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Thomas Edison invented the concept of the job interview.

Thomas Edison laboratory
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Author Kerry Hinton
May 29, 2024

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Although Thomas Edison was awarded 2,332 worldwide patents as an inventor, one of his lasting contributions to modern society was not proprietary: the job interview. Edison was not just a prolific inventor — he was also a businessman in charge of an industrial empire. His corporation, Thomas A. Edison, Inc., employed more than 10,000 workers at dozens of companies. Edison wanted employees who could memorize large quantities of information and also make efficient business decisions. To find them, he devised an extensive questionnaire to assess job candidates’ knowledge and personality.

Edison began using tests for candidate assessment in the late 19th century, but the questions he asked then were very specific to open positions he needed filled. Over time, he expanded on the idea, including questions that were not directly related to the job. While interviewing research assistants, for example, Edison served them soup to see if interviewees would season the soup before they tasted it; those who did were automatically disqualified as it suggested they were prone to operate on assumptions. In 1921, Edison debuted the Edison Test, a knowledge test with more than 140 questions. Questions varied depending on the job position, but all interviewees were asked about information outside of their areas of expertise. The queries ranged from agricultural in nature (“Where do we get prunes from?”) to commercial (“In what cities are hats and shoes made?”) to the macabre (“Name three powerful poisons”). After a copy of the questionnaire was leaked to The New York Times, Edison had to change the question bank multiple times to ensure applicants took the exam without any outside assistance.

A score of 90% was required to pass, and out of the 718 people who had taken the test as of October 1921, only 32 (just 2%!) succeeded. The test was difficult, to say the least. Edison’s own son Theodore failed it while a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). More famously, Albert Einstein failed the exam because he forgot the speed of sound. The 1920s saw an upswing in college-educated people in the workforce, leading to increased competition for skilled labor, and thus more applicants for employers to choose from. Edison’s strategy of questioning candidates to assess their personality and aptitude was innovative at the time, and is still standard practice today — though employers are more likely to ask about someone’s greatest accomplishment than the origins of prunes.

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A World War I questionnaire helped pave the way for the Edison Test.

Thomas Edison wasn’t the only person interested in the idea of screening people for specific roles. During World War I, psychologist Robert S. Woodworth developed the Woodworth Personal Data Sheet, a 125-question questionnaire used to determine a recruit’s likelihood of succumbing to shell shock, a term coined by soldiers and now known as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. Woodworth’s Psychoneurotic Inventory, as it was also known, was eventually commissioned by the American Psychological Association and is considered to be the great-grandparent of today’s personality tests.

The first woman in space forgot her toothbrush.

Tereshkova in space
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Author Michael Nordine
June 11, 2024

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We’ve all had that moment of panic upon realizing we left something important at home, but most of us have at least been on planet Earth when it happened. The first woman in space wasn’t so lucky: Valentina Tereshkova went without a toothbrush during her three days aboard the Vostok-6 spacecraft in 1963. To be fair, it wasn’t her fault. Mission control was actually in charge of packing the essentials, as the pioneering cosmonaut had other, presumably more scientific, things to focus on. In any case, she didn’t seem too bothered by the oversight: “I was resourceful, as any woman would be,” she said in 2015. “I had my hands and water.” Any kid who’s slept over at a friend’s house without planning for it in advance can relate.

More than six decades later, Tereshkova remains the only woman to have piloted a solo mission to space; five other women were trained for the mission, but the then-26-year-old was ultimately chosen. “A bird cannot fly with one wing only,” she has said of her historic role. “Human spaceflight cannot develop any further without the active participation of women.” Sally Ride became the first American woman in space (and the third overall after Svetlana Savitskaya) 20 years later in 1983; not having heard anything to the contrary in the decades since, we can safely presume that she had her toothbrush with her.

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There are golf balls on the moon.

