Recent research suggests that Ernest Hemingway never wrote the six-word story, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.” It’s more likely this urban legend of an alleged story was based on a 1921 newspaper column by Roy K. Moulton, who printed a brief note he attributed to someone named Jerry: “Baby carriage for sale, never used.”
Richard Nixon played piano.
In 1875, Louis Prang created the first line of Christmas cards in the United States. By 1881, he was printing five million cards a year.
According to one researcher, piggy banks didn’t come into existence because there was a kind of clay in the Middle Ages called “pygg.” Besides, says another researcher, in 1400, the word “pygg” would have sounded like “pug.”
This article appears in May 10 • 2013.