“In the Gardens of the Palais Royal, in Paris, there is a little cannon which stands on a pedestal, and is surrounded by a railing. Every day it is loaded with powder and wadding, but no one on earth is allowed to fire it off. However, far away in the realms of space, ninety-three millions of miles from our world, there is the great and glorious Sun, and every day, at twelve o’clock, he fires off that little cannon, provided there are no clouds in the way. Just before noon on bright days, the people gather around the railing, with their watches in their hands, — if they are so lucky as to have watches, — and precisely at twelve o’clock, bang! she goes.

“The arrangement which produces this novel artillery-practice is very simple. A burning-glass is fixed over the cannon in such a manner that when the sun comes to the meridian — which it does every day at noon, you know — its rays are concentrated on the touch-hole, and of course the powder is ignited and the cannon is fired.”

— Frank R. Stockton, Round-About Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy, 1910

In 1795, Boston millionaire James Swan paid off the American national debt to France, a total of $2,024,899, out of his own pocket.

Ironically, he spent the last 22 years of his life in a French debtors’ prison.

A letter to Abraham Lincoln, Oct. 18, 1860:

Dear Sir

My father has just home from the fair and brought home your picture and Mr. Hamlin’s. I am a little girl only eleven years old, but want you should be President of the United States very much so I hope you wont think me very bold to write to such a great man as you are. Have you any little girls about as large as I am if so give them my love and tell her to write to me if you cannot answer this letter. I have got 4 brother’s and part of them will vote for you any way and if you let your whiskers grow I will try and get the rest of them to vote for you you would look a great deal better for your face is so thin. All the ladies like whiskers and they would tease their husband’s to vote for you and then you would be President. My father is a going to vote for you and if I was a man I would vote for you to but I will try to get every one to vote for you that I can I think that rail fence around your picture makes it look very pretty I have got a little baby sister she is nine weeks old and is just as cunning as can be. When you direct your letter direct to Grace Bedell Westfield Chatauque County New York

I must not write any more answer this letter right off Good bye

Grace Bedell

Lincoln actually wrote back, asking, “As to the whiskers, having never worn any, do you think people would call it a piece of silly affection if I were to begin it now?”

When the two met the following year, Lincoln was president-elect — and had grown his famous beard.

Organizers founded the modern Olympic Games in 1896, and they hadn’t quite got the hang of things by 1904. That year included “Anthropology Days,” in which indigenous people from around the world were borrowed from the World’s Fair to compete against white men in various events, including mud fighting, greased-pole climbing, and rock and spear throwing.

This was so embarrassing that the Olympic committee held “intercalated” games just two years later, in Athens, to help everyone forget about it.