22 June: Onion rings

Happy Onion Rings Day! Ten facts about onion rings.

1. An onion ring is the cross section of an Onion which has been dipped in batter and deep fried.

2. They are sometimes called French-fried onion rings.

3. The first recipe for onion rings is attributed to John Mollard, a British food writer who published it in a book called The Art of Cookery Made Easy and Refined in 1802.

4. His recipe included parmesan Cheese in the batter and used lard for the frying. The recipe also suggested serving them with a sauce of melted Butter and Mustard.

5. Numerous restaurants in America claimed to have invented the onion ring. One of the best known claims is from the Kirby's Pig Stand restaurant chain in Oak Cliff, Texas in the early 1920s. However, there’s no concrete evidence for any of them.

6. It’s possible the origin of onion rings actually lies with Arab merchants in India, who would sell battered fried onions as street food to travellers passing through, thus spreading the idea far and wide.

7. Although it may be that what these merchants sold were actually strips of onion, a variation known as onion strings.

8. Onion rings taste slightly sweet because of a chemical reaction caused by cooking. Propanethial oxide turns into bispropenyl disulfide.

9. Americans consume 20 pounds of these onion rings per person annually.

10. If you hear an onion ring, answer it.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

21 June: 172

On day 172 of the year, ten fun facts about 172.

1. The Cessna 172 is the most popular aircraft ever. More Cessna 172s were built than any other aircraft.

2. 172 is the atomic number of a theoretical chemical element called Unseptbium, which has the symbol Usb.

3. 172 Baucis is a main belt asteroid discovered by French astronomer Alphonse Borrelly in 1877, and named after a character in the Greek legend of Baucis and Philemon.

4. The London bus 172 runs between Brockley Rise, Chandos and Aldwych Drury Lane. Also, the headquarters of London Buses is at 172 Buckingham Palace Road.

5. United Nations Security Council Resolution 172, adopted in 1962, recommended that the Republic of Rwanda be admitted as a member nation.

6. The A172 is a major road in North Yorkshire and Middlesbrough. It runs from Ingleby Arncliffe to Middlesbrough.

7. Year 172 AD was a leap year starting on a Tuesday. It was known as the Year of the Consulship of Scipio and Maximus. In this year, the Miracle in Moravia occurred: The Roman army was surrounded by the Quadi in intense and crippling heat, and as all seemed to be lost for the Romans a violent thunderstorm occurred which not only refreshed the parched Roman army but swept their enemies away in a torrent of mud.

8. In Binary, 172 is written 10101100 and in Roman numerals it's CLXXII.

9. 172 can be divided by 1, 2, 4, 43, 86 and 172. The sum of its divisors is 308.

10. In numerology a person affected by the energy of 172 is curious and likes to explore new places and ideas. They're comfortable doing things alone and tend to do things without consulting anybody else, but they will make careful plans.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

20 June: Space Oddity

On this date in 1969 David Bowie recorded Space Oddity at Trident Studios London. 10 facts about the song.

1. Given that the release date was 11 July 1969, days before the first Moon landing, it’s easy to assume the song was inspired by Apollo 11, but it was actually inspired by the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, which David Bowie had watched multiple times. This isn’t to say that the record company didn’t rush through the release in order to cash in on the space theme.

2. The BBC jumped on the bandwagon, choosing to play the song during the mission and even over some of the footage of the landing itself. While Bowie was naturally chuffed that they chose to use his song, it was clear to him they hadn’t really listened to the lyrics beforehand. Bowie commented: "Obviously, some BBC official said, 'Oh, right then, that space song, Major Tom, blah blah blah, that’ll be great. 'Um, but he gets stranded in space, sir.' Nobody had the heart to tell the producer that." Though presumably someone did, or the producer did listen carefully at some point, and then the song was banned by the BBC until the astronauts had returned safely to Earth.

3. The B side was Wild Eyed Boy from Freecloud.

4. Space Oddity isn’t the only song to feature Major Tom. Bowie’s 1980 single Ashes to Ashes also features him: "We know Major Tom's a junkie/Strung out in heaven's high/Hitting an all-time low." Major Tom gets another mention in Hallo Spaceboy from the 1995 album Outside and also in Bowie’s final album, Blackstar.

5. Major Tom does not, however, appear at all in the Italian version of the song, also recorded in 1969. Instead of directly translating the English words, the Italian songwriter Mogul was hired to write new lyrics. He re-worked it as a love song called Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Sola (Lonely Boy, Lonely Girl) with no mention of Major Tom at all.

