Details

As the U.S. tariff act of June 6, 1872, was being drafted, planners intended to exempt “Fruit plants, tropical and semi-tropical for the purpose of propagation or cultivation.”

Unfortunately, as the language was being copied, a comma was inadvertently moved one word to the left, producing the phrase “Fruit, plants tropical and semi-tropical for the purpose of propagation or cultivation.”

Importers pounced, claiming that the new phrase exempted all tropical and semi-tropical fruit, not just the plants on which it grew.

The Treasury eventually had to agree that this was indeed what the language now said, opening a loophole for fruit importers that deprived the U.S. government of an estimated $1 million in revenue. Subsequent tariffs restored the comma to its intended position.

| History · Language · Oddities

Near Things

The next important ceremony in which I was officially concerned was the Coronation of King Edward [VII, in 1902]. … Before the Coronation I had a remarkable dream. The State coach had to pass through the Arch at the Horse Guards on the way to Westminster Abbey. I dreamed that it stuck in the Arch, and that some of the Life Guards on duty were compelled to hew off the Crown upon the coach, before it could be freed. When I told the Crown Equerry, Colonel Ewart, he laughed and said, ‘What do dreams matter?’ ‘At all events’, I replied, ‘let us have the coach and the arch measured.’ So this was done; and, to my astonishment, we found that the arch was nearly two feet too low to allow the coach to pass through. I returned to Colonel Ewart in triumph, and said, ‘What do you think of dreams now?’ ‘I think it’s damned fortunate you had one,’ he replied. It appears that the State Coach had not been driven through the arch for some time, and that the level of the road had since been raised during repairs. So I am not sorry that my dinner disagreed with me that night; and I only wish all nightmares were as useful.

That’s from Men Women and Things, the 1937 memoir of William Cavendish-Bentinck, 6th Duke of Portland. An even more striking moment occurred 11 years later, when Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria visited England and the Portlands received him at Welbeck Abbey. During the weeklong visit, Portland and the archduke were shooting on the estate when “one of the loaders fell down. This caused both barrels of a gun he was carrying to be discharged, the shot passing within a few feet of the Archduke and myself. I have often wondered whether the Great War might not have been averted, or at least postponed, had the Archduke met his death then, and not at Sarajevo in the following year.”

| History · Oddities

A Kitchen Timer

Another notable invention for roasting meat was the musical turnspit, that, whilst causing joints to gyrate before the Count de Castel Maria’s kitchen-fire, played four-and-twenty tunes to the cooks of that opulent lord of Treviso. The spits of this machine turned a hundred and thirty roasts at the same time; and the chef was informed, by the progress of the melodies, when the moment had arrived for removing each piece of meat. Chickens were done to a turn when the organ had played its twelfth tune; the completion of the eighteenth air was the signal for withdrawing hares and pheasants; but the largest pieces of beef and venison were not ready for the board until the twenty-fourth melody had been played out.

— John Cordy Jeaffreson, A Book About the Table, 1875

| Oddities · Technology

Road Show

The avoid creating duplicate street names in Columbia, Maryland, developer The Rouse Company took its inspiration from famous works of art and literature. Street name maven Howard Channing cited these as some of his favorites:

  • Attic Window Way
  • Banjo Court
  • Barefoot Boy Street
  • Better Hours Court
  • Cloudburst Hill
  • Dragon Claw Street
  • Drowsy Day Street
  • Feathered Head Street
  • Flapjack Lane
  • Frostwork Row
  • Fruitgift Place
  • Hat Brim Lane
  • Honey Salt Row
  • Hundred Drums Row
  • Kind Rain Street
  • Latchkey Row
  • Lifequest Lane
  • Little Boots Street
  • Mad River Lane
  • Melting Shadows Lane
  • Quiet Hours Street
  • Resting Sea Street
  • Rustling Leaf Street
  • Satan Wood Drive
  • Sealed Message Street
  • Sharp Antler Street
  • Snuffbox Terrace
  • Tufted Moss Street
  • Wineglass Court
  • Youngheart Lane

These and more are listed in Paul Dickson’s 1996 book What’s in a Name?, and the town once published a book with the whole story. This database catalogs some of the names’ origins. Channing called Columbia the most “provocatively and imaginatively” named town he’s studied.

| Language · Literature · Oddities

In a Word

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gum_wall,_Seattle,_Washington,_Estados_Unidos,_2017-09-02,_DD_19-21_HDR.jpg
Image: Diego Delso

manducate
v. chew

congustable
adj. having a similar flavor

deturpation
n. a making foul

gazingstock
n. a thing gazed at with wonder

Beneath Seattle’s Pike Place Market is a 50-foot brick wall covered with used chewing gum. Begun in the 1990s, the wall now bears an estimated 180 pieces of gum per brick. In 2009 it was ranked second only to the Blarney Stone as the world’s germiest tourist attraction.

