Eight U.S. football stadiums have a listed capacity of at least 100,000 attendees; all of them are primarily the host stadiums for college football teams.
The largest stadium is Michigan Stadium, in Ann Arbor, MI, which is the home stadium for the University of Michigan Wolverines; its capacity is 107,600 people.
Super Bowl LV was played in Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The Buccaneers won, 31-9, and that was the first Super Bowl played in the home stadium for one of the teams. It happened again the very next year, when in Super Bowl LVI the Cincinnati Bengals played the Los Angeles Rams in SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California. The home team won then too. The Rams defeated the Bengals, 23-20.
These are the only two times this has happened.
James Monroe of Virginia served in the Continental Army during the American Revolution, retiring as a colonel. He was badly wounded, and cited for bravery by Gen. George Washington, another future President of the United States. He is pictured in Emanuel Leutze’s historically-inaccurate (but nonetheless inspiring) 1851 painting, Washington Crossing the Delaware. He is the officer behind Washington, holding up the flag.
Washington Crossing the Delaware at the Met is massive. Its dimensions are 12’4” x 21’2”.
The Delaware Blue Hen (also known as the Blue Hen Chicken) is a blue-colored strain of American gamecock. It is the official state bird of Delaware, and the University of Delaware’s athletic teams are known as the “Fightin’ Blue Hens.”
NFL QB Rich Gannon played football for the Delaware Fightin’ Blue Hens. And so did QB Joe Flacco and QB Scott Brunner.
Delaware was named after Delaware Bay, which in turn derived its name from Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr (1577–1618), the first governor of the Colony of Virginia.
68% of Fortune 500 companies are Delaware entities. This is because Delaware has business-friendly tax laws and a unique court system specifically for corporate legal cases.
Henry Luce was an American journalist and magazine publisher, who founded or co-founded three of the most influential U.S. magazines of the 20th Century: Time, Forbes, and Sports Illustrated; he was also the publisher of Life magazine during its heyday.
In July 1986, Life magazine called Nevada’s US Highway 50, also known as the Lincoln Highway or U.S. 50, the “Loneliest Road in America” in a negative article. The 287-mile stretch of road from Baker to Dayton through the high desert was described as having “no points of interest” and warned drivers to have “survival skills” to travel it.
Nevada embraced the tag and posted decorative signs along the route.
The Loneliest Road roughly parallels the Pony Express Trail, which goes from Silver Springs through Fallon and along the towns across Highway 50. Remnants of Pony Express Stations are visible for much of the way along the Loneliest Road.
In 2009, Mrs. Bullitt and I drove that 300 mile stretch.
According to NHTSA’s data, I-95 is the most dangerous highway in the United States. In 2019, it had the highest number of overall fatalities (284) and fatalities per 100 miles (14.88).
Many of these accidents occurred in the northeast in the winter, when road conditions were far from ideal. A large portion of accidents also occurred on the east coast of Florida in Jacksonville and Brevard County, which sits outside of Orlando.
I drove that stretch solo in the summer of 2023. It’s lonely. And long.
In play:
On August 22, 1986, the final section of Interstate 80 was dedicated on the western edge of Salt Lake City. This made I-80 the first contiguous freeway to span coast-to-coast, Teaneck, NJ, to San Francisco, CA.
Starfleet Command is shown as being based in the Presidio in San Francisco, California in the 1979 sf movie Star Trek: The Motion Picture, starring William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and the rest of the TV series’s regular cast.
The Spanish built the Presidio of San Francisco in 1776.
The Presidio of San Francisco served as a military installation, originally under Spain, then Mexico, until it was seized by the U.S. military in 1846. The U.S. Army operated it as a base until 1994, when it was turned over to the National Park Service.
The property is now jointly operated by the Park Service and the Presidio Trust. Many of the historic buildings on the property have been restored, and are leased by commercial enterprises.
The Presidio is a 1988 movie set in San Francisco, specifically at and around the Presidio building. It stars Mark Harmon, Sean Connery and Meg Ryan.
Mark Harmon played a doctor on St. Elsewhere, a Secret Service agent on The West Wing and a San Francisco police detective in The Presidio.
Actor Mark Harmon is the son of Tom Harmon, a college football star who won the Heisman Trophy as a halfback for the University of Michigan in 1940. Like his father, Mark played college football; he was the starting quarterback for UCLA in 1972 and 1973.
Harmon Killibrew (1936-2011) was a baseball player who played most of his 22-year career with the Washington Senators/Minnesota Twins franchise. While he only had a .256 career batting average, he was one of the most feared power hitters of his era. He hit at least 40 home runs in eight different seasons and led the American League in home runs six times. When he retired, he was second only to Babe Ruth in AL home runs and was the AL career leader in home runs by a right-handed batter.
Mark Harmon was not selected in the NFL draft, but he did get some offers from teams looking for QBs. He wanted to focus on acting so he declined those offers.
In high school Harmon played football, baseball and rugby.
Before he established his acting career Harmon acted in some Coors commercials. Like this one.