6. In 1983, German electro musician Peter Schilling released a sequel song called Major Tom (I'm Coming Home), which actually did better in the charts than the original 1969 release of Space Oddity. In 2003, K.I.A. released another sequel called Mrs. Major Tom, telling the story from the point of view of Major Tom's wife.

7. Must admit, I always assumed the lyric "And the papers want to know whose shirt you wear," referred to whether he shopped for clothes at Moss Bros or Marks and Spencer, but one source I looked at claimed it was nothing to do with office wear but is English slang for “Which Football team do you support?”

8. In 2013 a cover of Space Oddity became the first music video to be filmed in space. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded it on the International Space Station. He sang and played Guitar while other performers provided musical accompaniment from Earth. He changed the lyrics, not only to include a reference to something Soyuz as a nod to the International part, but also leaving out the bit where Major Tom gets stranded in space.

9. In 1969, Space Oddity was awarded the Ivor Novello Award alongside Peter Sarstedt's Where Do You Go To (My Lovely)?

10. It has been used in numerous films and TV shows, including The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, in which Walter Mitty (Ben Stiller) is frequently referred to as "Major Tom" for daydreaming while at work; Friends (The One After Vegas); Mad Men and EastEnders.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

19 June: Blaise Pascal

Today, 10 facts about the scientist, mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal, whose birthday was today.

1. He was home schooled by his father, who was a tax collector. From an early age, Pascal showed an aptitude for mathematics and at the age of 12 had worked out Euclid’s first thirty-two geometric propositions all by himself.

2. He almost died at the age of one year from an unknown disease which caused his stomach to swell up and gave him fits. In those days, the cause of such illnesses was generally assumed to be witchcraft, and an elderly woman who sometimes cared for the baby got the blame. At first, Pascal’s father rejected the idea, but when his son got no better he started believing it. The poor old woman was pressured into confessing, but was canny enough to suggest a cure – transferring the spell onto two stray Cats which were then killed by being thrown out of a Window. She probably thought it bought her some time at least, but by a happy coincidence, Pascal started to get better at this point.

3. By the time he was 16, he’d written a work on conic sections and submitted it to the polymath Père Mersenne. It was so good that Rene Descartes was convinced Pascal's father had written it, and it still forms the basis of Pascal’s theorem.

4. At 18, Pascal invented an early calculator, the Pascaline, which he did after watching his father work, wanting to make the laborious calculations he had to do easier. It wasn’t a huge success commercially as it was expensive to make and somewhat cumbersome to use. Rich people and royalty liked them as status symbols and expensive toys with which to show off, but the average tax collector couldn’t afford them.

5. Other inventions and ideas Pascal came up with include the hydraulic press, probability theory, the syringe and the concept of atmospheric pressure. He theorised that mercury in sealed container would rise or fall according to altitude. At this point, he was not very healthy and wasn’t able to climb a Mountain to prove it himself so he sent his brother in law up the mountain instead. Pascal did, however, climb a church bell tower that was 50 metres high in order to observe the effects himself.

6. He’s also credited with inventing public transport. He set up a network of horse drawn carriages called carrosses à cinq sols (5 sols being the flat fare) which followed five set routes and would run whether or not there were any passengers. The idea only enjoyed modest success at the time and by 1675 the venture had folded.

7. Pascal is also known for his works on religion and philosophy. He had a religious experience in 1664, an intense vision, which caused him to note on a scrap of paper: It began with: "Fire. God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob, not of the philosophers and the scholars..." and ended with a quote from Psalm 119:16: "I will not forget thy word. Amen." He sewed this note into his coat so it was with hm everywhere he went. When he changed his coat, he transferred the paper. It was found by his servants after he died. He’s famous for a work known as Pascal’s wager, which lays out why a person should strive to believe in God. He described it as a game, similar to a coin toss, with two possible outcomes on which it is compulsory to bet. God exists, or He doesn’t. If the latter is true the player only loses a few pleasures he or she may have given up in order to please God, but if the former is true and God exists, then the player betting against that loses an eternity in heaven, hence it makes sense to bet on God existing. Although the wager is named after him, he may not have thought of it himself as a similar concept appears in eleventh-century Islamic texts and the plays of Euripides.

