Adolf Hitler and J R Tolkien both fought in the horrific Battle of the Somme (fought between 1 July and 18 November 1916). It was one of the largest battles of World War I, in which more than1,000,000 men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history. Tolkien began writing stories of fantasy battles, based on his Somme experiences, when hospitalised in 1916. Those stories would later develop into The Lord of the Rings.
Corporal Adolf Hitler (right) during World War I
Tolkien
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From the national Geographic, 2007
405-Year-Old Clam Called Longest-Lived Animal
A clam dredged from icy Arctic waters is being hailed as the world's longest-lived animal.
Climate researchers at Bangor University in the United Kingdom recently counted 405 annual growth rings in the shells of a quahog clam. When this animal was young, Shakespeare was writing his greatest plays and the English were establishing their first settlements in the Americas. The team plucked the mollusk from 262-feet-deep (80-meter-deep) waters off the northern coast of Iceland.
The team is studying growth lines in clam shells as part of a project to understand how the climate has changed over the past thousand years. "On a side note, we discovered this very old clam," said Al Wanamaker, a postdoctoral researcher at the university.
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Quahog clams are known for their longevity. A 220-year-old taken from American waters in 1982 holds the official Guinness Book of World Records oldest animal title. Unofficially, the record belongs to a 374-year-old Icelandic clam housed in a German museum. The new clam is at least 30 years older, according to the Bangor University team.
The animal died when the researchers counted its rings.
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In 1950, Marcel Bich purchased the patent for the ballpoint pen from Hungarian László Bíró who had been producing such pens since 1943 in Argentina. The company formed by Bich, Societe Bic Group, spelled the name as Bic instead of Bich so that English speakers would not pronounce it as Bitch.
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When Boris Yeltsin met President Bill Clinton in 1995, his first question was “Do you think OJ did it?”
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Nutella was invented during WW2 when an Italian pastry maker mixed hazelnuts into chocolate to extend his chocolate ration.
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