# Tell us an interesting random fact you stumbled across (Part 1) **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 13, 2020, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674 "2020-04-13T03:19:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 108
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2145 "2021-06-18T02:48:40Z")
This makes me think of a missing persons case in my home town, years after I left. > Over 600,000 individuals go missing in the United States every year. Fortunately, many missing children and adults are quickly found, alive and well. and > It is estimated that 4,400 unidentified bodies are recovered each year, with approximately 1,000 of those bodies remaining unidentified after one year. Source: > **[Home](https://namus.nij.ojp.gov)** > > NamUs is a national information clearinghouse and resource center for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed person cases across the United States. Here’s a success story of sorts, many years later: > **[Fairfield woman hails NamUs; found brother after 36 years](https://www.dailyrepublic.com/news/fairfield/fairfield-woman-hails-namus-found-brother-after-36-years/article_cab3446f-a6b3-5ca8-86c7-ae7855042964.html)** > > FAIRFIELD — Rosemary Norris-Southward searched for her brother for 36 years. “Up until NamUs came up, all my efforts were disjointed,” Southward said. “I was even calling medical examiners throughout That article states > Southward said there is a vetting process for the information, but whatever inconvenience that may prove to be, it is worth the possible results. ---
**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:** [June 18, 2021, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2146 "2021-06-18T12:34:42Z")
Here’s something interesting I just stumbled across. For years I thought that Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli stories in **The Jungle Book** were more “natural” than Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan novels. Tarzan is an unbelievably unlikely creature. He’s the child of not only a white couple, but of the British aristocracy and heir to a title. His parents are marooned in Africa and survive for a time before both die, leaving their infant son alone, just in time for him to be found by Kala, whose own ape child has just died. Tarzan is thus raised by the apes. He also is a superb autodidact, who teaches himself to read (but not to speak. Interestingly, he first learns to speak French before learning English) Mwgli, on the other hand, is a feral wolf-child, and there are stories of children raised by wolves in India. One was still around during Kipling’s time in India – Dina Sanichar > **[Dina Sanichar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dina_Sanichar)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > Dina Sanichar (1860 or 1861–1895) was a feral boy. Sanichar was discovered by a group of hunters among wolves in a cave in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh, India in February 1867, at the age of around six. Sanichar was taken to Sikandra Mission Orphanage where he was given the name "Sanichar" because he arrived on a Saturday. When he arrived at the orphanage, he reportedly walked on all fours and ate raw meat. While he could not speak, he would make so... Surely, I always thought, Kipling knew about such children from Indian lore and built his Mowgli stories around the tradition. And it made a lot more sense – Mowgli was an Indian child who circumstances lead to being adopted by wolves. It’s a lot more likely than an aristocrsat from another country just happening to fall into the same circumstances. But it turns out that Kipling wasn’t inspired by those Indian feral children. At least not directly. By his own admission, he was inspired to write the Mowgli stories after reading a book by another famous author – H. Rider Haggard’s **Nada the Lily** (1892). That book features Galazi the Wolf, who was raised by wolves – in Africa. In fact, uncharacteristically for a book written in that place and time, the entire cast of characters is black. It’s a sequel to **King Solomon’s Mines** , following the adventures of Umslopogaas from that book. The first Mowgli story appeared the next year. Furthermore, Haggard wrote a story about a human raised by apes , years before Tarzan appeared – Hendrika in **Allan’s Wife** (1889). She is raised by baboons, with whom she communicates. And, like Tarzan (and unlike Mowgli) she has incredible strength. You have to wonder if Burroughs ever read it. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b77776/32.png) [@Paul\_was\_in\_Saudi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_was_in_Saudi)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2147 "2021-06-19T19:52:40Z")
The police department of [Show Low, Arizona](http://www.showlowaz.gov/364/Police-Department) is headquartered on East Duce of Clubs. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2148 "2021-06-19T21:41:05Z")
The Deuce of Clubs is a playing card or a main drag of a small town in Arizona. The Duce of Clubs was an Italian politician working his way up through the ranks of the thugs who broke up opposition rallies using heavy sticks. He later moved up to Duce of Jails then Duce of Armies before settling on Duce of All He Surveyed. But only briefly. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2149 "2021-06-20T11:37:25Z")
The NHL’s [Stanley Cup](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Cup#Traditions_and_anecdotes) has a tradition of each player on the winning team having possession of it for a day during the off-season. The bowl at the top - often used to hold champagne for the winning team - has been used as a baptismal font by more than one player. At least three players have had their dogs eat out of it, and Eddie Olczyk (NY Rangers, 1994) took it to the Belmont Stakes, where Kentucky Derby winner Go for Gin, ate out of it. ---
**Author:** ![Treppenwitz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/treppenwitz/32/3445_2.png) [@Treppenwitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Treppenwitz)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 11:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2150 "2021-06-21T11:43:54Z")
In Lewes, East Sussex, there is no vehicular access to Keere Street from the High Street. _Sure Trep, got a cite for that?_ [As it happens I have.](https://www.google.com/maps/@50.8707865,0.006842,3a,15y,330.35h,94.23t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s_7pZwVFl4GLTAzpypk0vZA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) Y’see, always the same - it’s one rule for them. another rule for the rest of us. Tcho! j (My apologies if you’re using a phone - you probably need a bigger screen to read that). ---
