Bathroom Readers' Institute's Blog, page 11

Sing, Captain America, Sing!

Each year, Uncle John and his team of devoted trivia hunters track down fascinating facts, little known stories, and forgotten pop culture to fill several hundred pages of reading material. Why? To compile the annual Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader, of course. Here’s the exact type of thing you’ll find — and plenty of — in […]

One-Sport Athletes Who Tried to be Two-Sport Athletes

Sure, Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders both played pro baseball and pro football, and simultaneously at that. But several other professional jocks who had what it took to make it one big league couldn’t quite cut it in another. Michael Jordan, baseball player In October 1993, shortly after winning his third straight NBA title with […]

His Name Was Alexander Hamilton

Lesser-known Founding Father Alexander Hamilton finally got his shot at legendary status thanks to Hamilton, a hip-hop Broadway musical about his life and impact. Lin-Manuel Miranda’s project is a cultural phenomenon, and a movie adaptation has arrived. Hamilton is also the subject of one of our Show Me History! books. Here are some little-known facts […]

Insert Coin for Really Weird Video Game Trivia

Video games burst onto the cultural scene in the 1970s, and what felt like a novelty or a toy fad only kept getting bigger and more sophisticated. Here are a few weird bits of trivia we picked up like they were coins or power pellets. The first appearance of Mario is in the game Donkey […]

A Few of the Biggest Collapses in Football History

As the NFL playoffs end and the Super Bowl is just around the corner, a few teams and players are bound to make sports history and achieve gridiron glory. That’s the opposite of what happened with these teams, who lost the magic at the worst possible time. Houston Oilers vs. Buffalo Bills, 1993 Playoffs There’s […]

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 […]

8 Things You Didn’t Know About Harriet Tubman

Many northern states banned slavery by the mid-1800s, but the immensely ugly practice continued in the South, ended only after presidential action, a constitutional amendment, and a Civil War. Until that point, enslaved Americans fleeing the South did so with the assistance of the Underground Railroad, a secret network that got people safely into the […]

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 […]

7 Things You Didn’t Know About Muhammad Ali

You know him for his boxing prowess and remarkable way with words, but how much do you really know about Muhammad Ali? Read on to find out more about "The Greatest." By age 18, Clay had won two Amateur Athletic Union national titles, two Golden Gloves national titles, and had amassed a record of 100 […]

True Crime Facts That Will Keep You Up At Night