According to author Robert K. Klepper, the 1929 German science-fiction movie The Woman in the Moon invented the backward countdown now used in space travel launches.

For the past 21 years, King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands has secretly been living a double life and co-piloting airplanes for KLM.

There is only one London subway station that shares no letters with the word “mackerel.” It’s St. John’s Wood.

According to The Washington Post, the United Daughters of the Confederacy erected a Confederate monument in 1913 in Rockville, Md., even though Montgomery County, where Rockville is located, never seceded. While Maryland sent 24,000 men to the Confederate armed forces, it sent 63,000 to the U.S. Army and Navy.

When Louis Braille accidentally blinded himself as a child with an awl, he didn’t realize what had happened and kept asking his parents when the sun was going to come out again.

This article appears in May 26 • 2017.

A note to readers: Bold and uncensored, The Austin Chronicle has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.

SUPPORT US