8. He also theorised that: ‘If Cleopatra’s nose had been shorter, the whole face of the world would have changed.’ Her long nose, he claimed, would have been seen as a sign of strength and good character, which contributed to her legendary beauty which attracted powerful men like Marc Antony and Julius Caesar. Her relationships with them had far reaching consequences. If she’d had a shorter nose, Pascal theorised, Marc and Julius might not have fancied her and the history of the world would have been completely different.

9. He died at the age of 39, having been in poor health for years. He declined medical treatment, saying that suffering was the lot of a Christian, and he would get better if God willed it. God clearly didn’t will it, and Pascal tried to get a place in a home for the terminally ill, but in the end, was too sick to be moved. An autopsy was carried out after he died, but even so it’s not clear what killed him. The autopsy noted stomach and abdominal organ issues and brain damage but came to no definite conclusion about cause of death. Modern speculation has suggested that he had tuberculosis, stomach cancer, or brain cancer or all three.

10. As well as a theorem, a law, a triangle, the SI unit for pressure and numerous university buildings, things named after him include: a programming language, an asteroid, a crater on the moon, islands in Australia and Antarctica, the Otter in the Animal Crossing series and the chameleon in Tangled.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

18 June: 169

Today is the 169^th day of the year. 10 facts about the number 169.

1. 169 is an artist in the UK Hip Hop or Grime genre whose collaborations with the rapper Dave include the hits Thiago Silva and Wanna Know.

2. 169 Zelia is a main belt asteroid discovered by the brothers Paul Henry and Prosper Henry in 1876. It was named for Zelia Martin, a niece of the astronomer Camille Flammarion.

3. London bus route 169 runs from Clayhall/the Glade to Barking Town Centre.

4. In computing, 169 is the first number of an automatic IPv4 address assigned by TCP/IP when no external networking device is contactable. (Don’t ask me what that means in English!)

5. The A169 is an A road in North Yorkshire which runs from the A64 at Malton on the edge of the Yorkshire Wolds through the Vale of Pickering and across the North York Moors to join the A171 just west of Whitby.

6. The 169-Storey Treehouse is the 13^th book in a series for children by Andy Griffiths and Terry Denton. Andy and Terry’s treehouse has 13 storeys added in each book. The levels included in 169 include an electric pony stable, a weather dome (where you can have whatever weather you want whenever you want it), a 100% edible gingerbread house, a potato-powered translation transmitter that allows you to talk to everything everywhere all at the same time, and a hall of funhouse mirrors.

7. The 169 series was an express train type introduced in 1969 by Japanese National Railways, and operated by East Japan Railway Company until 1996 and by Shinano Railway in Nagano Prefecture until 2013.

8. The year 169 (CLXIX) was a common year starting on Saturday, known at the time as the Year of the Consulship of Senecio and Apollinaris. During this year, Northern African Moors invaded what is now Spain; Marcus Aurelius became sole Roman Emperor upon the death of Lucius Verus, and forced his daughter Lucilla to marry Claudius Pompeianus.

9. The 169th prime number is 1009.

10. In numerology, 169 resonates with study, learning, and wisdom; also independence and aloneness. Hence a person influenced by it will be introspective and eager to learn about themselves. They are drawn to many different areas of study but especially science.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

17 June: Radar

On this date in 1935, Radar was tested in Orfordness, Suffolk, the first time radio-based detection and ranging was shown in Britain. The first target that was detected: a flying boat 17 miles (27 km) away. 10 things you might not know about radar.

1. The word radar is an acronym for "radio detection and ranging" which was coined in the early second world war.

2. Radar uses Radio waves to determine if something, like a ship, Submarine or aircraft, is out there when you wouldn’t be able to see it, how far away it is and how fast it is moving.

3. It does this by sending out short bursts of radio waves, or pulses. Some of these will bounce back if they hit something. The waves which bounce back are known as echoes. By measuring the time it takes for a pulse to leave the radar and return as an echo, the system can calculate the distance to the object. If the object is moving, the frequency of the returning waves changes slightly, which helps the radar figure out its speed. This is called the Doppler effect, which is the reason why a siren from an ambulance sounds slightly different when it’s moving away from you rather than coming towards you. Radar is similar to the echolocation that Bats use.

4. Physicists knew about the concept of radar as far back as 1886 when Heinrich Hertz  proved that electromagnetic waves (like radio waves) exist, and that they could travel through different materials and bounce off metal surfaces.

