1988:last 8-track tape from a major label

The 8-track cartridge was a magnetic tape format, popular for music from the mid-1960s to the early 1980s. It was created by Bill Lear (the Lear Jet guy) in 1964. 8-tracks replaced a similar 4-track tape system, called Stereo-Pak, invented by Earl "Madman" Muntz (known for crazy car commercials and cheap TVs).

The tape within the 8-track cartridge was arranged in an "endless loop" and coated with a slippery material to minimize the friction where the tape rubbed against itself. The coating sometimes also caused the tape to slip, leading to poor speed control, which hurt the sound quality and made the cartridges unpopular with audiophiles.

The design allowed simple, cheap, and mobile players; but unlike a two-reel system, it didn't permit tape movement in both directions. Some players offered a limited fast-forward function, but rewinding was impossible.

The 8-track cartridge was briefly used for 4-channel "quadraphonic" recordings, but was made obsolete by the Compact Cassette, invented at Philips in 1963. The cassette was originally intended to be a monophonic dictation device with no consideration for high fidelity.

The stereo "Music" audio cassette (or Musicassette) was introduced in 1966, and became a practical high fidelity format with the addition of Dolby noise reduction in 1971. (Your editor attended the press conference where Dolby Labs first demonstrated cassettes with their noise reduction.)

Cassettes not only sounded better than 8-track tapes, they were much smaller, stored more music without breaks, and could be recorded in home recorders, which were uncommon in the 8-track format. During the transitional period in the 1980s, there were adapters that fit into automotive 8-track players to allow playback of cassettes without a big investment.

8-track players became less common in homes and automobiles as the 1970s went on. By the time the Compact Disc arrived in 1982, the 8-track had nearly disappeared. 8-tracks were phased out of retail stores by 1983.

There is a debate about the last commercially released 8-track by a major label, but many agree it was Fleetwood Mac's Greatest Hits in November 1988. Some 8-track titles were still available through record clubs until 1989. Many of these late-period releases are highly collectible due to the low numbers that were produced. Among the most rare is Stevie Ray Vaughan's Texas Flood. The record-club-only 8-track cartridge that seems to sell for the highest amount is The Police's The Singles, which has sold for over $200 for a single copy. Another highly sought-after title among collectors has been The Sex Pistols' Never Mind The Bollocks Here's The Sex Pistols, which has sold for over $100 for an open copy in average condition.

There was also a rare record club only 8-track box set of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's Live/1975-85, which is probably the only boxed set ever released on vinyl, cassette, compact disc and 8-track tape. There are reports of bootleg 8-track tapes being made in Mexico as late as 1995, and some independent artists released 8-track tapes as late as 2006. (info from Wikipedia & other sources)

1904:patent for electric plug and outlet

While watching through a window as a janitor cleaned behind some electrically-operated games in a penny arcade, Connecticut inventor Harvey Hubbell noted the tedious process required for disconnecting and reconnecting wires in order to move the equipment away from the wall.

The exasperated janitor had to detach each of the power supply wires from separate post terminals extending outward from the wall. After moving the games aside and sweeping the floor, the janitor then had to identify each wire and its proper terminal post, make each of the reconnections, and check them to avoid short circuits.

Hubbell got the idea to design a device with individual wires attached, allowing the user to easily connect and disconnect a game. He built three prototypes, which the janitor tested.

Later, Hubbell's "separable plug" design took shape on the drawing board, and was submitted to the patent office. Additional designs -- separable plugs in different configurations, a flush-mounted receptacle, cartridge fuses and fuse block, lamp holders, and sockets -- soon followed. (info from Hubbell, Inc.)

1922:first woman on a Supreme Court

Florence Ellinwood Allen (1884 - 1966) majored in music at Western Reserve University, then studied piano in Berlin while also working as a music journalist. After a nerve injury ended her music career, she returned to Cleveland to work as a music critic and a teacher.

Later, law became her main interest, and she received a Master of Arts in political science and constitutional law.

Rejected by Western Reserve's law school because of her sex, Allen attended the University of Chicago and New York University. After receiving her law degree, she was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1914, and successfully defended women's municipal voting before the Ohio Supreme Court.

