As a young man, Josep Broz was a metal worker in the Benz factory in Germany and a test driver for Daimler in Austria. He was later to become Marshal Tito, President of Yugoslavia.
In the 1994 Undianapolis 500, Team Penske introduced a new engine, publically revealing it only days before the race. The Ilmor Mercedes-Benz 500I V-8 (209 cid) pushrod engine exploited a loophole in the rules and was rumored to have 1,000 horsepower, a significant advantage by 150-200 hp over the competition. Team Penske driver Al Unser jr. won the race, Team Penske dominated practices and qualifying, and after 1994 that engine was no longer allowed in competition.
Indianapolis, Indiana is home to the world’s largest children’s museum in both square footage and number of artifacts. It is also second only to Washington D.C. in its number of monuments and memorials (33).
Canada does not have a federal capital district, unlike the US with DC, and Australia with the ACT. The capital, Ottawa, is located in the province of Ontario, with spill-over into Gatineau, Quebec.
A large part of Namadgi National Park is contained within the ACT, the Australian Capital Territory. The ACT was previously called the Federal Capital Territory and the Territory for the Seat of Government.
Ayutthaya, capital of a same-named Kingdom which conquered much of present-day Thailand and parts of Cambodia, had a population of about 1,000,000 in the early 18th century; it is considered to have been the largest city on the planet for a while. (Beijing was the other contender for largest city at that time, but lost population at the time of the Manchu conquest.)
The largest North American metropolitan areas by population and by country are:
► Mexico City, 6th largest in the world
► New York, 11th largest in the world
► Toronto, 45th largest in the world
In early Batman comic strips, he was based in New York. The editors didn’t want it to remain in an actual city, so Bill Finger renamed it “Gotham City.” “Gotham” was and still is a nickname for New York City.
The City of London is widely referred to simply as the City and is also colloquially known as the Square Mile, as it is 1.12 square miles in area. It constituted most of London from its settlement by the Romans in the 1st century AD to the Middle Ages. It is one of two districts of London to hold city status; the other is the adjacent City of Westminster.
In the San Francisco Bay Area there are at least three major cities, San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose. And yet San Francisco is often called “The City” by many locals. San Francisco is roughly a square, 7 miles on an edge. From the Golden Gate Bridge and Fisherman’s Wharf to the north, to the Bay Bridge and Pac Bell Park (okay, AT&T Park (sigh)) to the east, to the Cow Palace and Lake Merced to the south, and to the Great Highway and Golden Gate Park to the west, San Francisco is a neat 49 square miles.
The Golden Gate Bridge was badly damaged in a surprise attack by the hostile Breen during the Dominion War in an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
Workers on the Golden Gate Bridge were paid between $4 and $12 per day depending on the danger and how high up they worked. Once they were assigned their place for the day their day did not start until they climbed to it. The job was dangerous- 10 men were killed on a single day in February 1937- and there was nothing like the safety meaures or workman’s comp or insurance that would be required today, yet there was a long waiting list for even the most dangerous of assignments due to the massive unemployment in the area.
Unemployment in the US before and after the Great Depression averaged about 5%. But during the Great Depression it more than tripled to 17% in the 1930s, with a high of 22% in 1934.
The Trivia Dominoes game at SDMB was started February 4, 2010 and is now about half over. At this midpoint, there are 22 Dopers who have contributed 150 dominoes or more each. Elendil’s Heir leads with 3781 dominoes but Bullitt is coming up fast, has 3606 dominoes now and will probably pass Elendil’s Heir during 2016.
With Prof. Pepperwinkle’s interest apparently waning, septimus’ #14 spot may be secure for now.
Sara Gilbert appeared as Leslie Winkle on The Big Bang episodes that introduced both Wil Wheaton and Mayim Bialik as Amy Farrah Fowler. Counting Johnny Galecki as Leonard Hofstadter and Kaley Cuoco as Penny, those two shoes had four former child stars on them, and The Big Bang Theory’s cast has a total of five former child stars.
The best sellng pin-up poster in history was a photo taken in 1976. It sold 20 million posters of an actress in a one piece (not a two piece!) bathing suit. It is this one.
**Off game: **
How come? Is there a limit to the number of posts in a thread?
In play:
Norman Rockwell based the pose in his “Rosie the Riveter” poster on Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel portrayal of the prophet Isaiah.
Painter Norman Rockwell’s Stockbridge, Massachusetts studio was located on the second floor of a row of buildings; directly underneath Rockwell’s studio was, for a time in 1966, the Back Room Rest, immortalized by Arlo Guthrie in his song “Alice’s Restaurant.” During his time in Stockbridge, chief of police William “Obie” Obanhein was a frequent model for Rockwell’s paintings.
The final lyrics in Sweet Baby James by James Taylor are