Uncle John’s Curiously Compelling Bathroom Reader (13 page)

The earliest known will was written in 2550 B.C.

THE RADIO CRAZE

Radio started slowly at first and then exploded. In 1921 only eight more radio stations received licenses to broadcast; by the end of 1922 another 550 stations around the country were on the air. Now that there was something to listen to, Americans began buying radios as fast as manufacturers could make them. Sales went from almost none in 1920 to $60 million in 1922; they more than doubled in 1923 and doubled again in 1924, and kept climbing after that. By 1926 radios were a $500 million business.

Another important development paralleled the tremendous growth in radio sales: the linking of individual radio stations—first into regional “chains,” as they were called, and then into national networks. AT&T started the trend in 1923 when engineers figured out how to link the company’s 18 radio stations by telephone lines so that a program originating in one station could be broadcast simultaneously over every station in the network. By 1924 AT&T was broadcasting from coast to coast.

In 1926 AT&T sold its radio stations to the Radio Corporation of America (RCA), which combined them with its own stations to form the National Broadcasting Company (NBC). The founding of NBC is considered the start of the golden age of radio.

The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) network was formed in 1927, and a third network—Mutual Broadcasting—went on the air in 1934. In the early 1940s, an anti-trust decision by the Supreme Court forced NBC to split into two independent companies. One part was sold off to Lifesavers president Edward J. Noble in 1943 and was renamed the American Broadcasting Company (ABC).

That was just the beginning for radio. For more on the little box’s Golden Age, turn the dial to
page 269
.

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“It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.” —
Walt Disney

It’s against the law to run out of gas in Youngstown, Ohio.

TOY FADS

The Federal Communications Commission used to have a rule banning children’s TV shows based on existing commercial characters or toys. The reasoning was that kids are impressionable, and such TV shows would just be long ads. But in 1982, the FCC repealed the ruling. Result: TV shows designed to sell toys…lots of toys
.

T
EENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

Description:
Radioactive ooze turns four pet turtles into human-size crime-fighting, pizza-eating, jive-talking teens named Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Donatello.

A Fad is Born!
In 1984 cartoonists Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman self-published
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
, a violent but darkly funny comic book. They printed 50,000 copies, all of which sold out in a few weeks. After that, the comic was published regularly for two years but garnered little interest beyond comic book fans. In 1986 advertising executive Mark Freedman discovered the comic and bought the rights from Laird and Eastman, figuring the Turtles could be a cultural phenomenon if they were marketed to kids, rather than older comic-book collectors. A newer, more kid-friendly comic was introduced, along with a TV cartoon series and lots and lots of Ninja Turtle toys. Freedman was right: In 1989, $250 million worth of toys were sold; in 1990, a live-action movie earned $140 million; and in 1991, a Burger King promotion sold 200,000 Turtle videos per week. But all fads are destined to die. Sales plummeted in 1992, and the cartoon was cancelled. A grittier, back-to-basics comic book was released, but it bombed. New cartoons and new toys were released in 2003, but they flopped too. A big failure? Hardly. Since 1984 the Ninja Turtles have generated $6 billion in revenue.

TRANSFORMERS

Description:
Giant robots that can “transform” into vehicles crash land on Earth from outer space, and wage battle for “energon” cubes.

A Fad is Born!
In 1982 Hasbro Toys scoured the world for toys on which they could base cartoons, which they could then use to sell more toys. They bought the rights to three Japanese toy lines: Takara Toys’ Car Robots and Micro Change, and Bandai’s Machine Men. The toys were all die-cast metal robots that, with a few twists and turns, became toy planes, cars, or other objects. Nearly 20 million of these toys had been sold around the world—but would they sell in the United States? Industry insiders predicted that Hasbro’s “Transformers” would flop—complicated Japanese toys were untested and parents would balk at paying $10 for a toy car, they said. But the insiders were wrong. Kids loved the strange new toys and action-packed cartoon. (It didn’t hurt that kids could figure out how to make the toys “transform,” while their parents couldn’t.) By the end of 1985, $380 million worth of Transformers had been sold. Sales and interest declined after that, but various versions of the show have been on the air since 1985 and related toys still sell well. The success of Transformers helped make Hasbro the second largest toymaker in the world.

