Martin Van Buren

EARLY LIFE

Martin Van Buren was born on December 5, 1782 in Kinderhook, a town in upper state New York. He was the third born of five children.

The eighth President of the United States, Van Buren was the first president to be born as a citizen of the United States and the first president not of British or Scots-Irish ancestry (he came from Dutch stock). The presidents before him were born as British subjects.

Imperial print of Martin Van Buren 

Martin's father, Abraham Van Buren, was a farmer and a tavern owner, who was a patriot during the American Revolution. His mother was Maria Hoes Van Buren, the granddaughter of a Dutch immigrant.

He was baptised as Maarten Van Buren at Kinderhook Dutch Reformed Church on December 15, 1782.

Because he was raised in a Dutch family, Martin spoke Dutch as his first language.

Martin went to school at the Kinderhook Academy in the village where he lived. He excelled there in English and Latin.

PRE-PRESIDENTIAL CAREER

Van Buren's formal education ended when he was 14-years-old. He began reading law at the office of Peter Silvester and his son Francis, prominent Federalist Party attorneys in Kinderhook. He also kept the office clean, copied documents and did other jobs. After six years under Sylvester, Van Buren spent a final year of apprenticeship in the New York City office of William P. Van Ness.

Van Buren passed the New York State Bar Exam in 1803, and became a lawyer.

After becoming a lawyer, Van Buren moved back to Kinderhook to work as an attorney with his half-brother, James J. Van Alen, in 1803. He became financially secure enough to increase his focus on politics.

In 1808 Van Buren was appointed Surrogate (legal officer) of Columbia County, New York. Van Buren held the office about five years until he was removed on March 19, 1813.

Van Buren represented New York in the United States Senate from 1821 to 1828 as a member of the Democratic-Republican Party.

The Democratic-Republican Party split over the choice of a successor to President James Monroe and the party faction that supported many of the old Jeffersonian principles, led by Martin Van Buren and the 1828 presidential candidate Andrew Jackson, became the modern Democratic Party.

To support Andrew Jackson's candidacy in the 1828 presidential election, Van Buren successfully ran for Governor of New York. He resigned a couple of months after assuming the position to accept appointment as U.S. Secretary of State after Jackson took office in 1829.

A painting of Van Buren by Francis Alexander, c. 1830

Van Buren was a key advisor during Jackson's eight years as President of the United States and from 1833 to 1837, he was his Vice President. During this time he built the organizational structure for the fledgling Democratic Party, particularly in New York.

President Andrew Jackson declined to seek another term in the 1836 presidential election,  and was determined to help elect Van Buren in his place so that the latter could continue the Jackson administration's policies. Van Buren won the election with 50.9 percent of the total, and 170 electoral votes.

PRESIDENCY

His inauguration on March 4, 1837, was the first where the president and the president-elect rode together to the Capitol for the ceremony.

Martin Van Buren was the only president to speak English as a second language. His first language was Dutch.

Just a few months after Van Buren became president, a financial crisis hit the United States triggered by the transfer of federal funds from the Bank of the United States to state banks. It touched off a major recession that lasted until the mid-1840s. Van Buren believed in limited government, and did not respond in a way that many people wanted. Many people blamed him for the Panic of 1837, and he became increasingly unpopular.

Picture below is a Whig cartoon showing the effects of unemployment on a family that has portraits of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren on the wall.

He was only five and a half feet tall and had red hair and red sideburns. Van Buren earned the nickname the "Red Fox" for his cunning politics and, “Little Magician” because of his size.

Van Buren's most long-lasting nickname was “Old Kinderhook,” which was used during his 1840 election campaign in the form of supporters carrying around placards saying "Vote for OK." The abbreviation became popular around this time and we continue to use it to this day.

He lost his 1840 re-election bid to Whig Party nominee William Henry Harrison due in part to the poor economic conditions of the Panic of 1837. Harrison's supporters ridiculed Van Buren as "Martin Van Ruin", and a surge of new voters helped turn him out of office.

PERSONAL LIFE

Van Buren married his childhood sweetheart, shy, blue-eyed Hannah Hoes on February 21, 1807 at the home of the bride's sister in Catskill, New York.

They had five children together: Abraham, John, Martin Jr., Smith, and Winfield Scott.

He always called her "Jannetje", a Dutch pet form of Johanna.

Hannah contracted tuberculosis and died on February 5, 1819 at age 35 and Van Buren never remarried.

