Every child in the Netherlands starts school on their fourth birthday. Since there are continually new students in the class, veteran students help welcome the newbies and teach them the rules. And we think that’s adorable.
Every child in the Netherlands starts school on their fourth birthday. Since there are continually new students in the class, veteran students help welcome the newbies and teach them the rules. And we think that’s adorable.
Rap first came to national prominence in the U.S. with the release of the Sugarhill Gang’s song “Rapper’s Delight” (1979) on the independent African American-owned label Sugar Hill. It quickly became a chart-topping phenomenon and gave its name to a new genre of pop music.
Kool Herc was widely credited as the father of modern rapping for his spoken interjections over records. Other influences for MCing include: - The epic histories of West African storytellers - Talking blues songs - Jailhouse toasts (long rhyming poems recounting wild stories)
Sliding the record back and forth underneath the needle also created the rhythmic effect called “scratching.”
Deejays began to develop new techniques for turntable manipulation. Needle dropping, created by Grandmaster Flash, prolonged short drum breaks by playing two copies of a record and moving the needle on one turntable back to the start of the break while the other played.
Kool Herc and other pioneering hip-hop deejays such as Grand Wizard Theodore, Afrika Bambaataa, and Grandmaster Flash isolated and extended the break beat (the part of a record where all sounds but the drums drop out). The beat inspired improvisational dancing- breakdancing.
Hip hop is 52 years old. At a back-to-school party in the Bronx in 1973, Jamaican-American deejay Kool Herc introduced the technique of playing the same album on two turntables and extending the drum section, which became known as the breakbeat. 🧵⬇️
Big time agree.
Wishing everyone a very "Noon-Rest-by-Van-Gogh" day off today.
The 'S' in Harry S. Truman does not stand for anything. His parents could not agree on a middle name at birth, so they gave him the middle initial 'S.' Become ungovernable.
Life's too short not to overthrow the Persian Empire. ⚔️ Summer, 330 BCE
Hurricane Katrina struck the U.S. in late August 2005. It claimed nearly 1,400 lives and is ranked as the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history. Two decades later, the lingering effects of Katrina continue to influence the economy and culture of the Gulf Coast.
In 1908, Australia chose an emu and a kangaroo for its coat of arms to represent a nation moving forward because it was thought that neither animal could move backward. Science has since determined that emus and kangaroos can, in fact, move backward. So…
On August 27, 1883, the Indonesian volcano, Krakatoa, erupted in an explosion that propelled ash 50 miles high and was heard 2,200 miles away. To this day, the eruption is considered the loudest modern sound ever heard. So, just how loud was it?
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Yes we already updated their bios to 'engaged.'
While we love a vintage-inspired 8-carat diamond set in 18k yellow gold, these are still some of our favorite rings. 🧵⬇️
In fact, the name “Chicago” is often thought to be derived from an Algonquian word for the wild leek plant that grew locally. Another interpretation of the Native American term means “strong” or “great.”
The original site for Chicago was unremarkable: a small settlement at the mouth of the Chicago River near the southern tip of Lake Michigan. Its location at the end of the Great Lake system, however, proved ideal as the country expanded westward in the 19th century.
britannica.com/animal/screwworm
In August, the U.S. confirmed its first travel-associated human screwworm case from an outbreak-affected country, renewing efforts to reestablish eradication.
Despite these major national and international efforts, outbreaks have continued to arise. In 2025, many countries throughout Central America and Mexico reported hundreds or thousands of New World screwworm infestations.
www.britannica.com/animal/screw...
Similar results were soon achieved across North America, and the technique, known as the ‘Sterile Insect Technique,’ was later used to control outbreaks of other pests, including the tsetse fly in Africa.
He began sterilizing New World screwworm flies with an old army X-ray machine shortly after World War II, and in 1954 sterile flies were dropped on the island of Curaçao. In only nine weeks the screwworm population virtually disappeared.
The result, he thought, would be that no fertilized eggs would be produced, and the numbers of the insect would drop dramatically. [Drumroll, please] He was right.
Edward Fred Knipling, an American entomologist, developed this efficient, pesticide-free method of insect control in the mid-1900s. Since each female mates only once, Knipling's idea was to sterilize male flies in large numbers, then release them to mate with fertile females.
The specifics of how screwworms infest animals are pretty gruesome, so we’ll spare you those details, but the technique used to control their population is quite innovative. That technique? The sterilization of male screwworm flies.
Texas is launching a $750 million effort to fight the screwworm, an invasive species that devastates livestock. Screwworm maggots are serious pests that attack livestock, deer, and other animals, including humans. And yes, that’s their actual name. 🧵⬇️
Long Island.
Trust the process.
Please don’t be upset, but Philadelphia Cream Cheese was never made in Philadelphia. When it was first created in 1872, the spread’s home state of New York had a reputation for making chalky cheeses, while Pennsylvania dairy farms had a reputation for making creamy cheeses.