Washington state governor Jay Inslee called the “gum wall” his “favorite thing about Seattle you can’t find anywhere else,” but in fact Bubblegum Alley, in San Luis Obispo, Calif., is even bigger, at 70 feet long (below). Opponents call it offensive, but the Chamber of Commerce lists it as a “special attraction.”

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bubblegum_alley.jpg
Image: Wikimedia Commons
| Language · Oddities

In Brief

When H.P. Re of Coldwater, Mich., died in 1931, his claim to have the world’s shortest name was up for grabs, and the Associated Press held a sort of contest to find his successor. J. Ur of Torrington, Conn., expressed early confidence because he had no middle initial, but, AP reported:

C. Ek and J. Ek, brothers from Duluth, promptly entered the lists as cochampions. Mrs. V. Ek, not to be outdone, claimed not only the woman’s title, but the mixed doubles championship. A former Duluth policeman said his name was C. Sy.

Then Fairmount, Minnesota, entered E. Py, farmer; Clinton, Iowa, put forward C. Au, J. Au, and W. Au, triple threats; Indiana offered Ed Py, inmate of Newcastle Jail; and Indianapolis made a poor try with Fix Ax.

In the end the palm went to Aaron A of Chicago, who went by A.A., a name that AP noted “leads all others in the Chicago telephone directory, alphabetically as well as longitudinally.” A’s ancestors had been jewelers in Saxony, and a philologist speculated that the surname derived from an old German word for river.

| Language · Oddities

Tight Quarters

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bishop_Rock_Lighthouse_SV8006.jpg
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The world’s smallest island with a building on it is the Bishop Rock, a skerry off the coast of Cornwall. The islet is 46 by 16 meters, and the tower’s base is 10 meters across. Before the installation of a helipad in 1976, visitors would rappel from the tower’s base to waiting boats.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Thousand_Islands_single_house.jpg
Image: Wikimedia Commons

Among the Thousand Islands at the head of the Saint Lawrence River is the smallest inhabited island in the world, known as “Just Room Enough.” It accommodates a single house.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Smallest_House_in_Great_Britain,_Conwy_(8035).jpg
Image: Wikimedia Commons

The “Smallest House in Great Britain” stands on the quay in Conwy, Wales. Built in the 16th century, it has a floor area of 3.05 by 1.8 meters.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Drumheller,_AB,_Canada_-_panoramio.jpg
Image: Wikimedia Commons

Built in 1958, the Little Church in Drumheller, Alberta, is available for ceremonies. It seats six.

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Lahaina Noon

Twice a year, objects Hawaii lose their shadows as the sun passes directly overhead.

A “zero shadow day” occurs biannually between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, arriving at each location when the sun’s declination equals its latitude.

| Oddities · Science & Math

“Narrow Escape of a Mouse”

https://archive.org/details/strand-1897-v-14/page/117/mode/2up

Mr. Chas. Hy. Heskins, of 94, Blenheim Road, Reading, was good enough to send in this extremely curious and interesting photo. The kettle, it seems, was a disused one, and stood for a long time on a shelf with the lid partly off, much as we see in the photo. One night the mouse got in, possibly in the hope of finding some stray crusts. Why the little animal should take it into his head to leave the inhospitable kettle by the spout is not known, but he did, with the result portrayed in the photo. His head got through all right, and two pathetic little paws; but ‘the force of Nature could no farther go,’ and poor mousie stuck fast. Next morning someone took the kettle in hand, and ‘assisted’ the mouse’s hindquarters with a stick of wood, with the result that he emerged slowly and stiffly, and was finally allowed to hobble painfully away. Truly, a narrow escape in more senses than one!

— Strand, July 1897

| Oddities

Double or Nothing

Carrying two brown satchels, one filled with $777,000 in $100 bills and the other empty, an unidentified man, dressed in jeans and cowboy boots, walked into Binion’s Horseshoe Casino in Las Vegas last week. He exchanged his money for $500 chips, strode to the craps table and put all of the chips on the back line, which meant that he was betting against the woman who happened to be rolling the dice. She first threw a six, then a nine and finally a seven. Said the dealer: ‘Pay the back line.’ The man scooped up his chips, traded them at the casino cage for $1,554,000 in cash and shook hands with Jack Binion, the stunned president of the casino. Said Binion: ‘It was the biggest bet in a gambling house that I have ever heard of.’ As the man walked out of the casino with his two brown satchels, both now stuffed with $100 bills, and climbed into his car, he told Binion: ‘You know, this damned inflation was just eroding this money. I figured I might as well double it or lose it.’ With that, he drove off into the night, still unidentified.

— Time, Oct. 6, 1980

(A few more details here.)

10/10/2025 UPDATE: The gambler was later identified. (Thanks, Patrick.)

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