The initials O.K. originally stood for Old Kinderhook, the nickname of President Martin Van Buren, whose hometown was Kinderhook, New York. The term came to national prominence when it was used during his 1840 election campaign in the form of supporters carrying around signs marked OK.
The first recorded use in print of "OK" was in Boston's Morning Post on March 23, 1839.
The initials eventually came to mean "okay," a word denoting approval, acceptance, agreement, assent, or acknowledgment.
A close-up of an OK button on a remote control.
“Okay” is said to be the most well understood word in the English language.
In 1961, NASA popularized the variant "A-OK" during the launch of Alan Shepard's Mercury mission.
"Ok" was the first word spoken on the moon, said by Buzz Aldrin as he shut down the lunar module's descent engine.
Okily Dokily!, a folksy form of OK (or okay).is the catchphrase used by Ned Flanders in The Simpsons.
The oldest oil wells date from AD 347, when the Chinese drilled to depths of up to 240 m (787ft) by attaching primitive drill bits to pipes made from bamboo. North America's first commercial oil well came about when asphalt producer James Miller Williams set out to dig a water well in Black Creek, Ontario in September 1858 and found oil instead.
Williams' discovery triggered North America's first oil rush and the village's name was changed to Oil Springs that same year.
The first commercially successful oil well in the United States was successfully drilled in 1859 by Col. Edwin L. Drake near Titusville, Pennsylvania, just northeast of Pittsburgh.
The world's first offshore oil well was drilled in 1896 at the Summerland Oil Field on the California Coast.
On January 10, 1901 oil gushed from a drilling derrick near Beaumont, Texas, kicking off the American Oil Industry. The oil spray coated the land for hundreds of feet around the well. The geyser pumped oil at a rate of 100,000 barrels a day for nine days before it capped.
The pumpjack, such as this one south of Midland, Texas, is a common sight in West Texas
The population around Beaumont skyrocketed and by the end of the year there were more than 285 oil wells and 500 land and oil companies. Some of those oil companies are still in existence today: They include Exxon, the Magnolia Petroleum Company, also known as Mobil and The Texas Company or Texaco.
The first major commercial oil strike in the Middle East was made at Masjed Soleyman in southwest Persia in 1908. The rights to the resource were quickly acquired by the Anglo-Persian Oil Company.
Oil prospectors in Kern County, California, drilled into a pressurized oil deposit on March 14, 1910. The eruption of hydrocarbons from the pressurized oil well in the Midway-Sunset Oil Field created a huge oil spill. The Lakeview Gusher lasted 18 months and released nine million barrels (1.4×106 m3) of crude oil into the atmosphere.
Lakeview #1 oil gusher after the well had partially subsided
Cat Creek was the site of the first commercially successful oil field in Montana. First discovered in 1919, it produced oil so pure it could be used in Ford Model T cars straight from the ground.
The era of the oil gusher came to an end with the development of the first blowout preventer in 1924.
The first oil was taken in Oil Rocks (Neft Daşları), the world's oldest offshore oil platform, on November 7, 1949. Neft Daşları lies 100 km (62 mi) away from the Azerbaijani capital Baku, and 55 km (34 mi) from the nearest shore in the Caspian Sea.
Oil Rocks near Baku Wikipedia
Neft Daşları is actually a functional town with a population of about 2,000 and over 300 km (190 mi) of streets built on piles of dirt and landfill.
The Piper Alpha drilling platform in the North Sea was destroyed by explosions and fires in 1988. 167 oil workers were killed, making it the world's worst offshore oil disaster in terms of direct loss of life.
After studies suggested there could be up to £1 billion worth of oil lying beneath Windsor Castle, Queen Elizabeth II gave permission on December 6, 1994 for drilling to take place in its grounds. However, the Government did not renew the licence needed for exploration to take place.
