Accidents May Happen*

by Charlotte Jones

  The original mistake of leaving grapes to wither on the vine was not the only time raisins accidentally became popular. In the 1870s many people were growing grapes in the San Joaquin Valley in California. The grapes were either eaten as fresh fruit or were made into wine. Most Americans had never heard of raisins at that time. In September 1873 a severe heat wave struck the area. Before the growers could pick all their grapes, the heat shriveled them on the vine.

  The grapes were lost.

  One grower took the dried grape crop to a grocer in San Francisco. The grocer’s customers discovered that raisins made a delicious treat, and the “new” accidental raisins grew into a major industry in California. Today almost all the raisins eaten in the United States are grown within thirty miles of Fresno, California. California produces a third of the world’s raisins.

  Raisins are high in iron, which is important to children’s growing bodies. Raisins also provide potassium, magnesium, calcium, phosphorus, and certain B vitamins. Without added preservatives, raisins will stay fresh, delicious, and nutritious if kept in a cool place.

  Tiny. Portable. Un-junk. But best of all, raisins are delicious!

  FLABBERGASTING FACTS

  Anyone can make raisins at home.

  Place clean seedless grapes on a windowsill that gets plenty of sunshine. Allow the grapes to stand two to three weeks to reach the proper degree of moisture (15 percent). Four to five pounds of grapes will yield one pound of raisins.

  VINEGAR

  Say the word “vinegar” and you’re almost speaking French. “Vinegar” comes from French: vin is French for wine, and aigre means sour.

  That’s exactly what vinegar is: sour wine.

  Historians say that about ten thousand years ago someone’s wine was accidentally left standing too long and went sour. The result? Vinegar!

  The vinegar we buy in stores today is the result of experimenting and controlled processing. However, the basic formula for making vinegar is simple:

  Step One: Yeast changes natural sugars to alcohol, in a process called fermentation. This is what makes wine. (Fruits, vegetables, or beer can be used to make the alcoholic liquid required for the first step in making vinegar.)

  Step Two: Bacteria acts on the alcohol, changing it to an acid. This process is called secondary fermentation or acid fermentation. The wine (or other alcoholic beverage) is simply exposed to air for a certain time.

  We usually think of using vinegar in salad dressings and pickles. But history says vinegar has been used as a medicine for centuries. About 400 B.C. Hippocrates, the man who is called the father of medicine, prescribed vinegar for his patients. Through the centuries doctors recommended vinegar for skin disorders and lung ailments, as an inhalant, and for sprains, fever, and hemorrhages (internal bleeding).

  Roman soldiers put vinegar in their drinking water to purify it. According to the Vinegar Institute in Atlanta, Hannibal crossed the Alps using vinegar. He heated boulders and then doused them with vinegar, which caused the large rocks to crack and crumble.

  Throughout history the most important use of vinegar has been as a food preservative. Refrigerators were invented less than a hundred years ago. Before that time, food was preserved by drying, salting, or pickling … and the most important pickling solution was always vinegar.

  Today many people still use vinegar to soothe sunburn, as a stain remover, household cleaner, weed killer, and rust cutter, and, of course, as a cooking ingredient. There is even vinegar in Butter Rum Life Savers candy.

  WORCESTERSHIRE SAUCE

  In 1823 two “chemists” opened a shop in Worcester, England. John Lea and William Perrins called their establishment Lea & Perrins. The store was similar to today’s American drugstores.

  One day a nobleman called Lord Sandys came into the shop. He had been in India and asked the chemists to make up a recipe he had brought back from Bengal.

  Mr. Lea and Mr. Perrins prepared Lord Sandys’s sauce and poured it into jars, making a little extra for themselves. When they tasted the sauce, they thought it was terrible!

  Probably since it was already in jars, they didn’t throw the stuff out but took the jars to the cellar and forgot about them.

  Some time later they rediscovered the jars—by now coated with dust. Before throwing them out, Mr. Lea and Mr. Perrins tasted the sauce once again.

  It was wonderful! The liquid had aged and matured. The sauce that had almost been garbage quickly gained a reputation and was sold all over the world as Worcestershire sauce.

  2. Child’s Play

  “Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.”

  —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

  KITES

  Probably the most famous kite in history was Benjamin Franklin’s. In 1752 he flew a silk kite in a thunderstorm to prove that lightning and electricity are the same thing.

  But kites have been used for many hundreds of years. Most experts believe kites originated in China about three thousand years ago. At first they were not used as a way to have fun on a breezy afternoon; the Chinese army used them as signals. A kite’s color, its painted pattern, and the way it was flown could send messages far away. Kites were also used as beacons, to distribute pamphlets, and even to transport bombs.

  Chinese soldiers tied bamboo shoots or stiff paper to their kites. When the kites soared overhead, the wind blowing through the bamboo or paper made a harsh whistling sound. The noise terrified the enemy, and they ran.