Virgo, in astronomy, is the zodiacal constellation lying in the southern sky between Leo and Libra. The constellation’s brightest star, Spica, is Latin for “head of grain,” and is also called Alpha Virginis, which somehow makes a lot of sense.
We don’t usually hop on style trends but…
My therapist (first edition Encyclopædia Britannica entry titled "Moral Philosophy", 1768) said this to me, and it hit me like a brick: "Good and ill are often blended, and wonderfully complicated one with the other."
Hygienic measures and elimination of rats from human habitations have virtually ended urban epidemics of plague in the developed world. The disease will always be present in rodents, but its occurrence in humans is controlled by limiting people’s exposure to infected animals.
In septicemic plague, the bloodstream is so invaded by the bacteria that, in untreated cases, death can ensue even before the bubonic or pneumonic forms have had time to appear. Septicemic plague can arise as a complication of bubonic plague or by infection from a flea bite.
In pneumonic plague, the lungs are invaded by bacilli. The symptoms are similar to severe pneumonia, and death will almost certainly occur in 3 - 4 days if treatment is not offered. Pneumonic plague is highly infectious through droplets expelled by coughing or sneezing.
Bubonic plague is not directly infectious from person to person. The bacillus is carried from rodent to person or from person to person by infected fleas.
Typically, bubonic plague starts 2 - 6 days after infection with flu-like symptoms. Its characteristic sign is one or more tender, swollen lymph nodes, which are referred to as buboes.
Today, bubonic plague accounts for virtually no deaths. In the past, at a time when contracting the other forms of plague brought almost certain death, it killed only about half of its victims.
Bubonic plague is probably the best-known form, and it makes up three-fourths or more of plague cases. Surprisingly, it’s the LEAST dangerous form of plague.
Plague is an infectious disease caused by Yersinia pestis, a bacterium transmitted from rodents to humans through flea bites. In humans, it has three forms: - bubonic - pneumonic - septicemic All three can be treated with antibiotics. 🧵⬇️
Eucalyptus leaves contain toxins that are dangerous to baby koalas. Mama koalas feed their babies microbe-rich poop instead to help them develop immunity. This post is educational, not instructive.
August 20 is World Mosquito Day. It was established in honor of British doctor Sir Ronald Ross, who in 1897 discovered that female mosquitoes transmit the malarial parasite between humans. Ross received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for his work in 1902.
You rang? www.britannica.com/animal/lizar...
New moon just dropped. science.nasa.gov/blogs/webb/2...
There are more than 5,500 species of lizards, so we could've made this much longer.
If there is nothing in it to absorb the energy, the waves bounce around inside, which can damage the microwave. If you do this for less than 5 minutes, you should be OK, but check for smoke and let the microwave cool down before seeing if it still works. Fire tweet, BTW.
Eau de beaver’s derrière Castoreum is a substance beavers use to mark their territory. It is secreted from a gland near their rear end. Due to its vanilla aroma, for centuries, castoreum has been added to perfumes and foods. The FDA requires it to be labeled “natural flavoring.”
The use of No. 2 pencils for exams today is a holdover from that period. Modern scanner technology can recognize marks made by pens and pencils alike. But for our money, nothing beats a freshly sharpened Ticonderoga.
The standardized use of No. 2 pencils on tests goes back to the 1930s, when IBM created a test scoring machine that graded answer sheets by detecting the electrical current flowing through graphite pencil marks.
So why “No. 2”? The hardness of writing pencils, which is related to the proportion of clay (used as a binder) to graphite in the lead, is designated by numbers from 1, the softest, to 4, the hardest.
During the French Revolution, graphite was in short supply, so French inventor Nicolas-Jacques Conté devised a mixture of clay and graphite. He’d shape the mixture before firing it in a kiln, a method still used today. Let 👏 them 👏 have 👏 pencils 👏
For all our back-to-school lovers out there, we present: the humble pencil. Our favorite writing tool first came onto the scene in 1565 when German-Swiss naturalist Conrad Gesner described a writing instrument in which graphite was inserted into a wooden holder. 🧵⬇️
www.britannica.com/science/trop...
When they develop over the North Atlantic, central North Pacific, and eastern North Pacific, cyclones are called hurricanes. When they form over the South Pacific and Indian Ocean, they are known as cyclones. When they develop in the Northwest Pacific, they are called typhoons.
A circulation system goes through a sequence of stages as it intensifies. The storm begins as a tropical disturbance, and depending on how fast wind speeds reach, it is classified as a tropical depression, a tropical storm, or a tropical cyclone/hurricane.
While 3I/ATLAS is special, being only the third interstellar object ever observed on Earth, it’s about to be in good company. The new Vera C. Rubin Observatory, a facility with cutting-edge technology, will likely allow us to see more interstellar objects in the future. From a distance.
For those who watched too many asteroid movies in the 2000s, don’t worry: 3I/ATLAS is not a threat to Earth. In fact, it’s not projected to come any closer than 150 million miles away from us.
This comet in particular comes from a part of the Milky Way that has old stars, so it is likely older than our entire solar system. We’ll let that sink in.