Windsor Castle
An explosion on April 20, 2010, on Deepwater Horizon, an offshore rig in the Gulf of Mexico ignited a fireball visible from 40 miles (64 km) away. The fire was inextinguishable and, two days later, the Horizon sank, leaving the well gushing at the seabed and causing the largest marine oil spill in history.
There is a cluster of oil wells on the campus of Beverly Hills High School that generates about $300,000 of revenue per year for the school.
Oil is a greasy, inflammable chemical substance that usually does not mix with water and has a high carbon and hydrogen content.
Some oils are made from plants and used in foods and for cooking. Plant oils that people use include African oil palm, maize (corn), olive, peanut, soy, and sunflower. There are also animal-based oils such as butter and lard.
Other kinds of oil are made from crude oil (petroleum) which comes from under the ground. Oil wells are used to bring the oil up to the surface. The oil is then transported to refineries where it is distilled into fuel for heating or transportation. Oils from crude oil are also used to make lubricants.
Archaeological evidence has been found of olive oil being used for cooking near Nazareth in present day Israel back in 5800 BC, indicating that it was a diet staple 4,000 years before the time of the biblical patriarchs.
Olive oil was a most important product in the economy of the ancient Hebrews. It was used for cooking, lighting, medicinally and after bathing, the body was anointed with oil.
Olive Oil
The ancient Egyptians used sesame oil, one of the first oil to be used for cooking purposes.
Oil lamps of a crude sort have been known since pre-Roman times.
In 1780 a Genevan physicist and chemist known as Ami Argand devised a much-improved oil lamp. They were first adopted by the well-to-do, but soon spread to the middle classes and eventually the less well-off as well.
Snake oil was introduced to the US by Chinese laborers who helped build the Transcontinental Railroad. Derived from the Chinese water snake, snake oil was rich in the omega-3 acids that help reduce inflammation and was quite effective, especially when used to treat arthritis and bursitis.
Clark "The Rattlesnake King" Stanley, sold "100% Snake Oil" in the late 19th and early 20th century. It did not actually contain any snake oil. Hence the term "Snake Oil Salesman".
On August 27, 1859 petroleum was discovered in Titusville, Pennsylvania leading to the world's first commercially successful oil well.
The March 18, 1967 Torrey Canyon oil spill off the south-west coast of the United Kingdom, was at the time the world's worst oil spill. The estimated 25–36 million gallons (94–164 million liters) of crude oil that spilled into the ocean gave lift to the emerging environmental movement.
On June 3, 1979, the oil rig named Ixtoc I, owned by the Mexican government-operated oil company Pemex, suffered a blowout and began leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico. The exact cause of the blowout was a failure in the drilling equipment, which led to the uncontrolled release of oil and gas from the well.
The wellhead remained uncapped, and efforts to stop the leak were initially unsuccessful. It took almost nine months to fully cap the well and stop the flow of oil. During that time, an estimated 3.3 million barrels (140,000 metric tons) of crude oil were released into the Gulf of Mexico, making it one of the largest oil spills in history at the time.
On April 20, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig, owned by Transocean and leased by British Petroleum (BP), experienced a blowout while drilling an exploratory well called Macondo in the Gild of Mexico.
The blowout caused a massive explosion on the rig, resulting in the loss of 11 crew members' lives and the sinking of the Deepwater Horizon two days later. The incident led to the release of an estimated 4.9 million barrels (approximately 210 million gallons) of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico over a period of 87 days. The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is considered to be the largest marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry
The Deepwater oil spill had devastating environmental, economic, and social consequences. The oil contaminated large areas of the Gulf of Mexico, affecting marine and coastal ecosystems, including fisheries, coral reefs, and wetlands. It caused the death of numerous marine animals, including birds, dolphins, sea turtles, and fish, and harmed their habitats.
Americans spill 180 million gallons of used oil per year, most of which ends up in waterways.
Whale oil was such an effective lubricant that within three years of the 1972 US whale killing ban, yearly automotive transmission failures had climbed from under 1 million, to over 8 million.