Allen's career included several female firsts: her appointment as assistant county prosecutor in 1919; election as common pleas court judge in 1920, and as Ohio Supreme Court judge in 1922.

President Roosevelt appointed her as Judge of the United States 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in 1934. Later Roosevelt and Eisenhower both considered her for a Supreme Court appointment, but apparently the time wasn't right. In 1958, Allen became chief judge of the 6th Circuit, making her the first woman chief judge of a federal court. (info from The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History)

1975:McDonald's sings Big Mac song

In 1968, the Big Mac burger became available in the whole McDonald's chain, after being invented by Jim Delligatti, one of the first McDonald's franchisees.

Sales really took off in 1975, with a commercial featuring the famous tongue-twister: "Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun." The phrase is a listing of the Big Mac ingredients, and was often spoken rapidly as a single word in ads. The first commercials ran only a year and a half, but the tongue-twister remained popular beyond its TV life.

McDonald's revived the phrase in 2003. In a commercial in the "I'm lovin' it" campaign, a rapper rapidly recites the Big Mac ingredients. Also in 2003, there was a Big Mac Christmas ornament that played the jingle.

In the 2004 documentary Super Size Me, several women were interviewed who couldn't correctly recite the Pledge of Allegiance, but could accurately recite the slogan.

In the late 1990s, Burger King offered a near-copy of the Big Mac, originally called the Double Supreme Cheeseburger, but later renamed the Big King. Some Burger King employees used to sing the McDonald's jingle while assembling Big Kings. (Info from Wikipedia, McDonalds and other sources)

1992:Singapore bans chewing gum

Chewing gum causes problems in Singapore, apparently much bigger problems than elsewhere.

In 1983 a gum ban was proposed because of problems in public housing. Vandals stuffed used gum in mailboxes, inside keyholes and on elevator buttons. Chewing gum left on floors, stairways and pavements increased the cost of cleaning and damaged cleaning equipment. Gum stuck on the seats of public buses annoyed passengers.

Government leaders thought that a ban would be too drastic and did not take immediate action. In 1987, the Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system, began operation. It was then the largest public project ever implemented in Singapore, and expectations were high. Vandals stuck gum on the door sensors, preventing the doors from functioning properly and causing disruption of train service. In 1992, new Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong decided on a ban.

The import of chewing gum was immediately halted. A transition period was provided for stores to sell their their existing inventory, and then the sale was completely terminated. When first introduced, the ban caused controversy and some open defiance. Some people went to nearby Malaysia to buy gum. A few tried to bring back more than what is legally permitted. These offenders were publicly "named and shamed" to deter other would-be smugglers. As time passed and the uproar died down, Singaporeans became accustomed to the lack of chewing gum. There was no black market.

In the mid 1990s, Singapore’s forbidding laws began to receive intense international attention. The US media sensationalized the case of Michael P. Fay, an American teenager sentenced to caning for vandalism (spray paint, not chewing gum). At this time Singapore gained its infamous "nanny state" image, with actions of every citizen scrutinized and dictated by the government.

Singapore leaders responded that as a sovereign state, Singapore had the right to form policies based on its unique political and cultural values, and these policies result in greater overall benefits. When a BBC reporter suggested that overly draconian laws would stifle the people's creativity, an official retorted: "If you can't think because you can't chew, try a banana."

In 1999, US President Bill Clinton and Singapore Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong agreed to initiate talks for bilateral free trade. The talks continued during the Bush administration. By the final phase of negotiations in early 2003, there remained two sticky issues: the War in Iraq and chewing gum.

US officials requested that Singapore express support for US invasion of Iraq, which was readily agreed to. The US also demanded that Singapore lift the gum ban, because of lobbying for the Wrigley gum company. This caused a serious dilemma to Singapore leaders. They knew that the agreement would be a great boost to Singapore's economy and they could not afford to be delayed by the chewing gum issue; but giving in would make them look bad.

Singapore came up with a creative solution. They recognized the health benefits of certain gums, such as Wrigley's Orbit sugar-free gum that contains calcium lactate to strengthen tooth enamel, and Pfizer's smoke-stopping Nicorette gum. They allowed sales of these medicinal gums, by dentists and pharmacists, who record the names of buyers. (info from BBC and Wikipedia)

2006:end of world's oldest family business

Japanese construction company Kongo Gumi, which was founded in 578 by a family from the ancient Korean kingdom of Baekje, went into liquidation in January 2006.

