Refresh for new random facts
1. The Burpee seed catalogue originally sold real chickens when first introduced by 17-year old Washington Atlee Burpee in 1876.
2. With 535, Edwin Land, inventor of the Polaroid camera, is second to only Thomas Edison for U.S. patents awarded for inventions...He trails him by a measly 558.
3. Wanamaker's of Philadelphia, was the first U.S. department store to install electric lighting, in 1878.
4. The last mass marketed 12 cylinder car produced in the United States was the 1948 Lincoln Continental.
5. Oil magnate John D. Rockefeller would be worth upwards of $300 Billion in today's dollars, adjusted for inflation.
6. Due to a family feud, the Waldorf-Astoria hotel was once two separate hotels built next to each other owned by John Jacob Astor IV and his cousin William Waldorf Astor.
7. IBM was founded by an ex employee of National Cash Register. The name International Business Machines was his attempt at one-upmanship.
8. American Express started off as a shipping company in 1850, shipping financial products across the United States; their first credit card wasn't issued until 1958.
9. The top three most valuable brands in the world in order of their value are Marlboro, Coca Cola and Budweiser.
10. Schoolboy Antonio Gentile of Suffolk, Virginia, received $5 for his winning drawing in a Planters Peanut 1916 contest. Mr. Peanut was born.
When me and old Abe used to sit by the fire he would tell me the darndest tales about this great land of ours.
