July 31, 2024

The balance beam is a small and thin beam, which is raised by a stand on both sides. These beams are made up of leather-like material. The measurements should be: 4.07 feet in height, 16 feet in length, and 3.9 inches in width. Female gymnasts exclusively perform this event.

- topendsports.com

July 30, 2024

The average MLB pitch speed for fastballs is 93.3 mph. On average, breaking balls like sliders and curveballs are thrown at around 80-85 mph. Relief pitchers typically throw faster pitches compared to starting pitchers, averaging around 95 mph. The average pitch speed for changeups is around 80-85 mph. The slowest average pitch speed in MLB history by a pitcher was around 48 mph.

- gitnux.org (July 17, 2024)

July 29, 2024

The LEGO name is made from the first two letters of the Danish words LEG GODT, meaning “play well.”

- Museum of Science + Industry Chicago

July 28, 2024

In 2005, the National Science Foundation published an article regarding research about human thoughts per day. The average person has about 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day. Of those, 95% are exactly the same repetitive thoughts as the day before and about 80% are negative.

- Dent Neurologic Institute

July 27, 2024

Ice cream cones were invented at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis, Missouri by concessions vendors as a way for people to eat ice cream easily while they enjoyed the fair.

- Ben & Jerry's (September 12, 2017)

July 26, 2024

Located in the heart of Hartford, Connecticut, this building served as a home to all three branches of Connecticut state government from 1796 to 1878. Some of our state’s most important stories of freedom, democracy, and civic action – from the Amistad and Prudence Crandall trials to the Constitutional Convention of 1818 – connect to this National Historic Landmark.

- Connecticut’s Old State House, wp.cga.ct.gov

July 25, 2024

In 1922, the Commissioner of Health for Chicago had a scale installed in the lobby of City Hall. Any and all passersby were invited to come in, step on, and find out what they weighed. City residents soon flocked to the building and lined up all day long to check their weight. The scale was the hottest ticket in town. Thirty years earlier, most Americans had no idea what they weighed — nor did their physicians. Doctors and hospitals had had scales since the 1870s; they just weren’t a part of standard health evaluations. Certainly, there were sociocultural attitudes and biases about body size and shape, but weight was a subjective concept. It wasn’t until the turn of the century when a confluence of events gave rise to both a massive interest in quantifying weight and the tools to do so — one tool in particular: the bathroom scale.

- Kelsey Miller, medium.com (February 15, 2021)

July 24, 2024

Stock photos are images that anyone can license for creative use. Rather than hire a photographer, designers can search a large database of photos and quickly find one that works for their project. Some of the most popular stock photos include people, travel destinations, animals, and food. This system also allows photographers to earn a steady source of income from their work, in the form of small royalty payments.

- shutterstock.com

July 23, 2024

The viral “Shopping Cart Theory” proposes that an individual’s moral character can be determined by whether they choose to return a shopping cart to its designated spot after use, or whether they simply leave it wherever it suits them. “No one will punish you for not returning the shopping cart, no one will fine you, or kill you for not returning the shopping cart. You gain nothing by returning the shopping cart. You must return the shopping cart out of the goodness of your own heart. You must return the shopping cart because it is the right thing to do. Because it is correct. The Shopping Cart Theory, therefore, is a great litmus test on whether a person is a good or bad member of society."

- Ron Wolforth, texasbaseballranch.com

July 22, 2024

The founder of the modern Games, the Baron Pierre de Coubertin, was enamoured with the idea of the true Olympian being a talented artist and sportsperson. Thanks to him, between 1912 and 1948 medals were given out for sporting-inspired masterpieces of architecture, music, painting, sculpture and literature.

- bluethumb.com (June 14, 2021)

July 21, 2024

The 110-meter and 100-meter hurdles are done on a running track, the 400-meter versions covers one whole oval track. Hurdles in track races are usually 68-107 centimeters in height, but sometimes it varies on the age and gender of the participants.

- topendsports.com

July 20, 2024

The first annual fair in the American colonies was held in 1641 in New Amsterdam (now New York City) to showcase farm products of the local area.

- showmensmuseum.org

July 19, 2024

With the 2024 Paris Games approaching, Olympic qualifying is now complete and nearly 600 athletes have earned their spots on the U.S. Olympic team.

- nbcolympics.com (July 10, 2024)

July 18, 2024

Watermelons are 92% water and 8% sugar. They can grow with or without seeds.

- Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

July 17, 2024

Within the past year, nearly every streaming service has raised its prices, including Netflix, Disney Plus, Hulu, Paramount Plus, Discovery Plus, and Apple TV Plus. Not to mention that Netflix is cracking down on password sharing... With DVDs, I don’t have to worry about commercials interrupting my movie — I can bask in nostalgia while watching all the front-running promotions for the “new” releases that came out 15 years ago.

- TheVerge.com (February 26, 2024)

July 16, 2024

According to birding experts Kenn and Kimberly Kaufman, it’s fine just to call them babies, chicks or youngsters. To be more specific, a young bird that has just hatched out of the egg is a hatchling, one that’s still in the nest is a nestling and a young bird that has left the nest is known as a fledgling.

- birdsandblooms.com (June 30, 2022)

July 15, 2024

We always see the same side of the Moon, because as Earth's natural satellite revolves around our planet, the Moon rotates, causing the same side to always face us. And yet, the Moon looks a little different every night. Sometimes the entire face glows brightly. Sometimes we only see a thin crescent. Other times the Moon seems to disappear entirely. Why does the Moon's appearance change? 