Astronaut Alan Shepard may not have been the first person on the moon, but he was the first to take one small shot for golf and one giant swing for golfkind. Part of the Apollo 14 mission, which made its lunar landing on February 5, 1971, Shepard was also a golfer who brought his hobby all the way to our humble planet’s only natural satellite — along with a makeshift club fashioned partly from a sample-collection device. He took two shots, claiming that the second went “miles and miles.” The United States Golf Association (USGA) later put the actual distance of his two strokes at about 24 yards and 40 yards, respectively — not enough to land him a spot on the PGA Tour, perhaps, but fairly impressive when you remember that the stiff spacesuit Shepard was wearing (in low gravity, no less) forced him to swing with one arm.

A 1920s millionaire started a baby-making race known as the Great Stork Derby.

Stork Derby entrant with 16 children
Credit: Toronto Star Archives via Getty Images
Author Sarah Anne Lloyd
November 20, 2025

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When Canadian lawyer, investor, and known practical joker Charles Vance Millar died in October 1926 with no heirs, he left a slew of social experiments in his will, including bequeathing a home to multiple people who hated each other and leaving shares of a Catholic brewery to Protestant ministers. But the bulk of his fortune went toward his most bizarre and impactful postmortem project: granting around $500,000 CAD ($9 million CAD in today’s money) to whichever Toronto woman had the most babies in the decade following his death. 

The “Great Stork Derby,” as reporters eventually called it, got off to a slow start. In 1932, the Ontario Legislature tried to transfer the money to the University of Toronto instead, prompting both outrage and publicity. The baby race moved forward and became a media frenzy, and families covered in the press dealt with multiple kidnapping threats and scamming attempts.

In 1936, several mothers, along with a couple of Millar’s distant relatives hoping to nullify the contest, started a two-year court battle to decide who took home the cash. In 1938, four mothers, each with nine children born within the time frame, were determined the winners, and were awarded $100,000 CAD (about $2 million CAD today) each. 

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A wealthy lumber magnate kept his heirs from inheriting for nearly a century.

Lumber baron Wellington R. Burt was one of the wealthiest men in the United States when he died in 1919 with a fortune of up to $90 million. He left most of his children and some of his staff a small annual pension, but Burt made sure they’d never see a dime beyond that. Due to family strife, he stipulated in his will that the vast majority of his wealth would be held until 21 years after the death of his last grandchild. That tied up the money for 92 years, and 12 descendants split the remaining $110 million in 2011.

The Vikings reached North America before Columbus.

Viking explorers
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Author Michael Nordine
June 6, 2024

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Though the idea that Christopher Columbus discovered America has long been taken as fact, the famous explorer did no such thing. Not only were Indigenous people already living in North America, but the Vikings reached the continent long before Columbus did. Led by Leif Erikson, a group of Norse explorers arrived on these shores in 1021, nearly 500 years before Columbus’ 1492 journey. The two expeditions do have one thing in common, however: Erikson probably wasn’t looking for America either.

There are two main accounts of the Norse journey to North America. The Saga of Erik the Red (Erikson’s father) suggests the explorer made his way across the Atlantic by accident en route from Norway to Greenland. The Saga of the Greenlanders, meanwhile, claims it was indeed intentional. Having heard about the strange new land from Bjarni Herjólfsson, an Icelandic trader who had seen North America but not set foot on it after overshooting Greenland on a journey of his own a decade earlier, Erikson was inspired to make the voyage himself. Upon his successful arrival in present-day Canada, he named it “Helluland” — Old Norse for “Stone Slab Land.” It’s believed that this was Baffin Island, which certainly fits the description.

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The word “Viking” means “pirate raid.”

If you’ve ever thought that the word “Viking” sounds like a verb, you might be onto something. Though the origins are disputed, the word likely comes from the Old Norse “vīk,” referring to a bay or inlet. (Anyone who’s been to Iceland will recognize the root word, as the country of fire and ice’s capital is Reykjavík and its southernmost village is simply Vík.) This evolved into “viking,” which roughly translates to “pirate raid.” Not all Vikings were pirates — many were humble farmers who may well have resented their people’s reputation for pillaging villages — but those who did engage in the pastime were said to be “going a-viking.”