5. In the early 1900s, a German inventor named Christian Hülsmeyer created the telemobiloscope, a device which could detect ships in Fog up to 3km away. While it did help prevent collisions in poor visibility, it didn’t tell you exactly where the other ship was.

6. Radar technology grew very fast during World War II. Eight countries were secretly working on developing it: the United Kingdom, Germany, the United States, the USSR, Japan, the Netherlands, France, and Italy.

7. Some historians believe it was radar, not the atomic bomb, which helped the Allies win the war.

8. After the war, other uses for radar were developed besides finding things to shoot at. It’s used for navigation and making air and sea travel safer; it’s also used in weather forecasting, tracking animals and Birds and in medicine. The flapping of a bird’s wings distinguishes it from aircraft, and it’s even possible to tell one type of bird from another using radar.

9. Police use radar guns to measure the speed of cars on the road. One person who was caught and fined using one of these devices was Sir Robert Watson-Watt, who was one of the people who developed radar in the early days of the war with the aim of collaborating with the United States to beat the German military.

10. The cathode-ray tube has been the preferred technology for displaying radar information ever since the early days. Radar displays have developed alongside computer and television screens so they keep getting better.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

16 June: Munich

Today is the feast day of St Benno of Meissen, Patron saint of Munich. 10 facts about Munich.

1. Munich is located on the river Isar north of the Alps and is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria with a population of 1,604,384 in 2024. It’s the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg.

2. It began with a monastery in the 12^th century and the settlement which grew up around it became known as zu den Munchen ("to the monks") which evolved into the modern German name for the city, München. That said, evidence has been discovered of settlements here dating back to the Bronze Age when the river Isar was an important trade route.

3. The town as we know it was founded by Henry the Lion, the Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, in an attempt to gain a monopoly in the salt trade. He’d burned down a rival town and built a bridge. He granted the monks the right to establish a market in 1157, which was fortified.

4. Munich is famous for beer. The first king of Bavaria, Maximilian Joseph, was instrumental in establishing Munich as a centre for Beer production. He granted a monopoly to the richest brewers, in exchange for them paying him taxes. He also did them the favour of removing a limit on the number of staff they could employ so that they could meet the beer requirements of a growing population. Munich's working and lower classes consumed beer as a staple of their diet. Since the Middle Ages beer had been regarded as nutritious liquid bread (fließendes Brot) in Bavaria. Not only that, but it wasn’t safe to drink the water.

5. Today, of course, it’s the venue for Oktoberfest (follow the link for more info on this) but not only that, there are over 60 beer gardens to have a beer or three in the summer; it’s home to 6 major breweries and the world’s only airport beer garden. There are also pools of beer underground beneath the city. These are not open to the public, but were built by breweries of old as a way to keep their product cool before fridges were invented. The pools are used for fermenting and storing beer, keeping it at the perfect temperature.

6. Also under the city are some artificial caves which Ludwig II, the "Swan King" had built under his palace. Given his penchant for fairytale castles, it will be no surprise to learn that these caves were fitted with waterfalls, coloured lights, and even a wave machine. It’s said he had a special shell-shaped boat and got some of his minions to push it around the underground lake while he listened to his favourite operas as a way to unwind from the pressures of royal life.

7. Talking of wave machines, one wouldn’t immediately flag Munich as a surfing destination, since it’s not by the sea. However, there’s a park in the city called The English Garden where there’s an urban surf centre, one of the very few in the world. The English Garden, btw, is huge, bigger than Hyde Park in London and Central Park in New York. It was designed by Friedrich Ludwig von Sckell between 1789 and 1807.

8. Munich was the base of the Nazi party in the 1930s and was where the 1938 Munich Agreement was signed by Neville Chamberlain. Heinrich Himmler and Eva Braun were born in Munich. Hence the city was heavily bombed in the second world war although much of the architecture has since been restored. A hill in the city called the Olympiaberg, which has great views, as far as the Alps on a clear day, is actually not natural but was created from the rubble from the bombings. The city was also the base of a resistance movement called the White Rose. This group stencilled slogans like "Down with Hitler" and "Hitler the Mass Murderer" on public buildings in Munich, which got their leaders executed.

9. The first photo taken in Germany in 1839 by the scientists Carl August von Steinheil and Franz von Kobellwas of a church, the Frauenkirche. Another of Munich’s churches has a fresco which includes a saint holding a Pretzel. This isn’t a modern thing but dates back to the 14^th century. There’s a local legend about a character known as the "Brezenreiter" or "Pretzel Rider," who would ride through the streets once a year handing out pretzels to the poor, and this is who the fresco is deemed to represent.