The company started when carpenter Shigemitsu Kongo built the Shitennoji Temple in Osaka. Kongo had been invited to Japan by Prince Shotoku, a great Japanese cultural hero, who at the age of 16 brought about the adoption of Buddhism in the country.

Shigemitsu Kongo's descendants continuously maintained the family business, and the firm was named the world’s oldest company by the Economist magazine. The firm has been a symbol of “shinise,” Japan's family business culture.

In addition to the Shitennoji Temple, Kongo Gumi built the Horyuji Temple in Nara. Both are important examples of early Japanese architecture.

Due to heavy debts and a severe drop in the value of land Kongo Gumi had purchased in 1980s, the company decided to liquidate; and operation of the company was transferred to the Takamatsu Corporation. With the retirement of Masakazu Kongo, Kongo Gumi's firm’s 40th president, 1,400 years of history as a family firm came to an end.(info from Chosun and other sources; photo from Osaka COnvention & Tourism Bureau))

2019 (approximate)last American telephone renter dies

In the 1990s, AT&T (the real one, not the current one that used to be called SBC) wanted to sell phone gear to long distance companies like MCI and Sprint, who competed with AT&T. These companies were reluctant to spend money that would enrich their enemy, so AT&T split apart in 1996, and the new phone equipment operation was named Lucent Technologies.

Lucent wanted to concentrate on business customers, and sold its consumer phone rental business to North Street Consumer Phone Services, a subsidiary of Swiss banking giant UBS. North Street does business as AT&T Consumer Lease Services, with the old (pre SBC) AT&T logo.

In the mid-1980s, more than 30 million people were renting phones. Prior to the sale to North Street, Lucent spokesman Bill Price told me that 2.6 million people were renting 3.5 million telephones. By mid-2004, only about 970,000 households rented a phone, according to the Associated Press. Most phones now rent for $5-$10 per month, and some of them have been generating rental revenue for 40 years.

Most renters are poor, uneducated, elderly, or all three. The youngest phone renter is Louella Belle Firestone of Hope, Arkansas. She's 73, and will probably pay rent for another 12 years.

1978: first person born in Antarctica

Belief in the existence of a vast continent located in the far south of the Earth has existed since around the year 150. Ptolemy, the Greek astronomer, mathematician, geographer, and astrologer, suggested the idea in order to preserve symmetry of landmass in the world.

Depictions of a large southern landmass were common in maps in the early 16th century. The first confirmed sighting of Antarctica was in 1820, but there is disagreement about which of three ships got there first.

The magnetic south pole was first reached during an expedition led by British explorer Ernest Shackleton in 1907. Shackleton himself and three other members of his expedition made several firsts in 1908 and 1909: first humans to traverse the Ross Ice Shelf, first humans to traverse the Transantarctic Mountain Range, and first humans to set foot on the South Polar Plateau. In 1911, a party led by Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen became the first to reach the geographic south pole. It was not until 1956 that anyone set foot on the pole again, when a US Navy group led by Rear Admiral George Dufek landed a plane there.

Antarctica has no permanent residents, but several countries keep permanent research stations there. The population on Antarctica and nearby islands varies from about 4,000 in summer to 1,000 in winter. In 1978, Emilio Marcos Palma was the first person born on the Antarctic mainland. His parents were sent there with seven other Argentinean families to determine if family life was suitable on the continent. (info from PBS and Wikipedia, photo from NASA)

2007:first power-pimped electric scooter

Gary Elkies of West Haven CT bought a "Razor" electric scooter to save on gasoline and car maintenance expenses when commuting to work.

Unfortunately, the first time he tried to ride the Razor to work, he ended up walking about half of the five-mile distance, because the battery died.

Gary refused to be discouraged, and sought the services of AbleComm Automotive Engineering of Milford CT.

AbleComm outfitted the scooter with a marine battery housing, a second battery, and an A-B switch to select which battery sends power to the scooter's motor. There's also a digital meter with an illuminated display to monitor battery power while charging, and during the trip.