Hannah Van Buren

He was one of the few presidents to be unmarried while in office. During Van Buren's term, his daughter-in-law, Angelica, performed the role of hostess of the White House and First Lady of the United States.

Van Buren didn't once mention wife Hannah in his 800 page autobiography.

He was a snappy dresser. An observer of an early Van Buren campaign stop at a church remembered him thus: "He wore an elegant snuff-colored broadcloth coat, with velvet collar to match; his cravat was orange tinted silk with modest lace tips; his vest was of pearl hue; his trousers were white duck … his nicely fitting gloves were yellow kid."

While campaigning for a second term of presidency, Van Buren was said by his opponents to "wallow in raspberries", a shocking extravagance.

LAST YEARS AND DEATH 

After his presidency, Van Buren emerged as an elder statesman and important anti-slavery leader, who led the Free Soil Party ticket in the 1848 presidential election.

A plaque in Plainfield, Indiana marks the spot where a carriage driver intentionally drove through a huge mudhole to fling ex-President Martin Van Buren out of the carriage and into the mud in the summer of 1842. Van Buren had opposed a bill that would have funded improvements to the National Road. the carriage driver who'd pulled off the prank was rewarded by some residents with a $5 silk hat.

Martin Van Buren developed pneumonia in the latter half of 1861 and was bedridden during the fall and winter of 1861–62. In July, 1862, he had a serious asthma attack and began to weaken. Van Buren died on July 24, 1862, at his home in Kinderhook, New York, of heart failure. He was 79 years old.

Source Theintercept

Rudolph Valentino

The archetypical romantic lead of the silent movie era was born Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Piero Filiberto Guglielmi in Castellaneta, Italy on May 6, 1895.

After moving to New York, Valentino worked as a gardener, a busboy, and as a taxi driver.

Rudolph Valentino's movie career started with his appearance as an uncredited extra in My Official Wife (1914), although this is now a lost film.

He featured in several films in a minor role until 1921. Valentino got his major break when he appeared in the role of Julio in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and he went on to play leading roles in fourteen films as a romantic figure.

The films in which Valentino played a romantic role within the action genre were the more successful at the box office including The Sheik (1921) and his final two works The Eagle (1925) and The Son of the Sheik (1926).

Valentino's fans were eager to hear him sing. On May 14, 1923, Valentino made two vocal recordings for Brunswick Records, "Kashmiri Song" and "El Relicario." Valentino's voice was not classically trained, but it was clear and expressive. He had a natural talent for singing, and his voice was well-suited to the romantic ballads that he performed. The recordings were not a commercial success, but they did provide fans with a rare glimpse into Valentino's singing voice.

Rudolph Valentino impulsively married actress, Jean Acker on November 6, 1919. A closet lesbian, she locked him out of her bedroom on their wedding night. The union was never consummated and the pair divorced two years later.

Valentino enjoyed gardening, riding, hunting for small game, collecting mussels along the sea shore and walking in the desert near Palm Springs.

Valentino did not live long enough to see movies with sound replace silent movies. He died suddenly of peritonitis on August 23, 1926, at the age of 31. The subsequent extensive media coverage turned his funeral into a national event when an estimated 100,000 people lined the streets of Manhattan to pay their respects.

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day is an annual celebration of romantic love. On February 14 each year lovers exchange Valentine's cards, flowers, chocolates, or just a nice gift.

HISTORY

The Roman Emperor Claudius Gothicus (May 10, 214 – January 270), decided to abolish the institution of marriage for many, as he felt that husbands did not make good soldiers. Claudius tried to enforce the new law with the utmost rigor.  Valentine of Terni, who had become bishop of Interamna, considered such a policy against the spirit of God and of human nature and was secretly marrying Christians. His "crime" was discovered and while on a temporary stay in Rome Bishop Valentine was arrested, imprisoned, and brutally clubbed to death on February 14, 269.

Bishop Valentine had prayed for the restoration of a young girl's sight, and she was cured. Shortly before his death he wrote the girl a farewell message signed "From your Valentine."

Reconstruction. Oil painting by Leonhard Beck, around 1510)

St. Valentine's Day was set as February 14th by Pope Gelasius I in 494. He included Saint Valentine among all those "... whose names are justly reverenced among men, but whose acts are known only to God."