The word "essential" in "essential oil" doesn't mean "important," but rather "the essence of". So oil of clove smells like clove, capturing the "essence" of the plant, and therefore can be called an essential oil.
"Oil" is the favorite word of people building online dating profiles in the U.S. states of Texas, Oklahoma, and North Dakota.
In Venezuela and Saudi Arabia, oil is cheaper than water.
The first schoolhouse to be located west of the Allegheny Mountains was built in Schoenbrunn, Ohio in 1773.
On April 7, 1788 American pioneers arrived at the confluence of the Ohio and Muskingum rivers, They established there the town of Marietta (in modern Ohio), the first permanent American settlement outside the original Thirteen Colonies. In doing so they opened the westward expansion of the new country.
Picketed Point stockade at Marietta
In 1796 surveyors of the Connecticut Land Company named an area in Ohio "Cleveland" after Gen. Moses Cleaveland, the superintendent of the surveying party.
In 1803 Ohio was admitted as the 17th U.S. State.
While the state of Ohio is listed as the 17th state in the USA, that's really not true: technically, it is #47. Congress "forgot" to vote on admitting Ohio into the Union until August 7, 1953.
The city of Columbus was founded in 1812 at the confluence of the Scioto and Olentangy rivers. It became Ohio's state capital four years later.
Ohio and Michigan "went to war" in 1835 in a border dispute called the Toledo War. No one was killed, but one man got stabbed.
In 1835—just two years after its founding—Ohio's Oberlin College became the first in the United States to admit African American students.
The Coxey's Army March was a protest march led by Jacob Coxey, a businessman and populist from Ohio. The march began on March 25, 1894, with around 100 unemployed men in Massillon, Ohio, and it grew as it moved eastward. The marchers were protesting against the high unemployment rate caused by the Panic of 1893 and were advocating for a public works program to create jobs.
At its peak, the march reportedly had between 500 and 1,000 participants, who marched to Washington D.C. to demand action from the federal government. However, the marchers were met with resistance from police and the military, and Coxey was arrested for trespassing on the Capitol grounds.
Despite its failure to achieve its goals, the Coxey's Army March was significant as the first major popular protest of the era and helped to spark a larger national conversation about unemployment and economic inequality.
Coxey's Army marchers leaving their camp.
In the entire state of Ohio in 1895, there were only two cars on the road and the drivers of those two cars managed to crash into each other.
The first recorded written speeding ticket in the United States was for Harry Myers in 1904. He was ticketed for traveling at a speed of 12 mph on West Third Street in Dayton, Ohio.
The first all glass, windowless building was completed in 1936 in Toledo, Ohio as the home of the Owens-Illinois Glass Company Laboratory.
When ten-year-old Jimmy Mastronardo discovered that Ohio was the only US state without a motto in 1958, he launched a campaign, gathering 18,000 signatures on a petition. His efforts successfully convinced the state legislature to pass a bill and the governor to sign it, resulting in the adoption of the motto "With God, all things are possible."
The state takes its name from the Ohio River. The name originated from the Iroquois word ohi-yo’, meaning "great river" or "large creek."
Columbus is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Ohio. It is in the middle of the state.
The Ohio State Buckeyes and Columbus Blue Jackets play in Columbus. In 2010 there were 787,033 people there.
The Ohio State Capitol located in Columbus, Ohio.
The geographical center of Ohio is Delaware – a town 25 miles northeast of Columbus.
Ohio derived its state motto, "With God, all things are possible", from a passage in the Gospel of Matthew, prompting a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union.
Tomato juice is the official state beverage of Ohio and the tomato is its state vegetable.
According to 2015's Berkeley Springs International Water Tasting, the best tasting tap water in the world comes from Hamilton, Ohio.
The Ohio city of Cincinnati has an subway system that was built, never used, and left abandoned
In the United States, people from Ohio are the most likely to use curse words.