Unfortunately, the weather has been too cold to test the modified vehicle, so Gary's not sure if he'll be able to scoot to work.

1976:last American convertible (for a few years)

In the mid 1970s, it seemed like the American convertible would disappear, a victim to government safety concerns, sunroofs, T-tops and air conditioning. Chrysler and Ford had stopped making ragtops early in the decade, and by mid-decade GM was making just one, the huge bloated Cadillac Eldorado.

GM announced that there wouldn’t be a ’77 Eldorado convertible, and Caddy built the last 200 1976 models as an all-white "last American convertible" special edition. Speculators grabbed many of them, and carefully stashed them away in anticipation of re-selling them later at a huge profit.

GM, Cadillac, the speculators and the American auto industry, were wrong. Not only was the ’76 Eldo not the last American convertible, but it wasn’t even the last Eldorado convertible.

In 1980, Chrysler boss Lee Iacocca had a Chrysler coupe sent to a custom auto body shop in California, where it was rebuilt into a convertible. When Iacocca drove it around Boca Raton, Fla., in the winter of 1981, it won instant admirers. That limited market survey helped convince him that the potential demand for a revived convertible was bigger than anyone imagined.

From the moment they went on sale, the Chrysler LeBaron convertible and its sister car, the Dodge 400, were extremely successful: 24,000 were sold in 1982, vs. 3,000 projected by Chrysler. The four-seat LeBarons were snapped up by celebrities, moguls, babes, pimps, and ordinary folks looking to show off.

Iacocca's LeBaron got Detroit thinking topless once again and started the convertible renaissance. Now in the 21st century, convertibles are a basic part of the American car business, with a huge variety available from both American and foreign brands. (Info from Time & other sources)

1996:man begins perpetual erection

Charles "Chick" Lennon received a Dura-II penile implant in 1996, about two years before Viagra went on the market. The implant is designed to allow impotent men to position the penis upward for sex, then lower it. It consists of a series of plastic plates strung together with steel surgical wire, almost like a roll of wrapped coins. Springs press against the plates, creating enough surface tension to simulate an erection.

But Lennon could not position his penis downward. He said that because of a defective implant, he could no longer hug people, ride a bike, swim or wear bathing trunks because of the pain and embarrassment. He became a recluse and was uncomfortable being around his grandchildren, said his attorney Jules D'Alessandro. "I don't know any man who for any amount of money would want to trade and take my client's life. He's not a whole person."

Lennon cannot get the implant removed because of health problems, including open-heart surgery, the lawyer said. Impotence drugs could not help Lennon even if he were able to have the device taken out, because tissue had be to removed for it to be implanted.

In 2004, a jury awarded him $750,000. A judge called that excessive and reduced it to $400,000. Later the Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed that award in a ruling that turned on a procedural matter.

Dacomed maintained that nothing was wrong with the implant. Dacomed was later acquired by a California company whose sales dropped when Viagra was introduced. The company filed for bankruptcy the following year. The medical device maker's insurance company argued that since the device's now-defunct manufacturer, Dacomed Corp., can't be held liable for the device, it can't be either.

In a recent interview, Lennon said "I'm suffering with it right now", he said. "It never stops. It's like a constant headache." (info from The Associated Press)

2006:Nixon no longer worst president since WW2

President George W. Bush was named the worst president in the last 61 years by American voters -- with nearly twice the negative rating of Richard Nixon -- in a poll released by Quinnipiac University on Jun 1.

Bush was named by 34 percent of voters, followed by Richard Nixon at 17 percent and Bill Clinton at 16 percent, according to the poll. Leading the list for best President since 1945 is Ronald Reagan with 28 percent, followed by Clinton with 25 percent.

President Bush was ranked worst by 56 percent of Democrats, 35 percent of independent voters and 7 percent of Republicans, the University poll found. Best ranking for Reagan comes from 56 percent of Republicans, 7 percent of Democrats and 25 percent of independent voters. Among voters 18 - 29 years old, Clinton leads the "best" list with 40 percent.