10. Munich is also home to Circus Krone. While you’d generally picture a circus as taking place in a big tent, Circus Krone has a building. It was the first circus to occupy its own building and is still one of very few European circuses to do so.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

15 June: Rubber

On this date in 1844, Charles Goodyear obtained his first rubber patent. 10 things you might not know about rubber.

1. Rubber comes from Hevea brasiliensis, a tall, softwood tree native to south America. In the wild this tree grows to a height of 34 metres (120 feet), but the trees cultivated for rubber production only reach about 24 metres (80 feet). The carbon they need to grow really tall is contained in the rubber which is harvested, and foliage is removed to make tapping easier.

2. Ancient people in South America knew about rubber 2,000 years ago. They used it to make soles for shoes and balls for ball games. The Mayans extracted white sap from rubber trees; the Olmecs who first created rubber balls. The Aztecs used rubber balls in a game called "ollama".

3. Rubber was brought to the attention of Europeans thanks to Christopher Columbus, who saw natives in Haiti playing with rubber balls in 1493.

4. It was 1735 before anyone made a scientific study of the stuff. This study was by Charles-Marie de La Condamine and François Fresneau of France.

5. The word rubber was coined by Joseph Priestley in 1770 when he found it could be used to rub out Pencil marks. It was Goodyear’s vulcanisation process which made rubber a desirable commodity.

6. The main chemical constituents of rubber are elastomers, or “elastic polymers,” large chainlike molecules that can be stretched to great lengths and yet recover their original shape. The first common elastomer was polyisoprene, from which natural rubber is made.

7. Rubber trees start producing latex when they're around six to seven years old and can be tapped for 20-30 years. During that time, a tree can produce 19 lbs of rubber each year. A tree will be tapped every couple of days, yielding approximately 50 grams (1.7 ounces) of latex. When it comes out of the tree, latex is white. Changes in colour occur when things are added. Tyres are black because carbon black has been added. Tapping is done by scoring the trunk of the tree at an angle of about 30 degrees, as high up as the tapper can reach. Subsequent cuts are made immediately below the previous one. Trees are often rested for a period after heavy tapping.

8. Synthetic rubber was first made in 1909 by Fritz Hofmann in Germany. In 1910, Russian scientist Sergei Lebedev made rubber from a colourless gas, butadiene, which came in handy during both World Wars when natural rubber was in short supply. Today, synthetic rubber has overtaken the use of natural rubber.

9. Hevea brasiliensis isn’t the only plant which produces latex; it’s merely the one that is best at it. One common plant which produces latex is the Dandelion. In Nazi Germany, research projects tried to use dandelions as a base for rubber production, but failed.

10. Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, India, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon, and Liberia are the world’s leading producers of natural rubber. 65% of the rubber produced is used by the automotive industry for mountings, gaskets, belts, hoses, and of course, tyres. 

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

14 June: Skunks

14 June is National Skunk Day. 10 things you might not know about skunks.

1. Skunks belong to the family Mephitidae, which means “stink.” There are about 10 different species in the family, native to North America.

2. A group of skunks is called a surfeit.

3. These animals are best known for spraying foul smelling stuff from their anal glands when threatened. That said, a skunk will try to avoid having to use the spray if it can, because it only has the capacity for five or six successive sprays and once that is used up, it takes about ten days to replenish. A skunk’s Black and White stripes actually point at the spray glands and act as a warning to any animal which has been caught out before. If that doesn’t deter the potential predator, the skunk will perform a warning dance first. The moves might include stomping the ground or slapping their tail. Some species will do handstands on their front paws. The spray is only used as a last resort.

4. If they do use it, though, it’s pretty potent stuff. It can cause temporary blindness in the case of a direct hit to the Eyes, as if the stench isn’t bad enough. It is made from thiols, sulphur-based compounds also found in garlic and onions. The Smell can be detected from over a mile away (unless you’re one of the one in a thousand people who can’t smell it) and can linger for weeks. It’s also flammable, not that the skunk makes use of that characteristic.

5. Skunks are omnivorous, so they’ll eat anything. Their diet includes berries, fungi, nuts, roots, grass, small mammals and Amphibians, Snakes (they are immune to snake venom), worms, eggs and insects, including Bees and Wasps. They have even been known to attack hives, their thick fur protecting them from stings.

