Three Bits o Trivia

Expats, Bartenders and San Juan

A Puerto Rican expatriate is known as a neoyorkino. More than one out of every three Puerto Ricans live in the U.S. outside of Puerto Rico.

Everyone agrees that the piña colada was created by a Puerto Rican bartender named Ramón. Depending upon whom you ask, it was either Don Ramón Portas Mingot at the Barrachina restaurant and jewelry store in 1963, or Don Ramón "Monchito" Marrero at the Caribe Hilton in 1954.

Before they called it Puerto Rico, Columbus called the island San Juan Bautista; its capital city, San Juan, is still named for John the Baptist.

Nominal Congressmen, Rainforests and Shots

The Commonwealth of Puerto Rico elects just one member of Congress, a member of the House of Representatives who serves a term of four years, rather than the normal two. Holding the title of The Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico, he or she has all the rights and privileges of any member of the House except the right to vote on bills.

El Yunque is the only tropical rainforest in the U.S. forest system.

The first American shots of World War I were fired in Puerto Rico, upon a German ship leaving the bay in San Juan.

Capitals, Divided Islands and Cannibals

Sint Maarten has two capital cities: Philipsburg and Marigot. One is Dutch, the other French.

Sint Maarten/Saint Martin is the smallest island in the world divided between two nations.

The Caribs were the native Americans who inhabited the West Indies when Spanish explorers. The name was derived from a word for cannibal.

Saint Christopher, Reales and Tiny Nations

Saint Kitts was originally known as Saint Christopher Island.

The proper name for a "piece of eight" is a Reale.

The islands of Saint Kitts and Nevis form the smallest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

Black Pineapples, 365 Beaches and Arawaks

A black pineapple is picked when it is green. It doesn't turn black unless it gets moldy.

Antigua's travel bureau boasts 365 beachs on the island, one for each day of the year.

The Arawaks were the natives who greeted Christopher Columbus when he first landed in the Americas.

Rum, Washington and Bajans

Mount Gay is the world's oldest rum distillery.

George Washington never left the U.S. but once, for a trip to Barbados with his half-brother Lawrence, who suffered from tuberculosis.

The good people of Barbados called themselves Bajans.

Camouflage, Language and Mountain Chicken

Many Caribbean nations make it a criminal offence for anyone, including children, to wear camouflage patterns or even carry such items.

The official language of French Dominica is English.

Mountain Chicken is a dish made with frog meat.

Islanders, Vampire Bugs and Time Zones

The island of Saint Thomas is home to almost half of the population of the United States Virgin Islands.

Even a patio screen won't protect you from No-See-Ums (aka Biting Midges, Sand Flies), the biting flies that can be as small as 1/25”. The welts they leave behind are bigger than they are.

The U.S. Virgin Islands are permanently on US Virgin Islands Standard Time (Atlantic Time). They don't need Daylight Saving Time.

Wealth & Poverty, Old Towns and Doubloons

The people of Puerto Rico have the highest incomes in all of Latin America. However, if the commonwealth became a U.S. state, it would be the poorest, with its citizens earning barely half that of the people in the poorest of the 50 states — Mississippi.

Santo Domingo, in the Dominican Republic, is the oldest European settlement in the Americas. Old San Juan in Puerto Rico is the second-oldest.

A doubloon was worth two "pieces of eight."

Trade, Trenches and Emancipation

Though certainly not the main draw, the trade between native Americans and European explorers in the 16th century included communicable diseases. The Europeans brought smallpox and whooping cough, and went home with syphilis.

Milwaukee Deep is the deepest part of the Atlantic Ocean. It is named for the ship, the U.S.S. Milwaukee, which discovered it in 1939.

In Puerto Rico, March 22 is celebrated as Emancipation Day, commemorating the the emancipation of Puerto Rico's slaves in 1873.