Russian stores ran out of vodka celebrating the end of World War II.

Victory Day in Russia, 1945
Credit: Archive Collection/ Alamy Stock Photo
Author Michael Nordine
November 20, 2025

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“Vodka is our enemy,” an old Russian proverb begins, “so we’ll utterly consume it.” That was never truer than at the end of World War II, when the country celebrated its hard-fought victory to such an extent that it reportedly ran out of its favorite spirit. It didn’t take long, either: By the time Joseph Stalin delivered his victory address 22 hours after a massive nationwide party began, the vodka reserves had already been depleted in some stores. 

“We drank for the victory, for those who did not live to see this day and for the fact that this bloody massacre would never be repeated,” a naval navigator named Nikolai Kryuchkov reportedly recalled. “On May 10, it was impossible to buy vodka in Moscow, because it was completely drunk.”

Like most supplies, vodka was scarce by the end of the war. The Soviet Union suffered the heaviest losses of any country in the world, stretching resources dangerously thin as soldiers and civilians alike struggled to endure. Soldiers received the “commissar’s ration” of 100 grams of vodka per day and production of the spirit never stopped, but it was in short supply.

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Vodka was used as currency in 1990s Russia.

The dissolution of the Soviet Union wasn’t exactly a smooth process. Hyperinflation soared as the economy contracted by nearly 50%, resulting in the once-mighty ruble becoming nearly worthless. Many Russians began exchanging American dollars, German marks, and British pounds for goods and services, a practice that was banned in 1993. As a result, a kind of barter system emerged in which one of the country’s most reliable goods became a new currency: vodka. “A repairman will yawn if you offer 20 rubles to get the car fixed or a ceiling plugged,” a 1991 Baltimore Sun article explained about the “liquid currency.” “But if you offer a bottle of vodka, the job gets done.” The practice waned as the economy slowly stabilized in the 21st century.

Mail was delivered up to 12 times a day in Victorian England.

Postman, 1867
Credit: World History Archive/ Alamy Stock Photo
Author Michael Nordine
November 20, 2025

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Instant messaging may be a relatively new invention, but staying in touch in the 19th century wasn’t as difficult as you might expect. In Victorian England, for instance, mail delivery was near-constant — up to 12 times a day in London. In 1889, the first deliveries went out at 7:30 a.m. and the last at 7:30 p.m., with Londoners so used to instant gratification that many complained if a letter took more than two hours to arrive. Birmingham, England, meanwhile, received the post only six times a day — perish the thought.

This frequency was made possible in part by legislation that created a flat rate for postal service and introduced the first adhesive postage stamp, meaning people could send a letter weighing half an ounce or less to any destination in Britain for a penny. In the U.S., mail carriers heeded a clause in Section 92 of the 1873 Postal Laws and Regulations requiring them to make deliveries “as frequently as the public convenience may require.” In most places, that meant twice a day — a practice that ended for most residential areas in 1950, though some parts of New York City enjoyed twice-daily mail delivery until the 1990s. 

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Victoria was Britain’s longest-reigning monarch until Elizabeth II.

At 63 years and 216 days, Victoria’s reign as queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland spanned the better part of a century. She ruled from June 20, 1837, until her death on January 22, 1901. Just 18 years old when she took the throne, her tenure defined 19th-century England — and broke the record previously held by George III, whose 59-year reign (1760-1820) is best remembered in the U.S. for being on the losing side of a certain revolution. Queen Elizabeth II overtook Victoria as Britain’s longest-reigning monarch on September 9, 2015, and held the throne another seven years after that. She died in 2022 at age 96 after serving for 70 years and 214 days.

Turkeys were named after the wrong country.