  Just as today’s kids imitate adults by playing with toy guns and toy airplanes, Chinese children quickly began flying kites.

  Kites have been used through the centuries in religious ceremonies, at festivals, and as tools for studying weather. Kites contributed to people’s knowledge as they began to build airplanes.

  FLABBERGASTING FACTS

  If you’re interested in kites and kite flying, there is an organization you can join:

  Kitefliers’ Association

  1559 Rockville Pike

  Rockville, MD 20852-1651

  Send a stamped, self-addressed envelope for free information. There is a membership fee.

  NURSERY RHYMES

  If parents today are concerned about too much violence, maybe they should stop teaching children nursery rhymes! Should children learn about a butcher’s wife who cuts off the tails of blind mice? Or about a baby who rocks in a cradle until the wind blows, when the baby plunges to the ground?

  Many “nursery rhymes” were never intended for children. But children heard the rhymes and quickly learned them.

  Some nursery rhymes began as folk songs or ballads sung in taverns. Some are based on street games, others on political events. Some were written to make fun of religious leaders or to gossip about kings and queens.

  Many of the rhymes used very bad language, but the words have been changed over the years.

  The word “nursery” was not even used with the rhymes until 1824, although many of them date back five hundred years or more.

  Humpty Dumpty

  Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall

  Humpty Dumpty had a great fall

  All the king’s horses,

  And all the king’s men,

  Couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again.

  If Humpty Dumpty wasn’t an imaginary egg when this rhyme was first made up, what or who was he?

  It’s believed that this rhyme was written to make fun of a nobleman who fell out of favor with a king. The king is believed to have been Richard III of England, who ruled in the fifteenth century.

  Jack and Jill

  Jack and Jill went up the hill

  To fetch a pail of water.

  Jack fell down and broke his crown,

  And Jill came tumbling after.

  According to some sources, there was no girl named Jill in the original version of this rhyme. The poem was about two boys—Jack and Gill. The boys were Cardinal Thomas Wolsey and Bi
shop Tarbes, who served England’s King Henry VII.

  In 1518 Wolsey and Tarbes tried to settle a feud between France and the Holy Roman Empire. They failed, and war broke out. Wolsey committed British troops to fight against France, and he raised taxes to pay for the war. The people resented the tax. This poem mocked Cardinal Wolsey and Bishop Tarbes.

  Little Jack Horner

  Little Jack Horner

  Sat in a corner

  Eating his Christmas pie.

  He stuck in his thumb

  And pulled out a plum,

  And said, “What a good boy am I!”

  According to legend, Little Jack Horner was not a little boy but a man named Thomas Horner.

  In the 1500s Horner was sent by Abbot Richard Whiting to deliver a Christmas pie to the English king, Henry VIII. Hidden beneath the crust of the pie were the deeds to twelve manor houses. These deeds were a “gift” to Henry VIII to persuade him not to seize lands that belonged to the Church.

  The story goes that during the journey, Horner reached into the pie and helped himself to a “plum”—the deed of Mells Manor, which he kept for himself.

  Some sources say descendants of Thomas Horner still live in Mells Manor, and his relatives insist that he purchased the deed from Abbot Whiting.

  Ring Around the Rosey

  Ring around the rosey,

  A pocket full of posies.

  Ashes! Ashes!

  We all fall down.

  It sounds like an innocent game. Most small children learn the singsong rhyme quickly and enjoy marching in a circle while they chant the words. But this rhyme did not originate as a playtime activity for children.

  Between 1664 and 1665, the Great Plague killed more than seventy thousand people in London. This rhyme was about the Great Plague.

  The first line, “Ring around the rosey” or “Ring-a-ring of roses,” describes the first symptom of the disease: a rosy rash that broke out on the victim’s body.

  The second line, “A pocket full of posies,” refers to the herbs or flowers people carried in their pockets. Since ancient times, people had believed that the breath of evil demons produced bad smells and caused disease. To protect themselves, they carried sweet-smelling flowers or herbs.

  The third line, “Ashes! Ashes!”, was originally “A-tishoo! A-tishoo!” and referred to the victim’s violent sneezing.

  The last line, “We all fall down,” tells of the victim’s collapse from the disease. Death soon followed.

  What began as a street rhyme about one of the world’s worst plagues became a children’s song of happiness.

  THE YO-YO

  In the Philippines the word “yo-yo” means “come-come” or “to return.”

  While the yo-yo today is a toy for kids, it didn’t start out that way.

  A version of the yo-yo was used as a weapon in the ancient Far East. In the sixteenth century hunters in the Philippine Islands tied wooden disks together with a long piece of rope or twine. Sitting in trees, they would throw the weapon through the air. If the weapon missed the hunter’s prey, he could pull it back by the twine and quickly try again.

  An American named Donald Duncan saw the yo-yo in action in the early 1920s. He changed the design and transformed it into a child’s toy that soon became popular.

  FLABBERGASTING FACTS

  • June 6 is National Yo-yo Day.