There is a G.I. Joe action figure modeled after General Colin Powell.

MIGHTY MORPHIN POWER RANGERS

Description:
With the help of huge robot dinosaurs, six teenagers use ninja skills to fight giant monsters sent to Earth by an evil witch who lives in a dumpster on the moon.

A Fad is Born!
The most popular kids show and toy line of the 1990s is an unlikely success story. In 1986 TV producer Haim Saban had an idea: take footage of the robot dinosaurs from the Japanese action show
Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger
(Dinosaur Squadron Beast Ranger) and combine it with newly shot scenes of American teenagers. The special effects from the Japanese show were cheap and sloppy, mixing miniature models, marionettes, and stuntmen in rubber suits. It took Saban seven years to sell it to a network, but Fox finally agreed to air it. Good move. It was an instant hit in the fall of 1993, becoming the #1 kids show on TV. Bandai was contracted to make toys based on the teenagers and robots, but didn’t anticipate the high demand. How high? Twelve million toys were sold in 1993. By 1996 the show had exhausted all the available
Kyoryu
footage, so it had to start stealing from other Japanese shows. Now, each fall,
Power Rangers
changes its entire premise and cast. New heroes, monsters, robots, villains—and toys—are introduced. To date, Bandai has sold over 160 million Power Ranger toys.

A typical hurricane lasts nine days.

CANADIAN NAMIN’

Over the years, we’ve written about how dozens of American places got their names. Now it’s Canada’s turn
.

T
ORONTO

North of the city is Lake Toronto. The Iroquois who once lived there called it
toronto
, meaning “place where trees stand in water.” Who put trees in the lake? Another native group, the Hurons, planted saplings there to help trap fish.

CALGARY

In the 1870s, when the area was a post for the Mounted Police, it was named Fort Brisebois after officer Ephrem Brisebois. But in 1876, after Brisebois declared a woman from the Metis tribe his common-law wife, his superior, Colonel James Macleod, angrily renamed it. Macleod had just returned from a trip to Calgary—a popular white sand beach on the Isle of Mull off Scotland—so Fort Brisebois became Fort Calgary.
Calgary
comes from the Gaelic
Cala ghearraidh
, which means “beach of the meadow.”

QUÉBEC

Prior to the arrival of French colonists in the 1500s, the area was inhabited by the Algonquin people. The Algonquins called it
kebek
, meaning “straight” or “narrow,” referring to the way the river (now the St. Lawrence) narrows where the Algonquins settled (now Québec City). Explorer Samuel de Champlain made the word French in 1613, spelling it “Québec.”

OTTAWA

In 1832 the British government hired a group of engineers, headed by Colonel John By, to build a canal in the colony of Upper Canada. The large camp that housed workers, called Bytown in the colonel’s honor, eventually grew into a town. In 1855 it became officially incorporated as a city, and took the new name Ottawa from the
Adàwe
, the native people with whom Europeans traded during early colonization of the area. French settlers had corrupted
Adàwe
to
Outaouak
; British settlers corrupted it to
Ottawa
.

Ireland’s longest place name: Muckanaghederdauhaulia (“pig marsh between two saltwater inlets”).

JUST PLANE WEIRD

If you’re reading this book on an airplane, you might want to skip this section until you’re safely back on the ground
.

M
UST. READ. INSTRUCTIONS.

In 2005 Japan Airlines (JAL) announced that one of its planes had been flying with two of its engines fitted on the wrong side of the plane. The “right” and “left” engines had been switched, they said, by a maintenance company in Singapore. The engines have different thrust directions, JAL officials said, but assured the public that there was no danger, adding that the plane made 440 flights before the mistake was discovered.