"Democrats just plain don't like President Bush. His father, the 41st President, was voted out of the White House after one term. Nixon quit under fire. But most Democrats think Bush 43 wins the worst-president race," said Maurice Carroll, Director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

"Kennedy and Truman get big Democratic votes, especially among Baby Boomers (45 - 64 years old) and seniors (over 65), but recent memory counts," Carroll said. "Democrats say Clinton's the best and Republicans say he's the worst. Republicans don't think much of Jimmy Carter either. There's no contest for the GOP favorite: It's the Gipper."

1991:last Horn & Hardart Automat restaurant

In 1912, Philadelphians Joseph Horn and Frank Hardart made history in New York City when they opened the "Automat," a cafeteria with prepared foods behind small windows with coin-operated slots. It was like a giant walk-in vending machine.

Some items cost as little as a nickel. The Automats were particularly popular during the Depression; and their Macaroni and Cheese, Baked Beans, and Creamed Spinach were
popular offerings. Despite the low prices and lack of table service, the dining experience was somewhat luxurious, with Art Deco architecture that rivaled the lobby of the Chrysler Building.

Unlike modern fast food restaurants, Automat food was served on non-plastic dishes, with metal utensils, and drinks were in glasses.

A fast-fingered cashier sat in a change booth in the center of the restaurant, behind a wide marble counter. She accepted paper money and coins from customers, and give them nickels. A customer would insert the required number of coins in a slot, and then slide open a window to remove the food. The machines were filled from a kitchen behind the windows.

The Automats became the world's largest restaurant chain, with 180 eateries serving 800,000 customers a day at its peak. The company also popularized the notion of take-out food, with the slogan "Less work for Mother."

The format was threatened by the growth of suburbs and the rise of fast food restaurants with drive-thru windows in the 1950s. By the 1970s, Automat appeal was strictly nostalgic. Also, inflation made food too expensive to be bought conveniently with coins, before dollar bill slots were common.

The last American Automat closed in 1991.

In The Apartment (1960), Jack Lemmon tells Shirley MacLaine that he ate dinner at the Automat last Christmas.

"Diamonds are a Girl's Best Friend", sung by Marilyn Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), contains the line, "A kiss may be grand but won't pay the rental on your humble flat or help you at the Automat."

In That Touch of Mink (1962), Audrey Meadows stocks the machines in an Automat.

In Hercules in New York (1970), Arnold Schwarzenegger as Hercules declares the food he got at a New York City Automat is "fit for the Gods".

Face The Music, a 1932 musical, featured Irving Berlin's "Let's Have Another Cup Of Coffee," a song celebrating the automat.

Want to know more, and have the recipes for Automat macaroni and cheese, chicken pot pie, and other favorites? CLICK to buy a book co-authored by Frank Hardart's great granddaughter, Marianne Hardart

2006:"planet" is defined, and Pluto isn't one

Pluto was discovered in 1930 by American astronomer Clyde Tombaugh. It was regarded as the ninth planet from the sun in our Solar System.

Astronomers later found many similar objects in the outer solar system, and on August 24, 2006 the International Astronomical Union defined the term "planet" for the first time. Their definition excluded Pluto, which was then reclassified under the new category of dwarf planet.

Pluto is smaller than several of the moons in our solar system, and approximately one-fifth the mass of Earth's moon.

Pluto is primarily composed of rock and ice.

Pluto is now classified as the prototype of a family of trans-Neptunian objects.

Walt Disney's Pluto is still classified as a dog.

The American Dialect Society voted “plutoed” as the 2006 word of the year. To pluto is to demote or devalue someone or something, as happened to the former planet Pluto

1841: beginning and end of shortest US presidency

William Henry Harrison was president only 30 days, 11 hours and 30 minutes. He was the first president to die in office, and served the shortest term of any American president

When Harrison arrived in Washington, he wanted to show that he was still the mighty hero of the Battle of Tippecanoe. He took the oath of office on March 4, 1841, an extremely cold and windy day. He wore no overcoat and delivered the longest inaugural address in American history. It took nearly two hours to read, even after his friend Daniel Webster had shortened it.

Harrison later caught a cold, which then got much worse. His doctors tried everything, applying opium, castor oil, plants, and even snakes. The treatments made Harrison worse and he went into delirium. He died on April 4, 1841, of pneumonia, jaundice, and septicemia.

When Harrison died, there was no 25th Amendment to the Constitution to specify the vice president's actions when the president became disabled or when there was a vacancy before the end of the incumbent's term.