Wild turkey, 19th century
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Author Bess Lovejoy
November 20, 2025

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Turkeys — the quintessential American bird — owe their name to a centuries-old case of mistaken identity. When Spanish explorers arrived in Mexico in the 1500s, they encountered a plump, impressively feathered bird that the Aztecs had long domesticated and called huexolotl. The Spaniards brought these birds back to Europe, where they quickly became a hit on farms and dinner tables.

So why do we call them “turkeys”? Possibly because Europeans had already encountered a somewhat similar bird, the African guinea fowl, which reached Europe earlier via trade routes controlled by the Ottoman Empire of the Turks. Because of that connection, guinea fowl were known as “Turkey cocks” or “Turkey hens.” So when the new, American bird arrived in Europe, people may have assumed it came from the same place and gave it the same name. However, some sources say the bird’s name arose simply because at the time, the Ottoman Empire was at its peak, and Europeans were apt to designate all new imports as “Turkish.” 

Either way, the misnomer stuck. But while English speakers called the bird a “turkey,” in other languages the geolinguistic confusion multiplied. The French dubbed it coq d’Inde — “rooster of India” — thinking it came from the Indies. In Portuguese it became a peru, in Malay a “Dutch chicken,” and in Turkish, tellingly, a hindi, meaning “from India.” Everyone, it seems, thought the bird came from somewhere else. But when your Thanksgiving feast is served up, the people you actually want to thank aren’t the Turks; they’re the Aztecs.

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Calling things “Turkish” was all the rage in 16th-century England.

In the mid-1500s, the Ottoman Empire was at the height of its power, and to many Europeans, “Turkey” was synonymous with exotic trade goods and faraway luxury. The English, in particular, had a habit of slapping the word “Turkish” on things that were new or foreign to them. Maize was called “Turkish wheat,” pumpkins were “Turkish cucumbers,” and even patterned textiles were described as “Turkish” to lend them an air of sophistication. (“Turkish delight” candy, however, didn’t appear on the scene until the 19th century, and ditto “Turkish dress” to mean bloomers.) In a sense, the turkey’s misnaming captures the European imagination of the 16th century — a time when the world seemed vast, trade was booming, and everyone wanted a touch of the “Turkish” mystique.

The U.S. had a lost state called Franklin.

Map of U.S. state Franklin
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Author Sarah Anne Lloyd
November 13, 2025

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After the American Revolutionary War, the 13 colonies once under British rule became the first 13 U.S. states. But the actual borders of the fledgling country weren’t set in stone. European settlers had started to drift westward past Appalachia, and the Continental Congress was divided on how to handle the expansion. It was amid this postwar confusion that the state of Franklin was born, located on Overhill Cherokee land between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River.

The four-county region, which is now part of Tennessee, was originally part of North Carolina before the state ceded the land to Congress. The settlers who lived there worried the land would be sold off to Spain or France to pay off war debt, so North Carolina tried to retract its decision. Rather than wait to see how that shook out, the settlers formed their own state, originally called “Frankland” but later changed to “Franklin,” and petitioned to have it included in the union. That effort failed, so the people of Franklin took a big leap.

On August 23, 1784, Franklin declared independent statehood; its residents wrote their own constitution, appointed a president, and negotiated treaties with Indigenous peoples. The state even instituted its own currency-free barter system — but its economy was so weak that it was forced to approach Spain for aid. With no federal recognition and facing financial instability, Franklin officially rejoined North Carolina in 1789.

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Vermont used to be an independent republic.

Before U.S. independence, the land that is now Vermont was hotly, sometimes violently contested territory, with both New York and New Hampshire laying claim. In 1777, with the Revolutionary War already underway, Vermont declared itself an independent republic with its own constitution. Despite the Green Mountain State securing some key victories in the war, Congress was reluctant to grant it statehood, so Vermont opened talks with the British about joining Canada. Congress eventually relented, and Vermont became the 14th U.S. state in 1791.

