Tom McHale

For seven years in the 1970s, Veterans Day fell on a Monday in October, all for a long weekend. Then the states revolted. By 1975, 46 of them had kept November 11 or gone back to it, and the House voted 410 to 6 to give the date back. tom-mchale.com/blog/congress…

In 1833, Henry Shreve figured he could clear a 100-mile log jam on the Red River in 66 days. It took 40 years and a lot of nitroglycerin. That was a recent issue of my free weekly newsletter: tom-mchale.com/subscribe?utm…

I'm kind of a plane nerd, and my AI assistant is now supporting my habit. My new @TheFlightWall display shows planes flying nearby, along with airport codes for the flight, tail number and a short description of the plane type. So I started asking @Muse (been kicking the tires to try it out as a "make my personal life simpler" tool) to help me ID the airport codes and planes I wasn't familiar with. After a few iterations, Muse noticed the pattern and offered to build me a tool to facilitate the process. Tell Muse an airport code, a tail number, or a plane description, and it looks up the info and adds it to my plane-spotting profile. The fun part is that this is not something I ever would have built. Cool and fun, but time-consuming to do by hand. Adds some fun to my workday, though. @Musecases

Plymouth Rock has had a hard life. Patriots broke it in half in 1774 while hauling it to the town square. Souvenir hunters chipped away at it for decades. And in 1867, workers cut off a chunk so it would fit under its new canopy. That piece became somebody's doorstep.

In 1893, Grover Cleveland told everyone he was going fishing on a friend's yacht. Instead, surgeons removed a tumor and part of his jaw on board. A reporter got the story, and the White House trashed his reputation. It took 24 years for one of the surgeons to back him up.

Bananas are a little radioactive. A whole truckload can set off the radiation detectors at U.S. ports. That's one of 80-plus stories in my Least Boring Person book, right next to why tennis players grunt: tom-mchale.com/books?utm_sou…

In 1950, game show host Ralph Edwards offered to broadcast live from the first town that would rename itself after his show. Hot Springs, New Mexico, voted 4 to 1 to do it. It's been called Truth or Consequences ever since. Edwards came back every spring for 50 years.

June 1939: the first reigning British monarch ever to visit the US got served hot dogs at FDR's Hyde Park picnic. Letters warned it would imperil the nation's dignity. Next day's New York Times front page: "King Tries Hot Dog and Asks for More."

Seventeen days before Thanksgiving 1959, the government warned that some cranberries carried a weed killer that caused cancer in rats. Sales tanked. Then Richard Nixon ate four helpings of cranberry sauce in Wisconsin. JFK drank two glasses of cranberry juice.

Women were voting in New Jersey in the 1790s. Then the state took it back. The road to the 19th Amendment wasn't a straight line, and it ended with a 24-year-old Tennessee legislator, a red rose, and a letter from his mom.

Wyoming has fewer than 600,000 people. California has about 39 million. Each one gets exactly two senators. That's on purpose. In 1787 the vote on it tied, five states to five, and the small states were ready to walk. youtu.be/XV9WI4KQjQo

In 1869, a skeptic buried a 10-foot stone "giant" on a New York farm and waited a year for someone to dig it up. People paid 50 cents a look. Then P.T. Barnum couldn't buy it, so he built a copy and told everyone his fake was the real one. tom-mchale.com/blog/the-fake…

In 1939, FDR moved Thanksgiving up a week to give stores more Christmas shopping days. Plenty of governors said no thanks, so the country had two Thanksgivings. Texas took both. Critics called the new one Franksgiving. Congress finally fixed it in 1941: the fourth Thursday.

The people who invented gunpowder were trying to live forever. Chinese alchemists spent centuries chasing an immortality potion. What they got instead burned their hands, their faces, and at least one house. Then again, it also gave us fireworks.

In 1750, Ben Franklin almost electrocuted himself trying to kill a turkey with electricity. His guests kept chatting; he got distracted and shocked himself instead. He asked his family to keep it quiet. Six weeks later, he confessed to a scientist friend in London.

Jamestown gets the credit, but St. Augustine, Florida beat it by 42 years. The Spanish founded it in 1565, and it's still a thriving city. This story is one of eleven in a free eBook you get when you join my weekly newsletter: tom-mchale.com/subscribe?utm…

Election Day used to come with cake. A big one. A 1796 recipe from America's first homegrown cookbook calls for 30 quarts of flour, 10 pounds of butter, 14 pounds of sugar, 12 pounds of raisins, three dozen eggs and a quart of brandy. It fed the crowds who came to town to vote.

In 1936, a South Dakota drugstore was barely hanging on. Dorothy Hustead couldn't nap for all the cars rattling past, so she had an idea: signs offering free ice water. As her husband told it, folks showed up before he got back from hanging them. Wall Drug still gives it away.

Candy corn's first name was Chicken Feed. No, really. Around 1898, Goelitz, the company that became Jelly Belly, sold it in a box with a rooster on the front, aimed at farm families. Halloween didn't claim it until after WWII, when trick-or-treating took off.