**Author:** ![Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiendish_astronaut/32/3295_2.png) [@Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiendish_Astronaut)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2151 "2021-06-21T17:13:36Z")
France’s longest border is with Brazil ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2152 "2021-06-21T20:11:41Z")
Cool! > **[Brazil–France border](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brazil%E2%80%93France_border)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > The Brazil–France border is the line, located in the Amazon Rainforest, that limits the territories of Brazil and France. The border is located between the Brazilian state of Amapá and the French region of Guyane. It is 730 kilometres (450 mi) in length. > It is the longest border France shares with another country, despite not being located in mainland France. The second longest is the one with Spain, at > 623 kilometres (387 mi). The Oyapock River... ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2153 "2021-06-21T20:18:04Z")
Major League Baseball’s two Rookie of the Year Awards (one for each league) were officially renamed the Jackie Robinson Award in 1987, forty years after Robinson won the very very first Rookie of the Year Award. The name has never really caught on though, and they’re usually just called the Rookie of the Year Award. (At one time they were named after Charles Comiskey, which also never caught on.) ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2154 "2021-06-21T21:32:15Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > I sing it as “Retarded Kids”. That’s really not appropriate. Pleased don’t hurl random epithets in MPSIMS. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2155 "2021-06-21T22:26:13Z")
What was random about it? My point was defusing an earwig by mocking its lyrics. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2021, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2156 "2021-06-21T23:10:09Z")
“Retarded” is a slur aimed at those who are mentally disabled. Or more often, at those who aren’t, but giving the implication that those who ARE mentally disabled are lesser human beings. Slurs – racial, sexual, and yes, disability-related, are not tolerated in MPSIMS. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2157 "2021-06-22T00:09:12Z")
Do we have an official “slur” list? ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2158 "2021-06-22T00:58:34Z")
No. If you want to continue this discussion, please take it to ATMB, it doesn’t belong here. ---
**Author:** ![Love\_Rhombus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/love_rhombus/32/10694_2.png) [@Love\_Rhombus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Love_Rhombus)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2159 "2021-06-22T01:17:58Z")
In Taiwan Kindergarten Cop is called: _Devil Kid King_ Wombats poop cubes. And Johnny Appleseed’s fruits weren’t for eating but for apple cider. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2160 "2021-06-22T02:09:49Z")
> [@Love\_Rhombus](#): > > And Johnny Appleseed’s fruits weren’t for eating but for apple cider. And that’s the kind with alcohol. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 11:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2161 "2021-06-22T11:03:39Z")
In the 1800s a quest like his could be motivated by only two possible things: Lust for booze or lust for Christian purity! 🙂 ---
**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:** [June 22, 2021, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2162 "2021-06-22T12:25:38Z")
> [@Love\_Rhombus](#): > > And Johnny Appleseed’s fruits weren’t for eating but for apple cider. This is Michael Polan’s (the guy who wrote _The Omnivore’s Dilemma_) contention, but i think he’s wrong. John Chapman, the real Johnny Appleseed, planted seeds that grew up into apple trees, and he sold the resulting orchards to incoming settlers. It’s true that random seeds don’t generally result in edible apples, so he figured that he was selling the aples to make cider out of. But what if he HAD been planting the orchards to produce eating apples? How would it differ? Answer – it wouldn’t. He’d go about it in exactly the same way. The first step in growing apples is to grow your apple trees to use as root stock. Then you buy your buds, your _scions_ from guys who come by later. These contain the buds from which your edible apples grow. They’re gut from a long line of trees that had similar shoots grafted onto previous trees and have since grown to produce more. The scion is grafted onto your existing tree to provide a new source of edible apples. But you can’t do it without having planted and grown a sapling onto which these buds can be grafted. so Johnny Appleseed was selling the necessary basis for edible apple orchards. I guess you could just have bought the orchard he planted, not graft anything onto it, and used the resulting inferior fruit to make cider, but why bother? The same procedure, by the way, is necessary for pears and cherries and and other fruit that has a lot of genetic variation and drift and requires grafting. I’m surprised that there’s no equivalent person for those – a Johnny Pearseed and Johnny Cherrystone ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2163 "2021-06-22T12:43:47Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > I’m surprised that there’s no equivalent person for those – a Johnny Pearseed and Johnny Cherrystone There’s a Sam Forty Fruits, sort of. > **[Tree of 40 Fruit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tree_of_40_Fruit)** > > A Tree of 40 Fruit is one of a series of fruit trees created by the Syracuse University Professor Sam Van Aken using the technique of grafting. Each tree produces forty types of stone fruit, of the genus Prunus, ripening sequentially from July to October in the United States. > Sam Van Aken is an associate professor of sculpture at Syracuse University. He is a contemporary artist who works beyond traditional art making and develops new perspective art projects in communication, botany, and agricul... ---
**Author:** ![BippityBoppityBoo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bippityboppityboo/32/5745_2.png) [@BippityBoppityBoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BippityBoppityBoo)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2021, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674/2164 "2021-06-22T16:51:53Z")
> [@lobotomyboy63](#): > > There’s a Sam Forty Fruits Seriously interesting! Thank you. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=107) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tell-us-an-interesting-random-fact-you-stumbled-across-part-1/851674.md?page=109)