The idea of a mid-February romantic celebration may have been inspired by the Roman fertility festival of Lupercalia on February 15. The festival which originated in pre-Christian Rome, honoured Lupercalia, the god of sheep and shepherds. That wasn't very romantic, however, and Lupercalia was later replaced by Februata June, a festival where young people chose the person they would marry.

In the Middle Ages, young men and women drew names from a bowl to see who their valentines would be. They would wear these names on their sleeves for one week. To wear your heart on your sleeve now means that it is easy for other people to know how you are feeling.

A traditional tale says, the type of man a woman would marry can be told by the bird she first saw on Valentine's Day.

Geoffrey Chaucer, who is more known as the writer of The Canterbury Tales. also wrote other things, such as a 700 line poem in 1382 called the Parliament of Foules, written in honor of the first anniversary of King Richard II of England and Anne of Bohemia's engagement. Chaucer mentioned, in his “Parliament of Foules” a belief that February 14 was the date birds choose their mate. This poem is generally considered to include the first explicit Valentine's Day / love connection.

The world’s first Valentine message is believed to have been sent by Margery Brews of Norfolk, to her fiancé John Paston in 1477. She addressed it to "my right wellbelovyd voluntyne".

An English Victorian era Valentine card located in the Museum of London

Anne of Burgundy was the first woman to receive a diamond engagement ring. It was given to her by Maximilian I of Germany in 1477. Previously only men wore diamonds, as a symbol of their courage and virility. However after Archduke Maximilian of Austria gave a diamond ring to Mary of Burgundy, diamonds have been the gem of choice for men who wanted to melt a woman's heart.

In 1537, England's King Henry VII officially declared February 14 the holiday of St. Valentine's Day.

Cadbury's created the first heart-shaped chocolate box. Richard Cadbury came up with the idea for St. Valentine’s Day, in 1861.

Pixiebay

The Catholic church dropped St Valentine's feast from the General Roman Calendar in 1969, leaving his liturgical celebration to local calendars.

Thailand issued the world’s first rose-scented postage stamps in February 2002 for Valentine’s Day.

A Pakistan high court  banned Valentine's Day celebrations across the country in 2017, since the holiday is not a part of Muslim tradition.

VALENTINE'S DAY FUN FACTS

St. Valentine was not only the patron saint of love and marriage, but also of beekeepers, epilepsy and plague.

In Finland, Valentine's Day is called Ystävänpäivä, which means Friend's Day and focuses on remembering friends.

Black Day is the South Korean anti-Valentine's Day, where singles dress in black and gather together to eat dark colored food. Jajangmyeon, a savory black bean sauce over noodles, is the preferred dish for those resenting Valentine's to commiserate over.

In China, a holiday called Qi Xi is also called "Chinese Valentine's Day", especially by younger people. Qi Xi is traditionally held on the 7th day of the 7th month of the lunar calendar.

Valentine's Day in Japan is a day when girls buy chocolates and other gifts for boys they like. A month later, on March 14th, is called White Day. On that day, the boys will buy gifts to give back to the girls who bought them gifts on Valentine's Day.

Valentine’s Day is the second most popular day for sending cards, beaten only by Christmas.

3% of all pet owners around the world give Valentines gifts to their pet.

Worldwide, over 50 million roses are given for Valentine's Day each year.

15% of U.S. women send themselves flowers on Valentine's Day.

220,000 is the average number of wedding proposals on Valentine's Day each year.

Over $1 billion worth of chocolate is purchased for Valentine's Day in the U.S.

Sources Daily Express, Latintimes

Vacuum cleaner

A vacuum cleaner is a cleaning device that uses an air pump  to create a partial vacuum to suck up dust and dirt from floors and carpets.

HISTORY

One of first devices that cleaned carpets was invented in a Chicago basement in 1869 by Ives W. McGaffey. A wood and canvas contraption, the "sweeping machine" required the user to crank a handle while pushing it along the floor as it sucked up dust. McGaffey obtained a patent for the machine on June 5, 1869, calling it the Whirlwind.

An early hand-pumped vacuum cleaner By Royalbroil

In 1900 Hubert Booth of Glasgow, Scotland demonstrated the principle of extracting dust from carpets by suction. He patented his device on August 30, 1901. Soon after, he coined the phrase “vacuum cleaner”, in calling his business “The Vacuum Cleaner Company Ltd”.

Earlier sucking cleaners had been patented but Booth's was the first not to rely on manual power. His first models used oil but later electricity was used.