6. They generally don’t wander more than 2 miles/3km from home, although a male skunk might extend his range to up to 5 miles/8km to look for females in the breeding season. A male skunk will mate with numerous females and plays no part in raising the young.

7. They have powerful front claws which they use for digging and breaking apart dead tree trunks for shelter or to get at tasty things inside.

8. Their senses of smell and hearing are excellent but they can’t see very well. If something is more than 10 feet/3 metres away, the skunk cannot see it.

9. They’re actually rather cute and intelligent and so some people believe they make great pets (with their spray glands removed). That said, keeping a skunk as a pet is only allowed in about 17 US states and even then there are restrictions on the type of skunk you can own and you need a permit. It’s legal to have a pet skunk in the UK, but it’s illegal since 2006 to remove the scent glands.

10. A famous fictional skunk is Pepé Le Pew, a Warner Brothers character depicted as an anthropomorphic French striped skunk, who is constantly in search of love and romance, but other characters run away from him because he stinks. Johnny Depp once said that he imagined Pirates of the Caribbean’s Captain Jack Sparrow as a blend of Keith Richards and Pepé Le Pew.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

13 June: F

According to “The Immortal Society”, today is F day. 10 things you might not know about the letter F.

1. F is the sixth letter of the Latin alphabet and the eleventh least frequently used letter in the English language (after G, Y, P, B, V, K, J, X, Q, and Z), with a frequency of about 2.23% in words.

2. The letter F evolved from the Semitic letter waw, which in turn is thought to have evolved from an Egyptian hieroglyph depicting a hook, club or mace.

3. In the hexadecimal (base 16) numbering system, F corresponds to the number 15 in decimal.

4. F is the chemical symbol for Fluorine.

5. On the vehicle registration plates of the European Union, F represents France.

6. "F" Is for Fugitive is the sixth novel in Sue Grafton's "Alphabet mystery" series, published in 1989.

7. In education, an F grade denotes failure.

8. There are a couple of rude words beginning with F, sometimes referred to in polite company as “The F word”. The F Word is also British cooking show featuring celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay.

9. In the video game Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare the F key is pressed when a character dies, and has become an internet meme for paying respects.

10. A bold italic letter f is used in musical notation as a dynamic indicator for "loud or strong". It stands for the Italian word forte.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

12 June: Cleopatra (the movie)

The most expensive film ever made, Cleopatra, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, opened on this date in 1963. 10 facts you might not know.

1. Its budget was $44 million is equivalent to over $411 million in 2024. This included construction of 79 sets, 26,000 costumes and the $1 million Elizabeth Taylor demanded for her role. Even being the highest grossing film at the box office that year didn’t save Twentieth Century Fox from almost going bankrupt. It took years for the film just to break even. If it wasn’t for The Sound of Music three years later, the studio would have gone under.

2. Elizabeth Taylor's 65 costumes alone cost $194,800, the highest ever for a single-screen actress. These included a dress made from 24-carat Gold cloth.

3. It was supposed to be two three hour films: "Caesar and Cleopatra", followed by "Antony and Cleopatra". Twentieth Century Fox decided to edit it down to three hours fourteen minutes for general release as just one film.

4. Another huge expense would have been all the ships needed for Cleopatra’s fleet. It was actually said at the time that Twentieth Century Fox had the world's third largest navy.

5. It was the first film that Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton starred in together, and marked the beginning of their famous on-off love affair. At the time, they were both married to other people, Burton to Sybil Williams and Taylor to Eddie Fisher. Hence their on-set affair caused a massive scandal that made headline news.

6. Before the role was offered to Elizabeth, Sophia Loren, Joan Collins, and Dorothy Dandridge were among those considered for the role.

7. At first, filming took place in Pinewood in England only eight minutes of this footage made it into the final cut because the weather in England isn’t much like it would have been in ancient Egypt. Those eight minutes cost £6.45m. Another problem was that the British climate didn’t do much for Taylor’s health, and she contracted pneumonia and almost died. A tracheotomy had to be performed in order to save her life; the scar is visible in some scenes. The climate in Rome was better for her recovery.

