing colleagues the hot air rising from the head of Benjamin Franklin. Speaking of Franklin, his illegitimate son William was the Royal Governor of New Jersey during the American Revolution (something I first learned from the play _1776_) ---
**Author:** ![Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b487fb/32.png) [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walken_After_Midnight)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/25 "2018-05-23T16:32:47Z")
In 1913, Adolf Hitler, Leon Trotsky, Joseph Stalin, Sigmund Freud and Joseph Tito all lived in the same place - [Vienna](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21859771). ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/26 "2018-05-23T16:37:09Z")
As of May 26, 2017, the U.S. was still paying one veteran’s pension to a child of a veteran of the Civil War. Irene Triplett gets $73.13 every month. [Cite](https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2016-08-08/civil-war-vets-pension-still-remains-on-governments-payroll-151-years-after-last-shot-fired). ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/27 "2018-05-23T16:40:06Z")
I just want to say that “Bublical figure” is a great typo. We need a term for grandmothers in the Bible. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/28 "2018-05-23T16:44:10Z")
> [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](#): > > In 1913, Adolf Hitler, Leon Trotsky, Joseph Stalin, Sigmund Freud and Joseph Tito all lived in the same place - [Vienna](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-21859771). At first I thought you meant they all lived together in the same apartment. Hey, I’d watch that sitcom! ---
**Author:** ![Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b487fb/32.png) [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walken_After_Midnight)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/29 "2018-05-23T16:51:13Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > At first I thought you meant they all lived together in the same apartment. Hey, I’d watch that sitcom! It would probably be a bit like _The Young Ones_. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/30 "2018-05-23T16:53:20Z")
> [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](#): > > It would probably be a bit like _The Young Ones_. “Darling Fascist Bully Boy…” ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/31 "2018-05-23T17:10:05Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > At first I thought you meant they all lived together in the same apartment. Hey, I’d watch that sitcom! from the script: > [@](#): > > Stalin: “Adolf, how many times do I have to tell you: your dirty clothes are all over the _lebensraum_, and some are on MY side again! You cannot come over here without permission!” > > Hitler: “Oh, I’ll _come over_ soon enough, just you wait and see!” > > Freud: “Und vy does it bother you so much, Josef? Didn’t your…_mother_ used to handle your dirty laundry?” > > Trotsky: \ > > Stalin: “Leon! don’t make me go upside your head!” ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/32 "2018-05-23T17:40:54Z")
Sir [Richard Francis Burton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Francis_Burton), the African explorer and aficionado of exotica (especially sexual), once met Brigham Young. He decided to visit Utah in 1860 because of his interest in polygamy. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/33 "2018-05-23T17:53:16Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, victor at the Alamo, lived in Staten Island in New York after the Civil War for a time after being exiled from Mexico . Santa Anna also introduced modern chewing gum to the United States. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/34 "2018-05-23T18:01:23Z")
If you brought Abraham Lincoln back from the past to the modern world, he wouldn’t know how to open a door. The modern door knob is a surprisingly recent invention. It was patented in 1878. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/35 "2018-05-23T18:08:25Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > If you brought Abraham Lincoln back from the past to the modern world, he wouldn’t know how to open a door. > > The modern door knob is a surprisingly recent invention. It was patented in 1878. On the other hand, indoor flush toilets (admittedly not with the modern mechanism) are surprisingly ancient: they have been found in the Indus Valley civilization, 2600-1900 BC. > **[Sanitation of the Indus Valley Civilisation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sanitation_of_the_Indus_Valley_Civilisation)** > > The ancient Indus Valley Civilization in the Indian subcontinent (located in present-day eastern-Pakistan and north-India) was prominent in infrastructure, hydraulic engineering, and had many water supply and sanitation devices that are the first known examples of their kind.\[citation needed\] > Most houses of Indus Valley were made from mud, dried mud bricks, or clay bricks of a standardised size. The urban areas of the Indus Valley civilization included public and private baths. Many of the buil... ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/36 "2018-05-23T18:19:40Z")
The United States and the Holy Roman Empire co-existed for nearly 30 years. Otto Frank (father of Anne) and Hitler were at the Somme in 1916. In 2016, China became the worlds largest economy. It has been that for most of history. When the British first came to India, what did they think of the Taj Mahal? Nothing, it had not been built yet and would not be for 50 years. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/37 "2018-05-23T18:45:13Z")
> [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](#): > > Not sure if it’s an oddity, but: A person born in 1902 who died in 1970 was born before the first lighter-than-aircraft flight and died after a man walked on the moon. My grandfather (b. 1900) often remarked about this before his death in 1971. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/38 "2018-05-23T18:48:55Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > Sir [Richard Francis Burton](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Francis_Burton), the African explorer and aficionado of exotica (especially sexual), once met Brigham Young. He decided to visit Utah in 1860 because of his interest in polygamy. That doesn’t quite capture it – Mormon polygamy was understandably a “hot” topic of discussion in Europe. Burton, who had written about Near Eastern polygamy, wanted to see how it compared. Having proposed to his future wife Isabel, Burton made the trip to Utah while awaiting her reply (!). When he got back after the trip, he wrote it up as _the City of the Saints_. It’s a good read. Burton had previously made the Pilgrimage to Mecca in the disguise of an Egyptian Muslim doctor. He wrote that trip up, too, as the two-volume _Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mekka and al-Medinah_, which is also worth reading (although, of course, things have changed enormously since Burton’s time) When Burton got to Salt Lake City, he had a private audience with Brigham Young (both were world-famous figures, after all), and Young was rumored to have greeted Burton with the words “I understand you’ve done something like this before.” A great story, but probably not true. Burton reports nothing like it in his book, although he does say he was impressed with Young and his knowledge. Burton wasn’t that impressed with a lot else, though. He regarded Truman Angell’s Salt Lake Temple as an architectural monstrosity. (I like it, myself). He found Mormon polygamy to be dry and straitlaced compared to the practice in the Near East (exactly how he decided this, I don’t know). His overall impression of Mormonism seemed to be (although he certainly didn’t put it this way) It’s No More Ridiculous Than Any Other Religion. Burton gives a synopsis of the Book of Mormon in the footnotes of his book, along with a listing of all the pro- and anti-Mormon literature he’d read before and during his journey. he read a LOT of stuff. ---
**Author:** ![Hermitian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hermitian/32/470_2.png) [@Hermitian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermitian)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/39 "2018-05-23T18:52:17Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > In 2016, China became the worlds largest economy. . Cite? The IMF doesn’t [agree](https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/04/the-worlds-biggest-economies-in-2018/). ---
**Author:** ![Moris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moris/32/2846_2.png) [@Moris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moris)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2018, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666/40 "2018-05-23T19:39:30Z")
The first skyscraper, Home Insurance Building in Chicago was finished in 1885. Neuschwanstein Castle was finished in 1886. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/historical-oddities/814666.md?page=3)