AIRLOCK

In August 2006, the captain of an Air Canada flight from Ottawa to Winnipeg turned controls over to his co-pilot and left the cockpit to use the bathroom. When he returned, the cockpit door wouldn’t budge—it was jammed. He was locked out, and the co-pilot couldn’t get it open from the other side. Panicked crew members had to take the door off its hinges to get the captain back inside—and they had to do it in a hurry, since there were only 30 minutes left on the flight. They succeeded; he safely landed the plane in Winnipeg. “The safety of our passengers was never compromised,” Air Canada said in a statement. Nevertheless, the embarrassed airline didn’t report the incident to Canada’s transit safety commission because they said it fell into the category of “non-reportable.”

FLYING BLIND

A 41-year-old Belgian named Luc Costermans hoped to set a world record: most hours ever logged by a blind pilot. Costermans lost his sight in an accident in 2004, and took up flying only after becoming blind. He planned to complete the feat with his instructor, Jean Andrieu, who takes care of takeoffs but gives the controls to Costermans once they’re airborne. If that seems weird, consider this: he did it. In June 2006 Costermans made the record books by flying a 13-hour 1,180-mile flight from France to Belgium, and back again.

Do their shoes have tongues? Bees taste with their back feet.

SPECIAL DELIVERY

A 25-year-old British military pilot was on a training exercise in eastern England in early 2006 when he made an unscheduled stop in a $7.27 million Lynx helicopter. “The pilot took it upon himself to deliver a pizza to his girlfriend,” a Ministry of Defense spokesman said. “He has been made aware that the chain of command doesn’t condone his actions and has been disciplined.” The stunt prompted fellow pilots at his base to design a new badge for the unit: the words
Quattro Stagione
, or “Four Seasons,” over a Domino’s Pizza logo.

LET’S GET SMALL

A woman in Vancouver, British Columbia, called 911, reporting a plane crash she and her son witnessed near their home. “We sent all our cars down there,” said Corporal Steven Han of the RCMP, “thinking there was a small plane that had crashed.” Turns out it
had
been a small plane—a four-foot-long toy plane. The owner of the remote-controlled device told police he’d had engine trouble. News of the “plane crash” made it to several local media outlets before the mistake was corrected.

*        *        *

LONGEST MOVIE TITLES OF ALL TIME

• Night of the Day of the Dawn of the Son of the Bride of the Return of the Revenge of the Terror of the Attack of the Evil, Mutant, Alien, Flesh Eating, Hellbound, Zombified Living Dead Part 2: In Shocking 2-D
(1991)

•
The Fable of the Kid Who Shifted His Ideals to Golf and Finally Became a Baseball Fan and Took the Only Known Cure
(1916)

•
Homework, or How Pornography Saved the Split Family from Boredom and Improved their Financial Situation
(1991)

•
The Lemon Grove Kids Meet the Green Grasshopper and the Vampire Lady from Outer Space
(1965)

•
Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
(1964)

•
Revelations of a Sex Maniac to the Head of the Criminal Investigation Division
(1972)

Surprising but true: The bottom of the Grand Canyon is above sea level.

APRIL FOOLS!

Don’t look now, but your fly is open. Made you look! Here are some classic April Fools jokes
.

H
UMOR UNDER FIRE.
On April 1, 2003, twelve days after the start of “Operation Iraqi Freedom,” the U.S. invasion of Iraq, the Iraqi ambassador to Russia, Abbas Khalaf Kunfuth, stepped before a group of international reporters and read from what he claimed was a Reuters news bulletin. “The Americans have accidentally fired a nuclear missile into British forces, killing seven.” The room fell into stunned silence; then Kunfuth shouted, “April Fools!”

D-U-INTERNET.
In its April 1994 issue,
PC Computing
magazine reported that Congress was considering a bill to make it illegal to surf the Web while under the influence of alcohol, and attributed the action to the term “Information Superhighway.” “Congress apparently thinks being drunk on a highway is bad,” the magazine said, “no matter what kind of highway it is.” So many people took the story seriously—and flooded Capitol Hill with angry calls—that Senator Pat Leahy and other politicians mentioned in the article had to publicly deny the story.