Which was insured for the most money, Fred Astaire’s feet, Betty Grable’s legs, or Jimmy Durante’s nose?
Astaire’s feet, insured for $650,000, were at the top of this list.
Grable’s legs were insured for only $250,000, Durante’s nose for $140,000.
Pontius Pilate killed himself after he ordered the crucifixion. In A.D. 36, Caligula ordered Pilate to Rome to answer charges of cruelty in the massacre of a group of Samaritans. Shortly thereafter, Pilate committed suicide, possibly by order of Caligula or in anticipation of harsh treatment.
Queen Victoria, who reigned from 1837 to 1901, was the grand daughter of the King George III, who lost the American colonies. This makes Elizabeth II, Queen of England since 1952, George’s great-great-great-great grand daughter.
David Ben-Gurion was born in Poland in 1886. He fled Poland in 1905 and settled in Palestine, becoming the first prime minister of Israel in 1948. Golda Meir was born in Russia in 1898 but was raised in the United States, where her parents moved in 1900. She settled in Palestine in 1921, becoming Israel’s…
Pius IX, who led the Catholic Church for nearly 32 years, from 1846 to 1878, was the longest-reigning pope. It was during his reign that the First Vatican Council, in 1870, promulgated the dogma of papal infallibility. That doctrine states that the pope cannot err on matters of faith or morals when speaking ex cathedra,…
The shoguns were the de facto rulers of Japan from 1192 to 1867. Originally military commanders, they exercised real power, while the emperor retained formal sovereignty. The name is an abbreviation of seii-tai-shogun, meaning “barbarian-quelling generalissimo.”
The term chauvinism originally referred to Nicolas Chauvin, a French soldier of the Napoleonic era whose devotion to Napoleon was considered excessive and unreasonable. He later appeared in a number of plays and literary works, including Baroness Orczy’s Scarlet Pimpernel (1905), always representing an exaggerated patriotism. The term has since taken on a more general…