Because interstellar objects come from outside our solar system, they give us insight into what is going on around other star systems. It’s a chance for us to ask: What’s up in the rest of the galaxy?
More about 3I/ATLAS: It’s fast. (~130,000 mph) It’s old. (~7 billion years) It’s big. (The diameter of its icy nucleus could be up to 3.5 miles across.)
So, the comet 3I/ATLAS formed in another star system and was somehow ejected into interstellar space. It has drifted along for millions, maybe even BILLIONS of years, until recently, when it made its way into our solar system.
The comet is an interstellar object- an object that has entered the solar system from interstellar space. Interstellar space is the space between the stars, which we can all agree does sound like a Nicholas Sparks novel.
On July 1, 2025, NASA reported the discovery of a new comet, called 3I/ATLAS. It is only the third known object outside our solar system ever to be observed. THIS IS REALLY COOL. Here’s why: 🧵⬇️
www.britannica.com/topic/Indian...
- The revolutionary activities of Aurobindo Ghose, Chandrashekhar Azad, and Bhagat Singh - The militant fervor of Subhas Chandra Bose - The civil disobedience of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru
Nationalism took many forms, including: - Armed resistance by Lakshmi Bai in the Rebellion of 1857 - The radical leadership of three assertive Indian Nationalists, popularly known as “Lal Bal Pal”
On August 15, 1947, India became free after two centuries of British rule. Independence was achieved by a collective effort that was extraordinary in scale and intensity.
How dangerous are volcanoes at every stage? Active (has erupted in the last 10k years) DANGEROUS Erupting (active volcano erupting) V DANGEROUS Dormant (active volcano with potential to erupt again) STILL DANGEROUS Extinct (has not erupted in over 10k years) YOU’RE GOOD
www.britannica.com/topic/How-Ma...
It remains unclear whether Trump and Putin ever met before the former became president. However, the two leaders met officially six times during Trump’s first term. The August 2025 summit in Alaska will mark their first encounter during Trump’s second term as president.
Several studies report that wildfires are becoming more intense and more common worldwide, due to rising global temperatures, specifically more severe and longer drought periods. One study noted that the frequency of the most extreme wildfire events more than doubled between 2000 and 2023.
Deadliest recorded wildfires in history
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To see the meteors, find a dark place far from city lights, and look northeast. The shower is best viewed with the naked eye because it happens over a large area of the sky, and binoculars or a telescope allow you to see only a small part of the sky. Happy gazing 💫
While the shower actually lasts from July 17 - Aug 24, the best viewing times will be on August 12/13, when there could be a peak of 75 meteors/hour. Heads up, though: the Moon will be in its gibbous (between half and full) phase, so only the brightest meteors will be visible.
The Perseids are caused by dust left behind by Comet Swift-Tuttle when it passes through the solar system every 133 years. As Earth passes through the dust trail, the meteors seem to come from a point in the constellation Perseus, hence the name of the shower.
On the night of August 12, the sky in the Northern Hemisphere will be lit up by the Perseid meteor shower. The earliest recorded observations of the Perseids were made by Chinese astronomers in 36 CE, so if you catch the show, consider yourself part of star-gazing history. 🧵⬇️
The Life of a Showgirl
Thank you for your email! We are out of the office because we just found out that Emma Stone and Emperor Hirohito were alive at the same time. We look forward to connecting once we recover from this fact. Best, Encyclopaedia Britannica
One horse can produce up to 15 horsepower.
To everyone who thinks a fun getaway involves visiting the land of the Lotus-Eaters, escaping from a cave by clinging to the belly of a ram, and rescuing your companions who have turned into swine.
Happy International Cat Day to all who celebrate. Especially those who would have done better in geometry if your teacher had used the "cat in the tree" example to teach the Pythagorean Theorem.
When Britain tried to impose the Stamp Act on the American colonies in 1765, protesters effectively nullified it by: - Refusing to use the stamps - Rioting - Stamp burning - Drawing skull and crossbones everywhere they could
Steve Jobs claimed that he named his company Apple partly because the word appears alphabetically before his previous employer, Atari. Let your petty flag fly today.
The Victorian era, in British history, is the period between approximately 1820 and 1914. It corresponds roughly but not exactly to the period of Queen Victoria’s reign (1837–1901).
As the British Empire expanded during the rule of Queen Victoria (1820-1914), military attire, in addition to being functional for soldiers, also became a symbol of pride and personality. And nothing says “cocktail hour” like golden braiding and epaulets.
When the invitation says the dress code is Victorian Era Battle Chic
The football huddle was invented by a deaf quarterback in 1894. Paul Hubbard, who attended Galludet University, created the huddle when his team competed against another deaf school so that the opponents wouldn’t be able to read his signals.
The Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale was developed in 1971 by structural engineer Herbert Saffir and meteorologist Robert H. Simpson. It was intended to help government officials and the public understand the risks of impending storms and the amount of damage that might occur.
"It naturally excites the idea of some deceptive preparation by artificial means." -English zoologist George Shaw, 1799
???Marco Polo’s Google cal??