Players, Spring and Coaches

UCLA's Kevin Love was named Gatorade's High School Athlete-of-the-Year in 2006, but his school, Lake Oswego High, in Oregon, selected a different athlete of the year, basketball player Margaret Johnson.

Q: Spring always starts on March 21, right?
A: Actually, we are in the midst of a ten-year string in which the vernal equinox falls on March 20 nine out of ten times (2007 being the lone exception).

Jim Harrick and Lon Kreuger are the only coaches to take at least four schools to the NCAA basketball tournament twice.

Happy, Birthdays and Michael

You can quickly tell Happy apart from the other Seven Dwarves. He's the fattest one. Fat and happy.

In the U.K., the King's Birthday (or currently, the Queen's Birthday) is celebrated as a holiday, but it is not actually celebrated on the anniversary of the monarch's birth.

Saint Michael the Archangel is the patron saint of cops.

GDP, Bank Robbers and Hollywood Stars

The United States real per capita GDP of $41,890 is second only to that of Luxembourg's $60,228.

The City Bank of New York was the first bank to be robbed of more than $100,000.

Joanne Woodward was the first person to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Storms, Vegetarians and Models

The March 18, 1925 "Tri-State Tornado" flattened 15,000 homes and killed nearly 700 people.

Rock singer "Meatloaf" is a vegetarian.

Last year, models made a median hourly wage of just $11.22, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Irish, Mexicans and Dublin Towns

The Republic of Ireland is 88.4% Catholic.

The second largest source of income for Mexico is the transfer of money from the United States to Mexico, sent home by Mexicans working in the U.S.

There are nine places in the United States that share the name of Ireland's capital, Dublin. Since Census 2000, Dublin, California, has surpassed Dublin, Ohio, as the most populous of these places (35,581 compared with 33,606 as of July 1, 2003).

Ashes, Feast Days and Life Expectancy

The ashes used on Ash Wednesday are made from burning the previous year's blessed palms.

Happy St. Patrick's Day. March 16 is, of course, the feast day of St. Patrick, the Bishop of Malaga, Spain.

Zambia has the world's lowest life expectancy in the world, a mere 40.5 years.

Blue Eyes, Epcot and Whale Songs

Until the end of the Ice Age, everyone had brown eyes. People with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor dating to a mutation that occurred between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago.

The concept for Disney's Epcot originally included pavilions representing Israel and the United Arab Emirates, but both concepts were scuttled before the 1982 opening.

A humpback whale's song can travel more than 100 miles.

Mercury, Brasilia and Saint Médard

Sure, you can boil mercury, as long as you can heat is to 674.11 degrees, and can avoid inhaling the fumes.

Among the world's major cities, none is new than Brasilia.

Saint Médard is the patron saint against bad weather.

Catholics, Storms and Old Cities

Italy is 83% Catholic. The Holy Land is just 2% Catholic.

Since the 1870s, more than 60 hurricanes have struck the island of Grand Cayman.

The city of Byblos, in Lebanon, is 7,000 years old.

The Bulge, Shark Liver Oil and Nephews

The American Army called the Battle of the Bulge the Ardennes Offensive; the Germans called it Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein, or Operation Watch on the Rhine.

Basking shark liver oil is used to treat hemorrhoids, inter alia.

The names of Popeye's four nephews are Pipeye, Peepeye, Pupeye, and Poopeye.

Crickets, Circles and Roses

Mormon crickets are cannibals.

In Dante's "Inferno" the deepest, Ninth Circle of Hell is reserved for those who betray family or country, e.g., Judas, Cassius, Brutus, Walter O'Malley.

Elizabeth I of England suffered from anthophobia, a fear of roses.

Pyramids, Gems and Crators

There are more pyramids in Sudan than in Egypt.

The world's rarest gem is painite, first discovered in Burma in the 1950s.

Mercury is the most thoroughly cratered planet in the solar system. Blame the lack of an atmosphere to slow and consume incoming meteors.