8. There were a few errors. In one scene, Caesar is saying goodbye to Cleopatra in Alexandria before sailing back to Rome, when an aide informs him he must hurry up or they’ll miss the tide. In fact, tides in the Mediterranean Sea are so minimal that the tide would never have been an issue. Other “mistakes” were not actually goofs at all, such as Cleopatra talking to Caesar about Rome's interest in Egyptian corn. Americans would claim that the Egyptians wouldn’t know about the corn they are familiar with, maize, because it was originally cultivated in prehistoric Mesoamerica and only spread worldwide in the 15th and 16th centuries. In fact, the script uses the British meaning of the word corn, which includes other cereal grains as well.

9. Elizabeth Taylor was originally barred from entering Egypt to film because, for her marriage to Eddie Fisher, she had converted to Judaism. However, when the authorities realised how much money the film would bring in to their economy, they relented.

10. Cleopatra eventually earned nine Oscar nominations, winning four, but people who actually worked on it were less than impressed. Director Joseph L. Mankiewicz was never proud of it and the only reason he didn’t quit was because Elizabeth Taylor was a good friend of his. He did later try to get his name removed from the credits. As for Taylor, it’s said that when she saw the final cut, she threw up.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/

11 June: Gene Wilder

This date in 1933 saw the birth of the American actor Gene Wilder. 10 things you might not know about him.

1. His real name was Jerome Silberman. He changed it to Gene Wilder because he didn’t think "Jerry Silberman in Macbeth" sounded right. "Wilder" was after author Thornton Wilder, while "Gene" came from the character Eugene Gant in Thomas Wolfe's first novel, Look Homeward, Angel, and also a distant relative of his, who’d been a bomber in the second world war and whom he admired.

2. He was eight when he caught the acting bug. His mother was ill, and her doctor said that he should try and make her laugh. His sister was studying acting, too, and after watching her perform he asked her teacher if he could join the class. He was 11. The teacher said that if he was still interested when he turned 13, he could. The day after his 13^th birthday, he called the teacher who accepted him.

3. He was bullied at one of his schools as he was the only Jewish boy in the school. About his faith, he would later say he was proud to be Jewish but didn’t believe in any of it apart from the Golden Rule “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

4. Wilder studied Communication and Theatre Arts at the University of Iowa, graduating in 1955. He then attended Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in Bristol, England.

5. He studied fencing, and after learning the sport for just six months became the first freshman to win the All-School Fencing Championship. He would later work as a fencing instructor to support himself while studying acting (he also drove limos) and later still, alongside acting, was a fencing choreographer.

6. He was drafted into the army in 1956 and served as a paramedic in the Department of Psychiatry and Neurology at Valley Forge Army Hospital, in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania.

7. Wilder's first professional acting job was in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he played the Second Officer in Herbert Berghof's production of Twelfth Night in 1959. His first screen role was as a hostage in Bonnie and Clyde, who was thrown out of the car when he told his kidnappers he was an undertaker. His first leading role was in a film called Mother Courage and Her Children. This was where he met Mel Brooks, who was dating his co star. One of his most famous roles was as Willy Wonka in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, even though it was a flop at the Box office at first. Fred Astaire, Joel Grey, Ron Moody, and Jon Pertwee had all been considered; Roald Dahl wanted to cast Spike Milligan and Peter Sellers had begged Dahl for the role. However, director Mel Stuart cast Wilder immediately after hearing him recite a few lines. Wilder refused to watch the 2005 remake because was a fan of Johnny Depp and feared he might be disappointed.

8. He married four times. His first wife was Mary Mercier, from 1960 to 1965; Mary Schutz, a friend of his sister, from 1967 to 1974 – she had a daughter, Katharine, from a previous relationship. Wilder adopted her but they became estranged when she grew up; Gilda Radner, from 1984 until her death in 1989 from ovarian cancer (the disease which his mother also died of); and Karen Webb, who he married in 1991.

9. He eventually gave up acting in films because he was “tired of watching the bombing, shooting, killing, swearing, and 3-D.” He said he’d consider returning to the big screen if the right script came along but in the mean time, he’d stick to television, and spend more time on his hobbies: watercolour painting and writing (He wrote several memoirs and novels, including one called Even Dogs Learn How to Swim, which was published after he died.

10. He died from complications of Alzheimer's disease in 2016 at the age of 83. He’d been diagnosed three years earlier, but kept it quiet because he didn’t want the children who knew him as Willy Wonka to get upset. He died listening to his favourite song, Over the Rainbow sung by Ella Fitzgerald.

I also write novels and short stories. If you like superheroes, psychic detectives and general weirdness you might enjoy them. 

Check out my works of fiction at https://juliehowlinauthor.wordpress.com/my-books/