Hubert Booth's sucking cleaning device looked nothing like a modern vacuum cleaner. The five horse-power motor and pump were so enormous that they were mounted on a horse-drawn carriage, while long tubes up to 25 yards long reached into the building that was being cleaned.

Hubert Cecil Booth Straßenstaubsauger von 1901. Wikipedia 

Booth later introduced clear tubes so clients could watch in awe as the dirt was sucked out of their homes.

Booth's cleaner was affectionately known as “Puffing Billy”.

Booth's Vacuum Cleaning Co provided the first mechanical cleaning service. However, his first vacuum cleaner was extremely noisy and frightened passing horses, which led to Booth being sued by cab proprietors.

The making of Hubert Booth's vacuum cleaner was the 1902 coronation of Edward VII of the United Kingdom during which his invention cleaned the blue carpets of Westminster Abbey. The king and queen were sufficiently impressed to order two cleaners- one for Windsor Castle, the other for Buckingham Palace.

As a result of the King's purchase of the device, society hostesses threw parties in their homes so guests could watch Booth's vacuum cleaner in action.

In 1907, James Murray Spangler, a janitor in a Canton, Ohio department store, deduced that the carpet sweeper he used was the source of his asthma. He tinkered with an old fan motor and attached it to a soap box stapled to a broom handle. Using a pillow case as a dust collector on the contraption, Spangler invented a portable electric vacuum cleaner.

Sprangler received a patent for his device in 1908, and formed the Electric Suction Sweeper Company.

One of the first buyers was a cousin, whose husband, William H. Hoover owned a saddle and leather company in New Berlin, Ohio. Sprangler sold his patent to Hoover, who made improvements which produced the first truly portable upright vacuum cleaner.

Hoover founded the Electric Suction Sweeper Company with $36,000 capital, retaining Spangler as production supervisor. After Spangler's death in 1915, the company name was changed to the Hoover Suction Sweeper Company.

Early electric vacuum cleaner by Electric Suction Sweeper Company, circa 1908

The device resembled a bagpipe attached to a cake box. But sluggish sales were given a kick by Hoover's 10 day, free home trial and the catchphrase "It beats as it sweeps as it cleans". Eventually there was a Hoover vacuum cleaner in nearly every American home.

In 1956, the English composer Malcolm Arnold wrote his A Grand, Grand Overture for 3 Vacuum Cleaners, 1 Floor Polisher, 4 Rifles and Orchestra. He dedicated it to former US President Herbert Hoover.

In the late 1970s, Norfolk-born inventor English inventor James Dyson had the idea of using cyclonic separation to create a vacuum cleaner that would not lose suction as it picked up dirt. Dyson went through 5,127 prototypes in five years while his wife Deirdre supported them and their three children by working as an art teacher. He eventually launched his bagless cleaner in 1983.

FUN VACUUM CLEANER FACTS

Some of the first vacuum cleaners were coal powered and were so big, they needed three people to operate them.

Scandinavian vacuum cleaner manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign, "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux."

Vacuum is one of three words in the English language with two "u's" in consecutive order: the other two are residuum and continuum.

In the US, there are about 15,000 vacuum cleaner-related accidents each year.

An hour of vacuuming burns about 180 calories.

The Book of Firsts by Ian Harrison, Unbelievable Facts by Geoff Tibballs, Europress Family Encyclopedia 1999, Thoughtco, Daily Express,

Vaccine

A vaccine is a modified preparation of viruses, or bacteria. It is introduced into the body either orally or by a hypodermic syringe to induce the general reaction which produces immunity.

HISTORY

In 1767, a smallpox epidemic in Siberia wiped out thousands of people. The French philosopher Voltaire suggested to the Russian Czar Catherine II that she summon the Quaker doctor Thomas Dimsdale to inoculate her and her son against smallpox. He inoculated them successfully and as word spread the Russian peasants began requesting vaccinations for themselves and their children. The parents of the first child patient were ordered by Catherine to re-Christian him "Vaccinoff".

English country doctor Edward Jenner first successfully inoculated an 8-year-old child with cowpox virus to produce immunity to smallpox in 1796. Two years later, Jenner published a paper explaining his work. He named the process in which he used the cowpox sore, vaccination, which came from the Latin vaccinus, meaning "from cows."

Dr Edward Jenner performing his first vaccination. Painting by Ernest Board (early 20th century).