Gatorade, Time and Capital Drinking Crimes

Dr. Robert Cade was the man who formulated Gatorade.

Mexico has adopted Daylight Saving Time nationwide, even in its tropical regions, because of economic ties to the U.S., but the Mexican state of Sonora does not observe it, because it borders Arizona, a U.S. state that also does not observe Daylight Saving Time.

According to article 179 of Iran's Islamic Penal Code, if someone has already twice been punished for drinking alcohol, and he is caught drinking a third time, the penalty should be death.

Trades, Acts of God and The Who

Only once in NBA history has the league's leading scorer been traded during the season. Wilt Chamberlain was traded for Paul Neumann, Connie Dierking, Lee Shaffer and $150,000.

A tornado disaster relief bill was once delayed by Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee because he was troubled by the bill's reference to natural disasters as "acts of God." Huckabee  insisted that God should not be blamed for the weather disaster.

The Who never won a Grammy.

Snakes, Unbeaten Teams and Travelers

The Book of Genesis never mentions Satan, not even during the snake scenes.

There have been four NFL teams that went undefeated through the regular season. Each made the title game. Only one -- the 1972 Dolphins -- won it. The other three teams, the 2007 Patriots (18-0), the 1934 Bears (13-0) and the 1942 Bears (11-0) lost the championship game.

Rutherford B. Hayes was the first president to visit the west coast.

Limestone, Motorcycles and Legislators

The limestone used to build the Empire State Building comes from Indiana.

If Harley-Davidson's founders had used their first names instead of their surnames, when building their company, your motorcycle might be called a "William & Arthur" instead.

Phineas Taylor Barnum, founder of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, was once elected to the Connecticut state legislature.

Draft Disasters, Bad Trades and Forgettable Debuts

Quarterbacks Dan McGwire and Todd Marinovich were both selected ahead of Brett Favre in the 1991 NFL Draft.

Giving up on him after one season, the Atlanta Falcons traded the NFL's eventual all-time winningest quarterback for the rights to rookie running back Tony Smith, who played just three seasons in the NFL.

Brett Favre's first pass in an official NFL game was intercepted for a touchdown. Favre went on to become the NFL's all-time career recordholder for both interceptions and touchdowns.

Inaugurations, Vice-Presidents and Sabbath Oaths

Until the 1930s, and except for the first, March 4 was the Inauguration Day for all newly elected American presidents.

Charles Curtis was the first native-American Vice President.

The U.S. without a president for one day in 1849. Zachary Taylor was supposed to be sworn in as president on March 4, 1849. He wouldn't take the oath on a Sunday, which was his Sabbath. He became president on Monday.

Oil, Silence and Depeche Mode

Oil wasn't discovered in Saudi Arabia, the world's most prolific exporter of oil, until 1938.

The surface of Mercury is dead silent.

Depeche Mode has placed 44 singles on the U.K. Top 40 charts, without ever topping the charts. No other artist has as many without at least one #1 single.

Vulgarity, Rushing Leaders and Baseball Legends

The word "vulgar" comes from the Latin word vulgus, which means common folks. Originally, something vulgar was simply something common or not royal or cultured.

Q: O.J. Simpson's six career games with more than 200 rushing yards is an NFL career record. Who is second?
A: Tiki Barber, who had five such games.

Jackie Robinson and Babe Ruth were both just 53 when they died.

Piña Coladas, Strained Pineapples and Greater Antilles

The Piña Colada originated in Puerto Rico.

Piña colada is Spanish for strained pineapple.

The four Greater Antilles are Cuba, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Jamaica, and Puerto Rico. The Cayman Islands are generally considered part of the same group, even though they are not geographically major islands.

Austen, Black and Seattle Rain

Jane Austen never finished writing her seventh novel, "The Brothers", which was retitled "Sanditon" after her death.

Elizabeth "Beth" Short was the Black Dahlia's name.

Seattle is well known for its rain, but New York gets a foot more rain, annually, than Seattle.