I like to learn a good fact or two.
Ever since I was a kid. I loved pulling out random volumes from our encyclopedia set, opening them to any page, and reading about the person, place or thing there on that page.
Seems like I still enjoy that little encyclopedia game of pulling out random facts to this very day.
So in honor of my eight-year-old self, or my current older self, today is “Fun Fact Day,” with facts containing information all about the United States of America.
1 The current U.S. flag was designed by a 17-year-old kid.
It is true. Our current 50-star flag was designed as part of a high school project.
A boy named Robert G. Heft designed the current United States flag as a school project in Lancaster, Ohio. Well, his teacher thought the design was just so-so, and Robert received a B- for his project. Just for the record, his teacher was a guy named Stanley Pratt. Way to go, Stan.
Anyway, Robert wasn’t happy with the B-. So. He had a talk with his teacher and they reached an agreement: If the flag was selected as the official flag by the United States Congress, he would get a better grade for the project.
They submitted Heft’s design and it was chosen out of more than 1,500 entries for the contest. Dwight D. Eisenhower was president at the time. And a happy story: his teacher changed his grade to an A.
After graduating from college, he became a high school teacher and later a college professor. He was also mayor of Napoleon, Ohio, for 28 years.
2 Here in the United States, we don’t have an official language.
Most people assume English is the official language of the United States, but the truth is we don’t have one. English might be the “official language” in many of the individual states. But. The federal government has never declared an official language, not English or anything else.
“¿Hablas español?”
3 Civil War Pensions? Irene Triplett was the last recipient of an American Civil War pension.
The Civil War ended in 1865, but Irene Triplett was still collecting a pension until her passing in 2020. Her father served in the war, which entitled Triplett to a survivor’s benefit of $73.13 a month. Isn’t that crazy?
To clear up the facts of the story:
Her father, Mose Triplett, fought for both the Confederacy and, later, the Union in the war.
IreneTriplett was born in 1930 to Mose Triplett, age 83, and Elida Hall, age 34. (North Carolina)
And this. Triplett was mentally disabled. Her education ended in the sixth grade, and in 1943, she moved with her mother and brother to a poorhouse, where she remained until 1960. She later lived in private nursing homes until her death.
According to acquaintances, she was a regular user of chewing tobacco and was a fan of gospel music.
4 Finally? Or beginning-ly? Dinosaurs loved it here.
I always think about dinosaurs as being in some far-off place. Like, I don’t know, some mystery continent. But here is where they were! The United States has not only found the most dinosaur fossils of any place on Earth, but it also has the most variety.
Most of the dinosaur “finds” have been scattered throughout the country. But the bulk of them were in desert areas. That is because vegetation isn’t likely to grow in all that barren land. So fossils remain more accessible since they are covered by nothing but sand and rock, as opposed to trees and soil.
At any rate, the big stompers, stomped right around here. Dinosaurs in Ohio. I like this state better already.
So there they are. Four widely different facts about America. I know I learned a thing or two. I hope you did, too.
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“I am always doing that which I cannot do, in order that I may learn how to do it.”
– Pablo Picasso
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“The beautiful thing about learning is that nobody can take it away from you.”
– B.B. King
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“Learning is a treasure that will follow its owner everywhere.”
– Chinese Proverb
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Here in the U.S. we have flags and dinosaurs. For instance.