By the early 1800s Edward Jenner's cowpox vaccination had spread to most of Europe. Bavaria declared vaccination mandatory in 1807, and Denmark did the same three years later.

One of the first original American advocates for inoculation against severe disease was a slave named Onesimus. Before being forcibly brought to Boston in 1706, Onesimus lived in West Africa, where inoculation was a common practice. There, he had been deliberately infected with a small amount of smallpox to make him immune from a more severe version.

Onesimus told his owner, the New England Puritan minister Cotton Mather, about the practice. Mather was keenly interested in science, and after a smallpox outbreak began in Boston in 1721, Mather used this knowledge to advocate for inoculation in the population.

Benjamin Waterhouse was the first American physician to use this new treatment. However, several Boston clergymen and devout physicians formed a society that opposed vaccination. Some Christians objected to it in no certain terms as they believed that vaccination takes away the power of life and death from God.

In 1853, 30 years after Jenner’s death, a law was passed in England saying that every child had to be vaccinated against smallpox. By 1871, infant vaccination was compulsory and parents refusing to have their child vaccinated were fined and imprisoned if the fines were not paid.

An 1802 caricature by James Gillray depicting the early controversy surrounding Jenner's vaccination theory

Since smallpox and syphilis lesions look similar, many Civil War soldiers got syphilis attempting to vaccinate themselves against smallpox.

During the Franco-Prussian war of the 1870s, more than 23,000 French soldiers died of smallpox. But the Prussians vaccinated their soldiers — and only 297 died.

A second generation of vaccines was introduced in the 1880s by Louis Pasteur who developed vaccines for chicken cholera and anthrax. The difference between the smallpox vaccination and anthrax or chicken cholera vaccinations was that the latter two disease organisms had been artificially weakened, so a naturally weak form of the disease organism did not need to be found. Pasteur's discovery revolutionized work in infectious diseases.

Pasteur later developed a vaccine against rabies after five years of investigation.

In 1896, a bubоnіc plаgue epіdеmic struck Bombay, and the government asked Waldemar Haffkine, developer of the first chоlera vаccіne, to help. After three months of persistent work (one assistant had a nervous breakdown and two others quit), a vаccіne was ready, with Haffkine tеsting it on himself first.

The first polio vaccine was developed by Dr Jonas Salk  at the University of Pittsburgh and came into use in 1955. Salk declined to patent his polio vaccine as he believed it belonged to the world.

Jonas Salk at the University of Pittsburgh where he developed the first polio vaccine.

The first mass-produced disposable syringe and needle was developed for Dr. Jonas Salk's mass administration of his new polio vaccine for one million American children.

The oral polio vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin and came into commercial use six years later.

The two vaccines have reduced the number of cases of polio reported each year worldwide from an estimated 350,000 in 1988 to 22 in 2017.

The last natural case of smallpox was discovered in Somalia on October 26, 1977. The World Health Authority considers October 26th to be the anniversary of the eradication of smallpox, the most spectacular success of vaccination the world has known.

After the coronavirus was detected in December 2019,  the genetic sequence of COVID‑19 was published on January 11, 2020, triggering an urgent international response to prepare for an outbreak and hasten development of a preventive vaccine. By December 2020, Tozinameran, the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, had become the first COVID-19 vaccine to be approved for national use. Before Covid-19, the record for the fastest vaccine development — for mumps — was four years. Most vaccines have required more than a decade of research and experimentation.

FUN VACCINE FACTS

Vaccines have helped reduce measles deaths globally by 78% between 2000 and 2008. In sub-Saharan Africa, deaths dropped by 92% in the same period.

Every dollar spent on the rubella, measles, and mumps vaccine saves the U.S. $23.30 in medical costs, according to CDC data.

1.5 million children die every year from diseases preventable by vaccines according to the World Health Organization.

In the Canadian provinces of Ontario, New Brunswick and Manitoba, it's illegal for non-vaccinated children to attend public school services.

Eight of the fifteen vaccines that are routinely recommended today were developed by an American microbiologist named Maurice Hilleman (August 30, 1919 – April 11, 2005). They are the ones those for measles, mumps, hepatitis A, hepatitis B, chickenpox, meningitis, pneumonia and Haemophilus influenzae bacteria.

Vaccinations don't work on octopuses.

Source New York Times

Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan is a landlocked Central Asian country, which was once part of the USSR.