Ohio is important in US elections because it is a swing state and candidates often campaign a lot there.
In Ohio it is illegal to ride on the roof of a taxi cab.
The Offertory is the part of a worship service where a collection of money or other gifts for the poor or for the Church is taken up. In the Roman Catholic Mass, they are brought forward together with the bread and wine, but not placed on the altar.
In Anglican churches the offering is accompanied by the singing of a congregational hymn (the "offertory hymn") or an anthem sung by the choir, and often both.
Charlemagne's 779 "Capitulary of Herstal" attempted to enforce the payment of tithes by each man to the Church.
Political philosopher Thomas Paine was an ordained minister of the Church of England.. He was a member of a church group known as the Vestry, which collected tithes and distributed them to the poor.
In early 19th century America some church collections were taken in a bag at the end of a pole with a bell attached to arouse sleepy contributors.
Collection bag used in Church of Sweden. By User:Grillo - Wikipedia
Some 19th century American churches rented out their pews to raise money. Some churches rented pews by auction each year, while others sold them to pay for the building and then taxed the value of the pew for annual revenue.
The most expensive seats were in the front, and the cheap seats were in the back. Free seats were available in the back or the balcony, but a free pew carried a social stigma.
Other groups, such as the Baptists and Methodists, often preferred to use a subscription book, which listed the total funds needed in the front. A church would pass the book around, and the members would record how much they pledged to contribute that year.
Collection bags or plates were introduced in the Church of England in 1868 after the abolition of compulsory church rates.
In 1991 Albert Cash of Tennessee sued his church to reclaim money he'd put in the collection plate. He maintained the church failed to assist him with some health problems within his family.
An automatic offertory machine with a card reader in Lund Cathedral, Sweden. By Bluescan
Ludwig van Beethoven's last complete symphony was the Symphony No. 9 in D minor. The German composer was increasingly aware of his declining health and spent seven years working on this symphony, starting the work in 1818 and finishing early in 1824.
Portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler, 1820
The symphony incorporates part of German writer Friedrich Schiller's poem "Ode to Joy" in its fourth movement. The words for "Ode To Joy", which are sung by four vocal soloists and a chorus, emanate a strong belief in mankind.
At the time it was a novel idea to use a chorus and solo voices in a symphony, which is why it's also called the "Choral" symphony. Beethoven, in fact, had serious misgivings about portraying the music's message with actual words. Even after the premiere, he apparently came very close to replacing all the vocal lines with instrumental ones.
The Ninth Symphony was premiered on May 7, 1824 in the Kärntnertortheater in Vienna. There had been only two full rehearsals and the performance was rather scrappy. Despite this, the premiere was deemed a great success.
Beethoven was completely deaf when he embarked on this masterpiece and it’s a tragedy that he never heard a single note of it except inside his head. At the end of the symphony’s first performance the German composer, who had been directing the piece and was consequently facing the orchestra, had to be turned around by the contralto Caroline Unger so that he could see the audience’s ecstatic reaction. Beethoven had been unaware of the tumultuous roars of applause behind him.
A page from Beethoven's manuscript of the 9th Symphony
This is the most requested piece of music on the BBC Radio show, Desert Island Discs, which has been broadcast since 1942. Over 60 guests have chosen this tune as one of the eight recordings they would like to have on the island.
The Council of Europe and subsequently the European Union chose “Ode to Joy” as National Anthem of Europe.
Beethoven's 9th Symphony is traditionally performed in Japan at the end of the year having been introduced in World War I by German prisoners. In December 2009, for example, there were 55 performances of the symphony throughout Japan.
The octopus is a cephalopod mollusc of the order Octopoda. There are about 300 octopod species, of which more than 100 are in the genus Octopus.
Octopods make up over one-third of the total number of living cephalopods. Other cephalopods include squid, and cuttlefish.