An episode of the fourth season of The Simpsons, "I Love Lisa", includes a song titled "We are the Mediocre Presidents", which was a tribute to lesser-known presidents. It included the lyric: "There's Taylor, there's Tyler, there's Fillmore and there's Hayes. There's William Henry Harrison, 'I died in thirty days!'"

According to a legend which has no historical basis, Tecumseh (who was defeated by Harrison at the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811), placed a curse on Harrison, claiming that every president elected in a year ending with zero (which happens every 20 years) would die in office. Harrison, Lincoln (elected 1860), Garfield (elected 1880), McKinley (elected 1900), Harding (elected 1920), Roosevelt (elected 1940), and Kennedy (elected 1960) all died in office, falling prey to the Curse of Tecumseh, sometimes called the "zero-year curse." Ronald Reagan, elected in 1980, broke the curse, though there was an assassination attempt on Reagan in 1981.

Harrison is the first -- but not the only -- American president to have no military vessel named after him. (info from Wikipedia)

1969:ARPAnet (father of Internet) is born

The Internet started as ARPAnet, and it was designed to fight a nuclear war, not to download porn or upload movies.

In the Cold War 1960s, Washington was worried that a nuclear attack would disrupt communications and hinder the Pentagon's ability to fight back. The Department of Defense started a project to develop survivable communications.

The Department's agency that dealt with futuristic research was (and is) ARPA, the Advanced Research Projects Agency. It was interested in survivable communications and in computer networking, and created the ARPAnet, the precursor to the Internet.

Originally linking four universities, the ARPAnet came online in 1969. One major difficulty was getting computers from different makers and using different operating systems to communicate. This led to the now-standard TCP/IP communication protocols.

Today, information is transmitted through networks, as it was in those early days. It's broken up into small packets, which are sent via whichever route is least busy, and reassembled at the destination. Information can successfully pass through a damaged network and needs no centralized control, providing the survivability that the Pentagon wanted.

The ARPAnet very quickly spread to other computer research facilities. In 1971, an email program was created, and in 1972, the @-symbol began designating where someone was 'at'.

The ARPAnet was extremely successful at a secondary goal: increased communication among researchers. Emailing lists took off on a wide variety of topics, and were not limited to computer science. One of the earliest and busiest lists was for sci-fi fans.

Soon universities who did not have Pentagon research contracts realized the need to have a similar network and CSNET was born. Commercial service providers such as AOL, Prodigy and Compuserve soon followed, and the boom was on. When adoption of http (hypertext transmission protocols) created the World Wide Web, the Internet was fully formed.

When the original ARPAnet was finally shut down in 1990, the Internet was so widespread that its end was barely noticed. (info from WiseGeek)

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If you want to learn more about the early days of the Internet, I strongly recommend Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins Of The Internet by Katie Hafner

1391?first toilet paper

Behinds have needed to be cleaned since human beings started living in groups. Our ancestors used grass, leaves, fur, moss, seashells, corncobs, stones and pieces of clay. Ancient Roman public toilets had a stick with a sponge attached to its end that soaked in a bucket of brine.

Using a wet hand is common in India and Muslim countries, where people use their left hand to clean themselves and their right hand for eating or greeting. In parts of Africa, though, the reverse is true, and a right-handed handshake could be considered rude. Some Indians and Middle Eastern people are disgusted by dry toilet paper because they feel washing is absolutely necessary.