HISTORY

What is now Uzbekistan was incorporated into the Persian Empire in ancient times. For many centuries the region of Uzbekistan was ruled by the Persian empires, including the Parthian and Sassanid Empires, apart from a period of Macedonian Greek rule.

As China began to develop its silk trade with the West, Persian cities took advantage of this commerce by becoming centres of trade. Cities in what is now Uzbekistan such as Samarkand, Khiva and Bukhara began to grow rich from the Silk Road.

During the eighth century invading Muslim Arab forces conquered Transoxiana, the territory between the Amudarya and Syrdarya rivers. The majority of the population, including the local ruling classes, were converted into adherents of Islam.

The area along with Central Asia as a whole, was decimated by Genghis Khan's Mongol invasion in the 13th century.

The area was conquered by Uzbek Shaybanids in the 16th century, moving the centre of power from Samarkand to Bukhara. The Uzbeks merged with the other inhabitants of the territory, breaking it into the separate principalities of the khanates (city-states) Khiva, Kokand and Bukhara.

The city-states were conquered by the Russian expansion into the area between 1865-76, with Tashkent becoming the political center of Russian Turkestan.

Russian troops taking Samarkand in 1868, by Nikolay Karazin.

The Tashkent Soviet was a public organization set up in Tashkent during the Russian Revolution. It was established on March 2, 1917 at an inaugural meeting that consisted of thirty five workers from the Central Asian Railway. It was headed by a technician named I. I. Bel'kov. The following day, there was a meeting in the local Duma which set up an Executive Committee of Public Organisations to manage the "sociopolitical and economic life of the city".

The Tashkent Soviet gradually extended its power after the First World War. In 1924, the Soviet Union was reorganized, and the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic was established. Uzbekistan became a constituent republic of the Soviet Union on May 12, 1925.

The Tashkent Soviet played an important role in the history of Uzbekistan. It was instrumental in the establishment of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic, and it helped to shape the development of the country in the years that followed.

Uzbekistan declared independence from the Soviet Union following the failed August 19-21 coup in Moscow on August 31, 1991 and became a constitutional republic.

Uzbekistan was one of the last Soviet republics to declare independence. The government of Uzbekistan had been hesitant to declare independence, but the coup convinced them that it was time to break away from the Soviet Union.

The declaration of independence was met with widespread celebrations in Uzbekistan. People took to the streets to celebrate their new-found freedom. The government of Uzbekistan quickly set about establishing its own institutions and laws.

The current flag of Uzbekistan was adopted on November 18, 1991, making the country the first newly independent republic in Central Asia to choose a new flag.

The crescent on the flag of Uzbekistan represents Islam, while the twelve stars symbolize the months of the Islamic calendar and the zodiac constellations.

Islam Karimov became the leader of the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic in 1989. He subsequently won Uzbekistan's first presidential election on December 29, 1991, with 86% of the vote. Foreign observers and the opposition party cited voting irregularities.

President Islam Karimov was widely held to be responsible for severe breaches of basic human rights including tortures and executions. His first presidential term was extended to 2000 by way of a referendum, and he was re-elected in 2000, 2007 and 2015, each time receiving over 90% of the vote. Karimov died in office at the age of 78 on September 2, 2016.

FUN UZBEKISTAN FACTS

Uzbekistan is bordered by five landlocked countries: Kazakhstan to the north; Kyrgyzstan to the northeast; Tajikistan to the southeast; Afghanistan to the south; and Turkmenistan to the southwest. It is with Liechtenstein, one of only two doubly landlocked countries. This means that it is landlocked by a landlocked country.

Uzbekistan is entirely surrounded by countries ending in -stan.

Uzbekistan is Central Asia’s most populous country with a 2017 estimated population of 32,979,000.

Tashkent is the capital and largest city of Uzbekistan. With a population in 2018 of 2,485,900, it is the most populated city in ex-Soviet Central Asia.

Uzbek, a Turkic language written in the Latin alphabet, is the country's first major language. It is spoken natively by approximately 85% of the population.

Sunni Muslims make up 88.5 percent of the population though they are secular and not religious Muslims. 9.4% of the population are Christians (mainly adherents of Russian Orthodox Christianity).

Palov is the Uzbek national dish. A main course typically made with rice, pieces of meat, and grated carrots and onions, legend has it that it was invented by the cooks of Alexander the Great.