Dodo meat was considered disgusting by the people who ate it.

Dodo bird from G. Edwards "A Natural History of Uncommon Birds"
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Author Michael Nordine
November 11, 2025

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Dodos have long been synonymous with extinction for centuries, but they weren’t hunted because they were tasty. The small, flightless birds, which evolved on Mauritius without any natural predators and were unafraid of humans as a result, departed this mortal coil more than 300 years ago due to a combination of factors including deforestation, destruction of their nests by invasive species, and hunting. The Dutch soldiers who first encountered the humble dodo sometime around 1600 were not kind to this strange bird. After killing them en masse, the Dutch didn’t even enjoy the resulting meal.

The stew the soldiers made from dodo meat was described as “offensive and of no nourishment,” according to BBC science writer Helen Pilcher, due to the fact that it was tough and oily. The creatures themselves, meanwhile, were referred to as walchvögel, meaning “repulsive bird.” That didn’t stop the Dutch from killing and eating the birds to extinction less than a century after arriving on Mauritius, however. Dodos have had a reputation for stupidity and haplessness ever since, though in recent years some scientists have challenged those notions and suggested that the dodo got a bad rap.

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Some scientists are working to “de-extinct” dodos.

The de-extinction company Colossal Laboratories & Biosciences, which also made headlines for its efforts to resurrect woolly mammoths and dire wolves, has announced its plans to bring back the dodo. It has so far succeeded in growing pigeon primordial germ cells and plans to use gene-edited chickens as surrogates for the new dodos. “These flightless islanders were simple in neither body nor mind, contrary to popular belief,” the company website states. “In reality, they were merely unaware of the dangers posed by predatory animals, because for the majority of their existence, dodos hadn’t encountered any.” Not everyone is convinced bringing back the bird is a good idea, but Colossal has made impressive strides in its other de-extinction efforts — including, most notably, by developing a woolly mouse.

Abraham Lincoln was the first historical figure to appear on a U.S. coin.

Lincoln 1 cent coin, 1909
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Author Michael Nordine
November 11, 2025

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As one of the most revered presidents in American history, Abraham Lincoln has been honored in countless ways. That includes the penny, which was the first U.S. coin to feature a historical figure of any kind. The Lincoln penny was first issued in 1909 to honor what would have been the president’s 100th birthday. The original 1-cent piece, which was made of pure copper and introduced in the 1790s, featured a female figure symbolizing liberty and was nearly 50% larger than its modern counterpart. The size shrank in 1856 when the composition changed to 88% copper and 12% nickel; this was also when the flying eagle design was introduced.

Today’s pennies are made of copper and zinc and still feature Honest Abe, though there have been several variations. Due to a copper shortage during World War II, pennies were briefly made of zinc-coated steel. Then, in 2009, Lincoln’s bicentennial was celebrated with four new variants of the penny marking different eras of his life on the reverse side: his birth and early childhood in Kentucky, his formative years in Indiana, his professional life in Illinois, and finally his presidency. However, the U.S. Treasury announced its plan to end production of the penny in 2025, citing the high cost of production: One penny costs more than 3 cents to make.

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Lincoln was the first president not born in one of the original 13 colonies.

In addition to his many other firsts, Abraham Lincoln, the 16th U.S. president, was also the first president born outside of the original 13 colonies. Lincoln was born in a one-room log cabin in LaRue County, Kentucky, now preserved as part of the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park. Of the first 15 presidents, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, and Zachary Taylor were all born in Virginia. John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams were born in Massachusetts; Martin Van Buren and Millard Fillmore were born in New York; Franklin Pierce was born in New Hampshire; James Buchanan was born in Pennsylvania; James K. Polk was born in North Carolina; and Andrew Jackson was born in Waxhaws, an area that crossed the boundaries of present-day North and South Carolina. Woodrow Wilson is the only commander in chief to have been born in Virginia since Taylor, but it remains the state that claims the most presidents to this day.

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