• In the court of Henry VII of England, the Groom of the Stool was given the job of cleaning the royal anus by hand.
• Real toilet paper, made specifically for butt wiping, goes back at least to the late 14th Century, when Chinese emperors ordered it in large sheets.
• Pages torn from newspapers and magazines were commonly used in outhouses in the early American West. The Sears catalogue was well-known for this purpose, and the Farmer's Almanac had a hole in it so it could be hung on a hook and the pages torn off easily.
• Joseph C. Gayetty of New York started producing the first packaged toilet paper in the U.S. in 1857. It consisted of pre-moistened flat sheets medicated with aloe.
• Modern rolled and perforated toilet paper was invented around 1880. Various sources attribute it to the Albany Perforated Wrapping Paper Company in 1877, and to the Scott Paper company in 1879 or 1890. Scott was too embarrassed to put their name on their product, as the concept of toilet paper was a sensitive subject at the time; so they customized it for their customers. Waldorf (Hotel) became a big name in toilet paper.
• In 1935, Northern Tissue advertised "splinter-free" toilet paper. Early paper production techniques sometimes left splinters embedded in the paper.
• In 1942, St. Andrew's Paper Mill in Great Britain introduced two-ply toilet paper.
• The Great Toilet Paper Shortage occurred in 1973 after Tonight Show host Johnny Carson joked that there was an acute shortage in the US. The next morning, 20 million people bought all the toilet paper they could find. By noon, most stores were sold out. (info from Great Northern, Wikipedia, Nobody's Perfect)

1849:first Chinese restaurant in the US

In China, there are about 300 McDonalds restaurants; but in the US, where there are about 13,000 McDonaldses, there are more than 40,000 Chinese eateries.

McDonalds opened in China in late 2005, but apparently the first US Chinese restaurant was opened in 1849 in San Francisco.

Chinese food arrived in America in the mid-1800s with laborers imported to work the California gold rush. By the 1890s, Chinese restaurants had opened in big cities on both coasts. Most early Chinese immigrants were from Canton, in southern China, and brought that city's cuisine. As Chinese cooks adapted to their new land, they came up with new dishes, including chop suey, chow mein, egg foo young, and the fortune cookie.

Chinese restaurateurs, aware of how intimidating the new cuisine could be, encouraged ordering "family style" and devised the "one from Column A, one from Column B" system to simplify selection. Chinese restaurants also welcomed blacks and Jews when other establishments shunned them. Christmas dinner at a Chinese restaurant is still a tradition for many American Jewish families.

Chinese-American cuisine changed after 1965, when increased immigration from Asia was permitted. Spicier Sichuan and Hunan dishes from northern Chinese provinces, began replacing former Cantonese favorites. New immigrants sought opportunities throughout the US. For example, in 1971 there were 28 Chinese restaurants in Utah. Now there are more than 250. (info from U.S. News & World Report, and other sources)

1604first known British babysitter

Since the earliest days, humans have relied on relatives and neighbors to watch over children, when adults had to hunt, tend the crops, make war or make love.

By the 15th century, royalty and other wealthy families in Europe were employing live-in nannies to watch over their children.

The babysitter, employed for a few hours rather than full-time, was a more recent development. The first known sitter was Abigail Greel, born in 1592 in Upton-on-Thrum in central England.

Her diary, now in the British Museum, records that she was paid three pence on November 14, 1604 to watch eight-year-old Harold Busby, while his parents saw a performance of Shakespeare's As You Like It. William Shakespeare himself was in the cast, acting as the ghost of Hamlet's father.

1874: the spork is patented

It is believed that the modern spork, a combined spoon and fork made of disposable plastic, was introduced by Kentucky Fried Chicken for eating coleslaw in the early 1970s; but this fast-food fixture actually goes back to Medieval times. Ancient sporks, however, were not called sporks, weren't made of plastic, and didn't look like modern sporks.

In England, the Folgate Silver Plate Company made sporks sometime between 1875 and 1900. In the US, various patents for sporks and proto-sporks have been issued over the years. A combined spoon, fork, and knife closely resembling the modern spork was invented by Samuel W. Francis and patented in 1874. Other early patents predating the modern spork include a "Cutting spoon", granted in 1908 and a spoon with a tined edge in 1912. These design patents do not prevent others from designing and manufacturing their own version of a spork. Modern US patents for sporks were granted in 1978 and 1998.

The word spork originated in the early 1900s to describe such devices. According to a December 20, 1952 New York Times article, Hyde W. Ballard of Westtown, Pennsylvania filed an application to register "Spork" as a trademark for a combination spoon and fork made of stainless steel. The Van Brode Milling Company registered SPORK for a combination plastic spoon, fork and knife in 1970, but abandoned the registration.

While the most common sporks are plastic throwaways, some are more durable, including lightweight titanium sporks for camping. Several recent spork-like utensils have the spoon and fork on opposite ends, and others have knife-like cutting edges. (some info from Wikipedia)