Ohio Trivia & Tidbits - Page 4

Looking for Ohio trivia? Try our list Ohio little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

—Guests sleep in the original grain silos of the Quaker Oats Co. at the Crowne Plaza Quaker Square Hotel in Akron.

first appeared: 4/8/2007

—Among his 400 varied patents, Dayton-born Charles Francis Jenkins (1867-1934) invented the prismatic ring, which eliminated the need for shutters in motion-picture projectors. His other creations included the cone-shaped drinking cup and an early automobile self-starter.

first appeared: 3/25/2007

—The nation’s longest serving U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services was Donna E. Shalala, appointed to the post in 1993, who served for eight years. Shalala was born in 1941 in Cleveland.

first appeared: 3/11/2007

—In the 1940s and 1950s, U.S. Air Force Capt. Edward Murphy, working in the aircraft lab at Wright Field near Dayton, built gauges to measure acceleration for rocket sled tests being conducted in California. After testing, the gauges registered zero because each had been incorrectly installed. Lore has it that the annoyed Murphy spouted what became known as “Murphy’s Law”: the notion that if anything can go wrong, it will.

first appeared: 2/27/2007

—Born in 1926 in Mount Vernon (pop. 14,375), actor Paul Lynde went on to play Broadway and television roles in Bye Bye Birdie and Bewitched in the 1950s and 1960s, but his greatest notoriety came as the wisecracking center square in The Hollywood Squares.

first appeared: 2/11/2007

—For clumsy people who fret about tripping while jumping rope, Lester Clancy of Mansfield (pop. 49,346) patented the solution—a cordless jump rope— last year. The handles are weighted and exercisers get a workout jumping an invisible rope.

first appeared: 1/28/2007

Malabar Farm State Park in Richland County was the home of Pulitzer Prize-winning author and conservationist Louis Bromfield, and served as a retreat for Hollywood stars in the 1940s and ’50s. The park preserves a 32-room country home, barn, hiking trails and fishing ponds.

first appeared: 1/14/2007

—Media mogul Ted Turner was born in 1938 in Cincinnati. In 1980, the businessman and philanthropist launched Cable News Network (CNN), the first live, in-depth, round-the-clock news television network. He founded WTBS, which pioneered the superstation concept in cable television, and he also originated the Goodwill Games as an international, world-class, multi-sport competition.

first appeared: 12/17/2006

—A piper since age 12 who later became a design engineer, Jerry Gibson played with several Scottish Highlands bands and founded Gibson Bagpipes Inc. in 1978 in Willoughby (pop. 22,621). The company crafts several hundred sets of bagpipes yearly.

first appeared: 12/3/2006

—Michael Neely, 14, of North Canton (pop. 16,369), coasted to first place in the stock division of the 69th annual All-American Soap Box Derby in July in Akron. The derby is called the “Gravity Grand Prix” because the homebuilt cars lack engines.

first appeared: 11/19/2006

—The Blair Museum of Lithophanes in Toledo is home to more than 2,300 antique lithophanes, which are porcelain castings that display detailed three-dimensional pictures when illuminated from the back. The delicate lithophanes were popular in Europe in the mid-19th century.

first appeared: 11/5/2006

—In 1883, Barney Kroger invested his life savings of $372 to open a grocery store in downtown Cincinnati. He was the first grocer to offer a bakery and to combine a meat market and grocery store under one roof. Today, Kroger Co. is one of the nation’s largest grocery retailers.

first appeared: 10/22/2006

—Blue blazes are painted on tree trunks, rocks and other natural signposts to guide hikers along the Buckeye Trail, which forms a 1,435-mile loop around the state. Volunteers maintain the 2-inch-by-6-inch blazes on the trail, which began in the 1950s.

first appeared: 10/8/2006

To celebrate the potato chip’s 150th birthday in 2003, five Ohio potato chip companies created a bag of potato chips weighing 1,082 pounds and serving 16,000. Chipping in were Ballreich’s in Tiffin (pop. 18,135); Conn’s in Zanesville (pop. 25,586); Jones’ in Mansfield (pop. 49,346); Shearer’s in Brewster (pop. 2,324); and Mike-sell’s in Dayton.

first appeared: 9/24/2006

Scientist Paul C. Lauterbur shared the 2003 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his pioneering work in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), a painless scan of the human anatomy used to diagnose or rule out certain diseases. Lauterbur was born in 1929 in Sidney (pop. 20,211).

first appeared: 9/10/2006

The man who taught America to write, Platt Rogers Spencer of Geneva (pop. 6,595), created the Spencerian style of penmanship in the 1840s, which soon was adopted by schools nationwide. Spencer also opened his own school to teach handwriting.

first appeared: 8/27/2006

In Hamilton (pop. 60,690), a hollow globe marks the 1829 gravesite of Capt. John C. Symmes, a soldier, author and philosopher who theorized that the Earth is hollow and its interior can be reached through openings at the North and South poles.

first appeared: 8/13/2006

In the 1890s, The New York World tested color ink with yellow on the nightshirt of a cartoon character drawn by Richard Outcault, creating the popular "Yellow Kid" and the term "yellow journalism." Outcault was born in 1863 in Lancaster (pop. 35,335).

first appeared: 7/30/2006

Martha Finley, creator of the Elsie Dinsmore series of children's books, was born in 1828 in Chillicothe (pop. 21,796). Finley's tales of the pious Elsie struck a chord with young readers and were popular through 27 sequels.

first appeared: 7/16/2006

In 2004, the Buckeye Bullet, an electric car designed and built by students at Ohio State University in Columbus, set an international speed record of 271 mph, becoming the world's fastest electric car.

first appeared: 7/2/2006

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