Palov By Utilisateur:Atilin Wikipedia

The country is a major producer and exporter of cotton. Uzbekistan is the world’s second-largest cotton exporter and fifth largest producer.

Uzbekistan maintains the world's second-highest rate of modern slavery, with 3.97% of the country's population working as modern slaves. Most work in the cotton industry.

The Aral Sea was once the Earth’s fourth largest inland sea. However the Soviets depleted its water supply to irrigate the cotton fields in the 1960s - the crop requiring a large amount of water to grow. They also extensively used chemical pesticides and fertilizers, meaning it has shrunk to about 10% of its former area.

Source Thefactfile

U2

U2 was founded by 14-year-old drummer Larry Mullen Jr at Mount Temple Comprehensive School in Dublin, Ireland. He posted a note on his school's notice board, asking for musicians to start a group on September 25, 1976. There were seven boys who went to their first practice.

At first, the band was called "The Larry Mullen Band", but they later changed their name to "Feedback" after the awful noise they made in early rehearsals.

Feedback played their first gig for a paying audience at St. Fintan's High School in April 1977.

After becoming "The Hype" for a short period of time, the band finally changed their name to "U2" because of its ambiguity and open-ended interpretations.

The final line-up was lead singer Bono (born Paul Hewson), lead guitarist The Edge (born David Evans), bassist Adam Clayton, and drummer Larry Mullen Jr.

U2 in Glasgow 2015 (from left to right): the Edge, Bono, Mullen, Clayton. By U2start

The Edge's older brother, Dik Evans, was an early member of the group when they were still known as Feedback. He went on to form The Virgin Prunes.

David Evans' nickname of "The Edge" came about because of his chin.

The name Bono refers to a type of hearing aid and in Latin means "good voice".

Bono's mother, Iris Hewson, died when the singer was 14 after suffering a brain aneurysm at her own father's funeral. The U2 songs "I Will Follow", "Tomorrow" and "Iris (Hold Me Close)" all reference her passing.

Bono is almost never seen in public without sunglasses, as he suffers from glaucoma and is sensitive to light.

Bono is known for for his activism for social justice causes. For this, he was named Time Person of the Year in 2005.

Bono is the only person to be nominated for an Oscar, a Grammy, a Golden Globe, and the Nobel Peace Prize.

Bonoat Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. By Daniel Hazard 

Bono, The Edge and Mullen were involved in a Charismatic Christian group in Dublin called the "Shalom Fellowship" for a time in the early 1980s. They have retained their Christian faith and U2's lyrics are often embellished with Christian and spiritual imagery.

Adam Clayton has more ambiguous religious views, and has never shared his bandmates' Christian faith.

Before founding U2, Mullen was involved in a Dublin marching band called the Artane Boys Band (now known as the Artane Band), contributing to the martial beats common in the drummer's work, such as "Sunday Bloody Sunday".

The lyrics of U2's song "New Year's Day" refer to the movement for solidarity lead by Lech Walesa in Poland. After it was recorded, Poland announced they would abolish martial law, coincidentally, on New Year's Day, 1983.

U2 performing at the US Festival in May 1983. By James LaMantia

U2 released The Joshua Tree which features the singles "Where The Streets Have No Name", and "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" on March 9, 1987. The album became the fastest selling in UK history and the first to sell over a million CDs,

The line "One life, with each other, sisters, brothers" from U2's "One" was voted the UK's favourite song lyric in a 2006 poll by music channel VH1.

The U2 360° Tour staged in support of the group's 2009 album No Line on the Horizon generated $736 million via 7.2m global ticket sales between 2009 and 2011. This broke the record for the highest-grossing concert tour of all time.

They have won 22 Grammy Awards, more than any other band.

U2 have clocked up 19 #1 singles in their native Ireland, six more than any other act.

Larry Mullen Jr has dyscalculia, a learning difficulty that affects the ability to understand numbers and perform arithmetic. In an interview with Times Radio, Mullen Jr. explained how this condition sheds light on his struggles with counting along to music, often leading to the “pained” expression fans might notice during performances. “I’ve always known there’s something not quite right with the way I deal with numbers,” he admitted. “I’m numerically challenged. I recently discovered I have dyscalculia, which is a sub-version of dyslexia. So I can’t count, I can’t add.”

He likened counting bars in music to an almost insurmountable task. “I am pained because I’m trying to count the bars,” he said. “It’s like climbing Everest. I had to find ways of managing it.”

Source Artistfacts