Yeah, But What Else Happened on the Fourth of July?
Independence Day is a great summer holiday, but lots of world-changing events happened on that date after 1776. Read to find out more.
Holidays
Endangered Species: Saved!
Endangered Species Day is a chance for us to reflect on the successes of our protection of the bald eagle, the Lake Erie water snake, and more.
African-Americans You Should Know About (But Maybe Don’t)
To commemorate Black History Month, here’s a list of notable figures often overlooked by history books.
An Earth Day Origin Story
Good news: This entire article is 100 percent planet-friendly! Here’s how we got a holiday celebrating the environment and arguing for its preservation. SILENT SPRING Author and biologist Rachel Carson won a National Book Award for The Sea Around Us, one of three 1950s bestsellers about the ocean. As the years wore on, she observed continually […]
Did You Know-Ho-Ho All This Trivia About the Origins of Christmas Traditions?
Billions of people celebrate Christmas, and there are almost as many ways to celebrate, with many beloved traditions around the world enduring for decades or even centuries. Here are some fun facts about how they came to be. Wreaths Made from a fir and decorated with ribbons and other adornments, wreaths are like very small, […]
Portable Press’s Ho-Ho-Holiday Gift Guide 2022
By Brian Boone In case you didn’t notice the holiday season has arrived. If you need a list, Portable Press has you covered — books make the perfect gifts, and we’ve got a little something for almost everyone. For the Trivia Champion Uncle John’s Awesome 35th Anniversary Bathroom Reader Everybody knows that person who’s ready […]
A Look Back at What Was Supposed to Happen in 2020 (According to Psychics)
This was a wild, harrowing, and unpredictable year… and one that self-proclaimed psychics somehow didn’t see coming. Here are some events that psychics claimed were supposed to happen in 2020. The world may have avoided a catastrophic attack by this man — psychic Sidney Friedman ominously predicted that “cookies” would “disappear.” Friedman also said that […]
All About New Year’s Resolutions
This year, we resolve to write more blog posts about New Year’s resolutions. And look at that, we did it! • Ancient Babylonians started the idea of New Year’s resolutions about 4,000 years ago, although the new year in that society started in the middle of March and lined up with crop-planting season. As part […]
Don’t Panic! Holiday Gift Guide
The gift-giving (and receiving) holidays are on their way — you can just about hear the jingling bells in the distance and make out those flickering candle flames. The perfect gift for any occasion: a book. And we’ve got you covered — we’ve got lots of books for every taste! For the paternal cornball YOU: […]
The Fourth of July By the Numbers
When a holiday has a number right there in its name, it just makes us want to take a deep dive into the huge numbers that make the United States’ celebratory day of independence so special. 56: The number of signatories to the Declaration of Independence, ratified on July 4, 1776, and establishing the United […]
They Could’ve Been Canadian
July 1st is the day that Canada’s 10 provinces and three territories celebrate Canada Day, commemorating the day the nation officially formed in 1867. Had history gone a bit differently, there’d be a lot more of Canada to celebrate on Canada Day. Vermont From 1777 to 1791, the state of Vermont was an independent republic, […]
Happy Father’s Day to the Heroic Dads Out There
A lot of people think of their father as their hero…especially the kids of the dads in these amazing news stories. Hero Dad vs. Speeding Car Early in the evening of November 16, 2018, Michael Devore and his 11-year-old daughter were walking through a crosswalk in Los Angeles. They’d nearly crossed the street when a […]
It’s “Eat What You Want Day” (But Don’t Eat This)
Saturday, May 11 is “Eat What You Want Day,” a time that organizers say we should all ease up on the healthy eating and just consume what we really want to consume. It might be going a little too far, however, to eat one of these record-setting giant foods, or try to match a competitive […]
The Story Behind Tree Day USA
Didn’t we just celebrate Earth Day? Well, now it’s time for that other April holiday about green things that grow: Arbor Day. The appreciation of trees in America, and all their benefits both biological and eye-pleasing, long pre-dates the 20th century’s environmentalism movement. It all goes back to Julius Sterling Morton, who, after earning his […]
A Very Inventive St. Patrick’s Day
St. Patrick’s Day has evolved into a celebration of Ireland, the people of Ireland, and the influence of the Emerald Isle on world culture. To that end, here are some indelible contributions to technology and science by those of Irish descent. Chocolate milk It’s strange to think that somebody had to invent the addition of […]
Esther Howland: Valentine Queen
In photographs, she presents the grim, humorless visage of a middle-aged, Victorian spinster. But Esther Howland popularized valentine giving in the United States and, by the time of her death in 1904, had earned the sobriquet “Mother of the American Valentine.” (This article was first published in Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Book of Love.) Be […]
The Nutcracker? Sweet!
Going to see a local production of The Nutcracker ballet is a holiday tradition for many families. Surprisingly, watching this old-fashioned entertainment is a relatively new idea. Based on a fairy tale The ballet, with famous, original music by Russian composer Peter Tchaikovsky, was not originally written for the stage. It’s based on a fairy […]
Don’t Be a Scrooge — Read These Facts About “A Christmas Carol”
Nearly every TV Christmas special and Christmas movie indirectly or directly descends from A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens’ 1843 novel about Ebenezer Scrooge, Tiny Tim, and the Ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future. Here’s a deeper dive into the most influential Christmas story of them all. SOUNDS FAMILIAR Dickens wrote the novel in just […]