 The moonlight we see on Earth is sunlight reflected off the Moon's grayish-white surface. The amount of Moon we see illuminated changes over the month — lunar phases — because the Moon orbits Earth and Earth orbits the Sun.

- NASA

July 14, 2024

Originally created as the L.L.Bean Ice Carrier in Brunswick, Maine in the fall of 1944, the signature tote’s original purpose – like so many L.L.Bean products – was to be a problem solver. In the 1940s and 50s, most homes had only small freezers that were often thick with frost. This required Americans to buy and transport block ice from a distributor, which was then stored in a separate ice chest. The L.L.Bean Ice Carrier was the middleman – the means of toting the ice home.

- llbean.com (October 12, 2020)

July 13, 2024

Your dishwasher uses less water than hand-washing does. Just how much less water depends on your washing style and your dishwasher, but the average hand-washing session uses about 20 gallons, while the average dishwasher cycle uses 10 gallons. The most energy-efficient dishwashers use between four and six gallons! (This savings is, of course, negated if you run your dishwasher when it’s only half-full.)

- thekitchn.com (November 4, 2020)

July 12, 2024

A thing is considered “antique” if it has been around for at least 100 years. It’s crucial to remember that this is only a broad guideline and that other people or organizations may have slightly different definitions or standards for what constitutes an antique. 

 The 100-year mark is frequently used as a benchmark since it allows for a sizable amount of time to pass and conveys that the object is from a bygone era. This minimum age criterion aids in separating vintage items—generally regarded as being between 20 and 100 years old—from antiques. Things that are less than 20 years old are typically labeled as “collectibles” or “contemporary.”

- jerrysantiquesandestates.com (July 4, 2023)

July 11, 2024

The average person spends 81,396 hours — the equivalent of more than nine years — at work. “Americans are now more likely to make friends at work than any other way — including at school, in their neighborhood, at their place of worship, or even through existing friends,” according to the Survey Center on American Life. So, people spend a lot of their lives at work, and that’s where they’re most likely to develop friendships.

- Harvard Business Review (October 7, 2022)

July 10, 2024

The propeller beanie was further popularized by a television program, Time For Beany. The show was hugely popular with children, and even adults. The title character was a propeller beanie-wearing puppet named Beany whose sock-puppet friend called Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent was voiced and controlled by an unknown Stan Freeberg! Starting in 1949, it ran five times a week for five years.

- todayinsci.com by Ian Ellis

July 09, 2024

There are over 75 million pet dogs in the U.S. — more than in any other country.

- American Kennel Club (August 2, 2023)

July 08, 2024

At any given time, dogs have some level of bacteria and fungi on their skin. When your dog’s paws have a bacteria called Pseudomonas and Proteus, they can give off a yeasty odor that smells similar to corn chips. Dogs control their body temperature by panting. Since they don’t perspire, the only place dogs have to cool down is on the bottom of their feet. Fritos smell is completely normal and doesn’t mean that your dog has a bacterial or fungal infection.

- American Kennel Club (Jul7 25, 2023)

July 07, 2024

The average person creates 1/3 ounce of dead skin each week, which is about the weight of a car key. This dead skin combines with other particles to create household dust. While that 1/3 ounce doesn’t seem like much, the average home in the United States collects 40 pounds of dust each year. A commonly quoted statistic is that 80% of dust is made up of dead skin, but that’s actually a pretty small percentage. Dust in houses and offices is made up of a combination of pollen, hair, textile fibers, paper fibers, soil minerals, cosmic dust particles, and various other materials found in the local environment.

- hughesenv.com (April 21, 2015)

July 06, 2024

When it rains, the humidity is at 100%, which is why the clouds are unable to hold any more water. When it rains, it will increase the relative humidity because of the evaporation. When the air is hotter, it will cause the water to evaporate faster, thus creating a higher level of humidity. If the air is cooler, the water will reduce the humidity level and actually make it seem cooler than the temperature outside.

- smartfog.com

July 05, 2024

A firework requires three key components: an oxidizer, a fuel and a chemical mixture to produce the color. The oxidizer breaks the chemical bonds in the fuel, releasing all of the energy that’s stored in those bonds. To ignite this chemical reaction, all you need is a bit of fire, in the form of a fuse or a direct flame.

- smithsonianmag.com (July 4, 2014)

July 04, 2024

It wasn’t until the 1970s when goggles first made an appearance in competitive swimming. Scottish swimmer David Wilkie went down in history as the first swimmer to don a pair in a race when he competed at the 1970 Commonwealth Games, wearing a pair of homemade goggles to protect him from a chlorine allergy. The impact was there for all to see, as Wilkie won a gold medal and set a personal best before going on to break team USA’s dominance in swimming with a gold at the 1976 Olympics, cementing his status as a trailblazer for goggles in the process.

- swimswam.com (April 11, 2021)

July 03, 2024

Sailing around the world westward is more difficult than eastward. Most world-record contenders choose to sail eastward due to the stronger and more predictable winds and currents that push eastward in the Southern Hemisphere.

- sailwildhearts.com (November 1, 2019)

July 02, 2024

According to different estimates, ants can carry 10 - 50 times their body weight, or maybe even more! How? Because ants are so small, their muscles have a greater cross-sectional area (they are thicker) relative to their body size than in larger animals. This means they can produce more force pound-for-pound (or in the case of an ant, milligram-for-milligram).

- Arizona State University School of Life Sciences

July 01, 2024

Bicycles save over 238 million gallons of gas every year.

- bicyclehistory.net