Showing results by narrator "Mark Schectman" in All Categories

The French Alpine town of Albertville sits in the southeast of the country, near the border of Italy, and is home to only about 10,000 people. Like most French communities, the people of Albertville rely on cheese. But unlike most other French areas, cheese is more than just a snack or part of a meal for the residents of Albertville. It, quite literally, powers part of the area.

What scandal nearly cost President Grover Cleveland the election? Get the inside story on this episode of Now I Know. The Presidency of Grover Cleveland is already unique for the well-known reason that his two terms were not consecutive. Cleveland won the 1884 Presidential election by a narrow margin – less than a half a percent of the popular vote – and took the Presidency.

Crack – a smokable form of cocaine which is all too common – is highly addictive and very dangerous. At $50 to $100 per gram on the street (that's a Google-fueled guess by the way; sorry if I have that wrong, but I've never been in the market for crack), it's also a lower-cost alternative to those cocaine addicts who need a hit but don't have the dollars for the straight, snort-able kind. Oh, and in most places, it's illegal – including in the United States, which includes the state of Tennessee.

There's a teensy problem with the Lincoln Memorial – one that spelling sticklers might have the biggest problem with. Explore this little-known fact on this episode of Now I Know. The Lincoln Memorial is one of Washington, D.C.’s top tourist attractions. The monument, erected to honor the 16th President of the United States, is a painstaking work of architecture and sculpture. It features a 19-foot high sculpture of Abraham Lincoln himself, and the attention to detail is breathtaking.

A fun and practical guide to thrive not only in Silicon Valley, but in the emerging Global Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley has become synonymous with big ideas, start-ups, and inventing the future. But today, the magic of Silicon Valley has gone viral and global. From Austin to Boston, from...

It's common knowledge that rubbing alcohol makes cuts burn. But, why? Find out the answer to this burning question on this episode of Now I Know. Get a scrape or a cut and your first step – after the subtle facial expression you make from the pain – may be to grab some rubbing alcohol. Your goal is to clean off the wound before applying a bandage, as you want to shield the scrape from the elements, and prevent trapping bacteria or other stuff within the injured area.

In the fall of 1994, the United States was introduced to a new tool in the world of crime solving and prosecution – DNA evidence. The O.J. Simpson trial had captured the nation's – if not much of the world's – attention, and a large part of the trial's outcome hung on DNA. At the time, the use of DNA evidence was still emerging, and the science wasn't well understood – or trusted – by juries.

There's been a hostage situation in the UK every year since the 1500s. Oh, and it involves the queen. Explore the Queen of England's 'flesh and blood' insurance policy, on this episode of Now I Know. Every May or June – depending on whether the United Kingdom is holding Parliamentary elections that year – both houses of Parliament assemble to be addressed by the reigning monarch. The event is rife with pomp and circumstance, as one would expect from a regal tradition dating back to the 1500s.

François-Marie Arouet, better known as Voltaire, was a French writer during the Enlightenment. Known for what would today be considered snark, he often made comments to which many would take offense. For example, in his 1764 treatise Dictionnaire Philosophique (which translates as Philosophical Dictionary), Voltaire quipped that "common sense is not so common." This smarter-than-thou attitude was a theme throughout his works, and, one would expect, his life as well.

It was June 23, 2011. A 59-year-old man named Richard James Verone was being held in North Carolina, unable to pay his $2,000 bond. He was awaiting his day in court – June 28th – for a crime he'd committed two weeks earlier. It was a smooth, calculated crime. On the morning of June 9th, Verone showered, ironed his shirt, and hopped into a cab to go to a nearby bank. He handed the teller a note with a simple demand: take some money out of the drawer and hand it over.

When George M. Stratton made himself a pair of “inverting glasses," his world turned upside down – and the scientific community gained some interesting new perspective. Learn more on this episode of Now I Know. George M. Stratton was born in 1865 in Oakland, California. By his early thirties, he was a professor of philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, but he took interest in psychology.

Today, the United States celebrates the fake holiday known as Groundhog Day. The tradition, which dates back to the 18th or 19th century, is pseudoscience, but probably the harmless variety. People gather around in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, waiting for a groundhog named Punxsutawney Phil to emerge. (And yes, there are other Groundhog Day groundhogs, too, but Phil's the OG, assuming the "G" stands for "groundhog".)

Checks are, basically, IOUs. The person writing the check promises to pay the check's recipient at some point in the very near future. The check writer isn't even part of the transaction at that point – the writer's bank is instructed, literally, to "pay" the amount specified "to the order of" the person to whom the check is made out. The bank plays a critical role in the transaction beyond the delivery of cash, too – it helps ensure that the check writer is good for the debt now owed.

In 2013, Mamoru Samuragochi was nearing his 50th birthday and was at the peak of his fame. A talented composer, Samuragochi was near the top of the list if you needed an original score for a video game and was widely regarded as a leading talent in the realm of digital composition. He was also well known for composing a symphony about the Hiroshima bomb, which quickly became one of the more popular classical music pieces in Japan.

Should I stay or should I go? Find out why a large-scale effort to improve crosswalk safety in the U.S. and Canada crashed and burned, on this episode of Now I Know. About five years ago, municipalities across the United States, Canada, and likely points elsewhere began installing new technology for crosswalk safety. Gone were many of the simple “WALK” or “DON’T WALK” signals.

Here's a simple experiment you can try at home – and, probably will in the near future, whether you'd like to or not. Call a customer support hotline, try to talk to a real human and, well, you don't have to do much else. In many cases, you'll be put on hold, and you'll get to experience hold music. It's almost a given that this will happen, as hold music has become a very common feature of such phone systems. But it has a very uncommon history.

Meet the Beverly Hills Caviar Automated Boutique: a super fancy mall vending machine that sells caviar, escargot and truffles. Explore the fishy facts on this episode of Now I Know. In the market for a high-end, expensive meal? Here are two rules of thumb: One, don’t even bother looking at vending machines. A Snickers bar or bag of Pirate’s Booty may seem like a grand idea, but – even with the 20 ounce drink of your choosing – it isn’t going to make for a good date night experience. And two, don’t go to the mall.

Choco pies are two pieces of cake with a marshmallow-y filling in between, all covered with a layer of chocolate. In the US, at least, you can find them for about a buck a piece, but they're not very popular there – or in most of the West, for that matter. But in parts of Asia – China, Vietnam, and South Korea in particular – Choco Pies are a staple of snack time.

On January 5, 2010, Irish authorities descended upon the home of an electrician who, just a couple of days earlier, had traveled from his native Slovakia back to his adopted home of Ireland. Acting on a tip from the Slovak authorities, the Irish police believed that the man – whose name was never released to the press – had recently smuggled explosives into Ireland. Specifically, the man was believed to have transported an explosive called RDX in his luggage during his January 2nd flight.

In China, millions of women regularly gather for morning square dancing – despite the government's attempt to stop them. Get the step-by-step story on this episode of Now I Know. Today millions of Chinese women aged 55 and older regularly gather for morning square dancing – even though the Chinese government tried to stop them. Square dancing in China, at least among middle-aged and older women, became a trend in the mid-1990s.