North and South Carolina Are Home to the Venus Fly Trap
The only native habitat of these carnivorous plants is in a small area of North and South Carolina. North Carolina even named the Venus Fly Trap its State Carnivorous Plant.
You may see them in your favorite oddity stores, but wild Venus Fly Traps are actually at risk of extinction. One more reason to take better care of our precious environment!
The Donkey Symbol of the Democratic Party Originated from an Insult!
In 1828, a random antagonist called Andrew Jackson a jackass. Rather than letting the insult get to him, Jackson decided to one-up the insult flinger and adopted the donkey as the symbol of his party.
The symbol that originated from a rude remark exists to this day! Talk about not letting the haters get you down!
A Hotel in Chicago was Designed Specifically for Murder
During the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893, some hotel guests were especially unlucky. The sociopath and serial killer, H.H. Holmes designed an insane and intricate hotel equipped with rooms that held secret gas lines, which Holmes used to murder unsuspecting guests. There was even a sealed room where Holmes would trap people and then starve them.
He got away with killing hundreds of people this way. They would go missing and their families would have no way of tracking their bodies down because Holmes had an incinerator in the basement of the hotel. How horrifying is that?
In 1776 the First Submarine Attack Occurred
David Bushnell invented a submarine that was specially designed to attach powder kegs to ships. Named The Turtle, Bushnell’s submarine attached a keg to a British ship in New York Harbor.
That’s certainly not a turtle anyone wants to mess with!
The Victorians Pretended the Dead were Alive
Back in the Victorian era, not only was it extremely expensive to take a photo, but the exposure time also took forever. In fact, the first photograph was taken in 1826 and took 8 hours to expose. Due to these factors, most people only had one photo of themselves.
When someone died and loved ones wanted something to remember them by they’d have their photo taken, but they’d pose their body as if they were alive sometimes putting pennies in their eyes to make them seem brighter in the photo. They certainly didn’t have to worry about the person moving and ruining the photo this way, either!