1947 marked the second full year of Harry S Truman’s Presidency. Truman, Democrat of Missouri, is the only person to date to authorize the use of nuclear weapons in wartime.
Harry Truman is the only native Missourian to serve as President. He is also the only native Missourian to serve as vice-President.
One of the constitutionally-mandated duties of the U.S. Vice President is to receive the tallies of electoral votes for President and Vice President from the states, and to open the certificates “in the Presence of the Senate and House of Representatives” (Article II, Section 1).
Only four Vice Presidents have had the honor to announce their own election as President in this manner: John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Martin Van Buren, and George H.W. Bush.
The most recent former vice president to die was George H. W. Bush on November 30, 2018.
Seven vice presidents have died in office. Two of them served under the same president.[ul][li]George Clinton (served under James Madison)[/li][li]Elbridge Gerry (served under James Madison)[/li][li]William Rufus De Vane King (served under Franklin Pierce)[/li][li]Henry Wilson (served under U.S. Grant)[/li][li]Thomas Hendricks (served under Grover Cleveland)[/li][li]Garret Hobart (served under William McKinley)[/li]James Sherman (served under William Howard Taft)[/ul]
There have been 48 vice presidents of the United States. Of these 48, there are 46 unique surnames. The only shared last name is Johnson, of which there are three: Richard Johnson (vice president of Martin Van Buren), Andrew Johnson (Abraham Lincoln), and Lyndon Johnson (John Kennedy).
Howard Deering Johnson operated several successful ice cream shops and restaurants in the Boston area in the 1920s and 1930s. In 1935, he and a business partner became pioneers of the modern franchise restaurant model, when they began to allow other restaurant operators to use the Howard Johnson’s name, logo, and menu for a fee.
Lyndon Johnson enjoyed the perks of the Presidency perhaps more than anyone since Theodore Roosevelt. Once, told by a U.S. Air Force officer when he was walking towards the wrong helicopter on an Air Force base’s tarmac, “Your helicopter is over here, sir,” he threw his arm around the officer’s shoulder, grinned and said, “Son, they’re all my helicopters.”
In 1939 (and after immigrating to the US from Russia), Igor Sikorsky designed and flew the Vought-Sikorsky VS-300,[9] the first viable American helicopter, which pioneered the rotor configuration used by most helicopters today. He also developed the first trans-ocean flying boats in the 1930s.
The first caliper and rotor type of automobile disc brake was patented by Frederick William Lanchester in his Birmingham, England factory in 1902 and used successfully on Lanchester cars.
The city of Birmingham, in the West Midlands region of England, has been the hometown of a number of successful rock groups and performers, including Black Sabbath (and, by extension, Ozzy Osbourne), Duran Duran, Electric Light Orchestra, Fine Young Cannibals, The Moody Blues, The Spencer Davis Group (and, by extension, Steve Winwood), Traffic, and UB40, among others.
Steve Winwood first performed with his father and his elder brother, Muff, at the age of eight. Muff later recalled that when Steve began playing regularly with his father and brother in licensed pubs and clubs, the piano had to be turned with its back to the audience to try and hide him, because he was so obviously underage. He joined The Spencer Davis Group at the age of 14, along with Muff, after Davis saw them at a Birmingham pub called the Golden Eagle.
Basketball player Charles Barkley, Bo Jackson, Willie Mays, and Satchel Paige all come from Birmingham AL.
According to Wikipedia, which cites Paige’s own birth certificate, he was born and raised in Mobile, AL.
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Ronan Farrow’s full name is Satchel Ronan O’Sullivan Farrow; his father, Woody Allen, named him for Satchel Paige. Allen was reportedly a talented baseball player in high school.
In 1963, Hank Aaron and Willie McCovey tied for the NL homerun title, hittimg 44 each. They both wore uniform number 44, and both were born in Mobile Alabama. They almost did it again six years later, when McCovey again hit 44 homers, and Aaron hit 45.
The 1962 World Series ended on one of the most thrilling series-ending plays ever. Down 1-0 to the New York Yankees in the bottom of the ninth in Game 7, the San Francisco Giants had runners on second and third with two outs. Willie McCovey, the Giants batter, hit a line drive directly at Yankees second baseman Bobby Richardson, who caught it for the final out.
The New York Yankees never played the New Jersey Titans, a fictional major league baseball team based in Newark in Stephen King’s 2010 non-supernatural novella Blockade Billy. The tale is named for, and about, the rookie catcher phenom who ended up ruining the team’s 1957 season.
Greyfriars Bobby was a Skye terrier who for 14 years, starting in 1858, guarded his master’s grave in Greyfriars Kirkyard in Edinburgh, until he died in 1872. In 1873, a statue of him was placed opposite the entrance to the churchyard to commemorate his faithfulness. The statue and kirkyard have become tourist attractions; however, some believe that the story is partly fictional and its authenticity is questioned.
Terriers are a class of dog originally bred to hunt vermin such as rats. They are typically small, wiry, very game, and fearless even to the point of following their prey down into their holes or dens.
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The small town of Rat, Missouri had its post office established in 1898. It remained in operation until it was discontinued in 1954. The community was named “Rat” in protest after postal authorities denied the townspeople their first choice of “Buckshorn”. Rat MO has been noted for its unusual place name.
Rat MO is about 130 miles southwest of St. Louis MO, and about 130 miles northwest of Kennett MO, in the “bootheel” of the state. Here’s a map >> Google Maps.