Common octopus By albert kok - ma photo, Wikipedia Commons
The standard pluralized form of "octopus" in the English language is "octopuses" although the Ancient Greek plural "octopodes" has also been used historically.
INTELLIGENCE
Octopuses are considered to be one of the most intelligent marine species. Their brain is the largest and most advanced of any invertebrate.
It is believed that an octopus's memory and learning capability can be compared in complexity to that of advanced vertebrates - Octopuses have been known to undo child proof tops on medicinebottles to get at food.
An octopus opening a container with a screw cap. By User:MatthiasKabel - Wikipedia
Octopuses are good mimics. Some imitate other dangerous animals like sea snakes and lionfish.
BEHAVIOR
Octopuses have been seen eating their arms as a result of a neurplogical disease.
When an octopus' arm is severed, the arm will continue to search for food – Then it will try to feed the mouth it doesn't have.
They eat mostly crabs and some fish. Some species of octopuses eat other octopuses.
In his History Of Animals, Aristotle remarked that when the octopus comes into proximity with small fish, it might change its color to resemble surrounding stones and that it reacts in a similar way when alarmed.
The southern sand octopus shoot jets of water into the sand below it, creating a pit of quicksand to escape from predators.
Amphioctopus marginatus travels with shells it has collected for protection. By Nick Hobgood
All octopuses are venomous. To kill their prey they drill through the prey's shell and inject their venom into their body using their beak.
Although all octopuses are venomous, only the blue-ringed octopus is harmful to humans.
A female octopus can lay clutches of about 100,000 eggs, however, only a handful will survive to adulthood.
A female Giant Pacific Octopus quits eating and spends six months slowly dying as she tends to and protects her eggs.
The longest known brooding period for any species on the planet goes to the Graneledone boreopacifica, an octopus that guards its eggs for an astounding 4.5 years.
Octopuses have been observed acquiring shiny objects and stones and planting them around the sea bed like a garden. The song "Octopus’s Garden" by the Beatles was inspired by the captain of a boat informing Ringo Starr of this fact while on vacation in Sardinia.
ANATOMY
A baby octopus is about the size of a flea when it is born.
An Octopus consists of just a head and tentacles. Therefore his stomach, testicles etc are in his head.
The neurons in an octopus are not concentrated in the brain - two thirds of them are located in the tentacles meaning that each individual tentacle acts autonomously and independently of the brain. However, an octopus can exert precise control over a tentacle when need be through eyesight alone.
An octopus actually has six arms and two legs, not eight legs. They use their rearmost tentacles to push off from the surface of the sea bed before propelling themselves through the water with the other limbs.
Octopuses swim with their arms trailing behind. By albert kok - Wikipedia
Octopuses are the only animal that walk without any rhythm or pattern at all, just random movements that propel it forward.
An octopus is able to squeeze through a hole the size of a dime.
An octopus has three hearts. Two hearts are used to pump blood to each of the octopus' lungs and the third pumps blood throughout the body.
Heavyweight boxer Tony 'Two Ton' Galento was a colorful and controversial figure in boxing, and he was always up for a publicity stunt. In 1946, he accepted a bet to fight an octopus with boxinggloves on its tentacles. The fight took place at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City, New Jersey on August 5, 1946.
The octopus was a large, eight-armed creature that weighed over 100 pounds. It was placed in a tank of water, and Galento climbed in to fight it. The octopus fought back with its tentacles, but Galento was able to land some punches. In the end, neither fighter was able to knock the other out, and the fight was declared a draw.
Octopus wrestling, a sport which involved diving into shallow water and fighting an octopus back to the surface, was most popular on the West Coast of the United States during the 1960s. The 1963 record was a 57-pounder.
The annual World Octopus Wrestling Championships was held in Puget Sound, Washington. The event was televised and attracted up to 5,000 spectators in the 1960s.
FUN FACTS
According to Hawaiian mythology, the octopus is the only surviving member of a previous version of Earth.