  • “Fast” Eddy McDonald must be the yo-yo champ. According to The Guinness Book of World Records, in 1990 he completed 21,663 loops in three hours.

  3. Patriotic Accidents

  “America was discovered accidentally by a great seaman who was looking for something else.”

  —The Oxford History of the American People

  THE CRACK IN THE LIBERTY BELL

  Before radio, TV, and daily newspapers, bells were an important part of a community. They warned of attacks by enemies; announced births and deaths; and called people to meetings, to worship, and to school.

  In 1751 the Pennsylvania Province Assembly ordered a bell to be made and hung in the new State House. Unfortunately, the bell they received in September 1752 cracked the first time it was tested.

  The bell was recast twice before it was hung in the State House steeple in 1753. It rang on important national occasions and to mark the birthdays and deaths of important people.

  In 1835 the bell cracked again while tolling the death of Chief Justice John Marshall. It was muffled and rung several times after that, but in 1846 it was permanently silenced.

  There is still debate about whether the bell’s crack was caused by a casting error or improper handling during shipping. Whatever mistake was responsible, the resulting crack has made the Liberty Bell the most famous bell in the world. A cracked bell that can’t be rung has become a symbol of America.

  Today the bell stands in Independence Hall in Philadelphia. More than 1.8 million visitors see and touch it each year.

  FLABBERGASTING FACTS

  • The Liberty Bell weighs about 2,080 pounds.

  • It is twelve feet in circumference.

  • It contains 70 percent copper, 25 percent tin, and small amounts of lead, zinc, arsenic, gold, and silver.

  • The original yoke is made of slippery elm.

  • The inscription is from the Bible (Leviticus 25:10): “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.”

  • The name “Liberty Bell” came in 1839 from a Boston antislavery group called the Friends of Freedom. “Liberty” does not refer to America’s religious or political liberty, but to African Americans’ liberation from slavery.

  • Another mistake: On the bell the word “Pennsylvania” is spelled “Pensylvania.” When the bell was recast, the spelling error was kept for sentimental reasons.

  INDEPENDENCE DAY

  July 4 is a great time to have a picnic! And the fireworks are worth waiting all year for!

  But maybe Independence Day should have been June 7 … or July 2 … or July 8 … or August 2.

  Records show that Richard Henry Lee of Virginia introduced to the Continental Congress a motion for a declaration of independence on June 7, 1776.

  The document had to be written, then rewritten.

  The congress declared independence in Philadelphia on July 2, 1776.

  Congress celebrated independence on July 8 that year. There was a big public celebration, with guns firing and soldiers parading. Congress celebrated, but New York didn’t even vote on the resolution until July 9.

  And the declaration was signed by most of the delegates on August 2—not in July. A few didn’t sign until later. One, Thomas McKean, didn’t sign until 1781—five years later.

  But Thomas Jefferson’s document titled the “Declaration of Independence” was dated July 4. It seems that the document declaring independence became more important than the actual act of declaring the independence.

  THE NATIONAL ANTHEM

  Important government documents don’t just happen. They are written and rewritten and rewritten.

  Wouldn’t you think that anything as important as a country’s national anthem would be written by a carefully selected poet or songwriter?

  America’s national anthem didn’t begin that way.

  Francis Scott Key was a lawyer. His friend Dr. William Beanes had been taken prisoner by the British during the War of 1812. Beanes was held aboard a British warship off the coast of Maryland near Fort McHenry.

  On September 13, 1814, during a brief truce, Key went aboard the British ship to ask for his friend’s release. The British agreed to release Beanes, but insisted on keeping both men aboard the ship overnight so that they couldn’t reveal the plan to attack Fort McHenry.

  Throughout the night of September 13, 1814, and into the early hours of September 14, Key watched “the bombs bursting in air” from the ship’s deck.

  The next morning, in “the dawn’s early light,” Key was so relieved to see the “star-spangled banner” still flying over the fort that
he wrote a poem about it on the back of an envelope.

  An actor named Ferdinand Durang sang the poem to the tune of “To Anacreon in Heaven,” which was an old English drinking and love song. The tune stuck.

  While the army and navy used it as an anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner” was not officially declared the national anthem of the United States for another 117 years. In 1931 President Herbert Hoover issued a presidential proclamation designating “The Star-Spangled Banner” the national anthem.

  FLABBERGASTING FACTS

  • It is illegal in several states to dance to “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

  • Some people believe “The Star-Spangled Banner” is a glorification of war.

  • Music critics say the tune is very difficult for the average person to sing.

  • “The Star-Spangled Banner” is sung at sporting events more than at any other kind of occasion.

  4. A Dose of Medicine

  “All the world is a laboratory to the inquiring mind.”

  —Martin H. Fischer

  ETHER AND NITROUS OXIDE

  Do you need to have a tooth pulled, an appendix removed, or a cut stitched up? A couple of centuries ago surgery was a pretty grim prospect.