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Who’s yere?
US states all have nicknames. It’s not clear why a state needs a nickname, and some of them, like New Mexico’s (“the land of enchantment”) sound like the product of a marketing meeting in the state capital. Many of the nicknames come from some aspect of the history of the state — or even the Continue reading
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August 19
Carl Fisher was born in Indianapolis in 1874. Not today; his birthday was in January. He joined in the bicycle craze of the late 1800s and opened a bike shop. By the early 20th century the shop was doing pretty well, and Fisher’s new enthusiasm was for those new horseless carriages. He saw a big Continue reading
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K-L-M-N-O-P
Oh…K The letter K is somewhat underused in English. Its sound is often usurped by a hard C and even, in some cases, X. The K section of dictionaries is one of the thinner chapters. There are nevertheless some interesting words lurking in there. One of the best is also one of the most obscure, Continue reading
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August 18
Pierre Janssen, who was an astronomer, discovered helium on August 18, 1868. Wait, you ask, what is an astronomer doing discovering a chemical element? Ah, that’s the right question. Not only did Janssen discover helium, he was the first person in history to discover a new element, but not on Earth. In fact, at the Continue reading
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Eccentricities
The Victorian Era, at least when it’s depicted in fiction, boasts any number of charming eccentrics; generally upper-class British gentlemen enjoying, shall we say, “interesting” hobbies. Besides current steampunk-genre characters, Philias Fogg (who traveled around the word in 80 days) and Caractacus Potts (who built Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang, the magic car) are a couple of good examples. Continue reading
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August 17
Those are the original Seven Commandments of Animalism, as espoused by Squealer and Napoleon, the two leaders of the revolution at Manor Farm. The world found out the whole story on August 17, 1945, when George Orwell’s Animal Farm was first published. As you might remember, it was a story about a revolution that didn’t Continue reading
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May I inquire how you spell “enquire”?
In 1616 (or thereabouts), Shakespeare included this in his play Coriolanus: “You must enquire your way.” Then in 1633, Joseph Hall wrote a book (with one of those absurdly long 17th century titles), in which he wrote: “To inquire my interpretation of this dreame.” Ever since, some people have been using “enquire” where others think it ought to be “inquire,” Continue reading
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Vincenzo Coronelli, August 16
There are different ways to look at globes — that is, three-dimensional representations of the earth. They can be political guides, showing you where the nations and borders are. They can be geographical or oceanographical tools. And they can be works of art. The globes made by Vincenzo Coronelli, who was born August 16, 1650 Continue reading
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Paul Rand, August 15
You may have noticed how often you see sans-serif typefaces like Helvetica in corporate publications? Not to mention photos rather than drawings. Typography as a design element. Asymmetric layouts that use a grid. Those all come from the International Typographic Style, a school of graphic design dating back to the 1930s. If you’ve heard of Continue reading
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Deliquescent
In 1876 Mortimer Collins referred to “The dusty and deliquescent pedestrian.” In 1845, Charles Darwin noted “Those salts answer best for preserving cheese which contain most of the deliquescent chlorides.” In 1874 Mordecai Cubitt Cooke pointed out that “It is very difficult to observe the structure of the hymenium, on account of its deliquescent nature.” And in 1866, in a textbook Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. I shouldn’t be surprised, but she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my other blog, Techlimitics, where I’m grappling with the nature of simplicity.
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