That Scopes Monkey Trial was an American legal case in 1925 in which a substitute high school teacher, John Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee’s Butler Act, which made it unlawful to teach human evolution in any state-funded school. It featured William Jennings Bryan as the prosecutor and Clarence Darrow as the lawyer for the defense. At the time of the trial, the majority of Christians did not believe in any evolution.
William Jennings Bryan, a pacifist, served as President Woodrow Wilson’s Secretary of State, but resigned when it became clear that the U.S. was going to enter World War I on the side of the Allies.
William Jennings Bryan is famous for advocating the restoration of silver as money at 1/16 the price of gold.
[QUOTE=William Jennings Bryan at the National Democratic Convention, 9 July 1896]
You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of gold.
[/QUOTE]
(A joint gold-silver standard leads to certain confusions. For example, France maintained a fixed 15.5:1 ratio, but Gresham’s Law forced gold out of circulation there before the 1849 Gold Rush, and forced silver out after 1849.)
[oog]
In the modern hi-tech world, it’s hard to believe many Americans were anti-science just 90 years ago. 
The play Inherit the Wind’s characters of Matthew Harrison Brady, Henry Drummond, Bertram Cates and E. K. Hornbeck correspond to the historical figures of William Jennings Bryan, Clarence Darrow, John T. Scopes, and H. L. Mencken, respectively.
The five elements in Japanese Buddhism are, in ascending order of power, Earth, Water, Fire, Wind, and Void.
Under the postwar Japanese constitution, the Emperor (currently His Imperial Majesty Akihito, son of Hirohito) is not actually designated as the head of state, but serves in that de facto role. Japan is the only country in the world that now has an emperor.
By my count, France has had at least twelve constitutions: five republican, four monarchical, two imperial, and one fascist.
The number and variety of constitutions has to be a record of some sort.
The cephalic index is the ratio of the maximum width of the head of an organism (human or animal) multiplied by 100 divided by its maximum length.
Ancient Germanic languages used a mixture of base 10 and 12, with “hundred” denoting six score (‘twelvety’).
As late as the 17th century, many quantities in accounts in Scotland used the Roman numeral C to denote 120 (M was 1200). The ‘long hundred’ and ‘short hundred’ coexisted in medieval Scotland; ‘C’ was always the short hundred (100) when representing dates or money.
For example,
[QUOTE=Scottish account book, 1266 A.D.]
ccc carcosiis vaccarum, scilicet, xviii[sup]xx[/sup]
[translation] three hundred carcasses of cows, that is to say, eighteen score)
[/QUOTE]
The Dozens is a game of spoken words between two contestants, common in African-American communities, where participants insult each other until one gives up. It is customary for the Dozens to be played in front of an audience of bystanders, who encourage the participants to reply with more egregious insults to heighten the tension and consequently, to be more interesting to watch. Among African-Americans it is also known as “roasting”, “capping”, “clowning”, “ranking”, “ragging”, “sounding”, “joning”, “woofing”, “wolfing”, “sigging”, or “signifying”, while the insults themselves are known as “snaps”.
One hypothesis from 1939 suggests that the game formed as a way for African Americans to express aggression in an oppressive society that severely punished such displays against whites. Another theory from 1962 highlights how the game’s focus on one’s opponent’s mother is a reflection of the dominance of females in African American families and how young males may feel rejected by females and react accordingly.
So now you know where Yo’ Mama jokes come from.
One of the earliest examples of a ‘Yo Mama’ joke is from the Bible:
*When Joram saw Jehu, he said, “Is it peace, Jehu?”
And he answered, “What peace, so long as the harlotries of your mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many?”*
Jezebel’s death is recounted in the Bible in gruesome detail. She is thrown from her window, her corpse is trampled by horses and her flesh eaten by stray dogs, except for the palms of her hands.
In Agatha Christie’s novel *Crooked House *the precocious Josephine is fascinated by the story of Jezebel and wonders why the dogs wouldn’t eat Jezebel’s palms.
In 1998 the Archimedes Palimpsest was sold by Christie’s in New York for $2 million to an anonymous bidder. The amazing palimpsest continues to yield new discoveries. In 2005 highly focused X-rays produced at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center revealed large amounts of previously invisible text. In 2009 yet another text was found in the palimpsest with yet another very high-tech technique.
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[oog]
I wanted to segue off Jezebel, but had already fired both barrels:
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Not for number:
“On April 17 [2015], Thailand completed the first draft of its new constitution – the country’s 20th since 1932 – as expected.” This doesn’t include a 21st constitution that will likely be developed by any elected government to curb the anti-democracy features of this 20th, junta-imposed charter.
Sir Charles Villiers Stanford was an Irish composer, music teacher, and conductor. He was one of the founding professors of the Royal College of Music, where he taught composition for the rest of his life. Among his pupils were rising composers whose fame went on to surpass his own, such as Gustav Holst and Ralph Vaughan Williams.
The Dominican Republic has had the most constitutions in world history, with 32 (!) since gaining its independence in 1844.
Ninja’d! ETA: Gustav Holst played no known role in the adoption of any D.R. constitution.
The Order of Preachers (abbreviated as OP from its Latin title Ordo Praedicatorum) is more commonly known as the Dominicans after its founder, the 15th century Spanish priest Saint Dominic de Guzman.
nm
There are many excellent Dominican baseball players, such as David Ortiz, Pedro Martinez, Robinson Cano, Manny Ramirez, Albert Pujols, Sammy Sosa, Nelson ?Cruz, and many more, but of them all Joaquin Arias gets to call himself Champion because he and the San Francisco Giants are the current World Champions of baseball.
Just sayin.
The most popular tourist attraction in Northern Ireland is the Giant’s Causeway in Country Antrim.
Basalt columns are a common volcanic feature and are not unique to the Giant’s Causeway. They occur in many sizes because faster cooling yields smaller columns. Other sites are in California, Wyoming, Texas, and Massachusetts, as well as in Armenia, Iceland, Scotland, Mexico, New Zealand, and India.