It shouldn't surprise us that records of money and court cases are so often prioritized over records of human lives, which is the case of Eulalie Mandeville. No documented records of her life exist outside of the three-year court fight over her money, but those records tell a gripping tale. Eulalie Mandeville was a free woman of color in New Orleans who became one of the richest Black women in America. Born enslaved, she was manumitted by her white father and raised in his white family. In 1793, she was already a successful young businesswoman when she met Eugene Macarty, who was white and would become her life partner. They were prohibited by law from marrying, and their children were therefore considered illegitimate. Neither Mandeville nor their children could inherit anything when Macarty died in 1846. He was found to have an estate of only $12,000, when his brother and other relatives thought he was rich. The couple had prepared for this situation for many years, transferring wealth and property to Mandeville in different ways, resulting in her fortune of $155,000 (worth around five million today). Macarty's relatives cried fraud, and took Mandeville to court. Read the not-too-long story of that long court case that tells us what we know about the life of Eulalie Mandeville at Jstor Daily. -via Strange Company

(Image source: New York Public Library)

The Soviet Union had, on a small scale, a domestic production of video and arcade games. Tetris, is, of course, the most famous Soviet video game, if not the most successful cultural export of the Soviet Union. Many of these games are playable at the Museum of Soviet Video Games, which has locations in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

This particular arcade game tested players' strength. It simulates the motion of pulling up turnips and takes its inspiration from a Russian folktale about an entire family harvesting an especially massive turnip.

You can see photos of other Soviet arcade games at this 2019 post from the Arcade Blogger.

-via @after_history

You've heard the phrase "don't think about an elephant." It is impossible to achieve, because the word elephant implants that concept in our heads, despite the word "don't" that we understand. Understanding that negative word in context and obeying the sentence is two very different things, and artificial intelligence has not mastered the idea of negation. It's a good thing that humans can separate uncontrolled thoughts from controlled actions, because we can draw a room without putting an elephant in it -and even when it's there, we can ignore it. But maybe that's taking the elephant analogy too far.

Dr. Erica Brozovski (previously at Neatorama) explains negation and the words we use for it in English. We don't always use these words correctly, but we understand them and we can usually parse what someone is saying to us even when the words are misused, as in double and triple negatives. However, there are rare cases when language is so confusing that we really have to stop and ask, "What are you really trying to say?" Even so, we are better than AI.

Many British castles earn their maintenance costs by flaunting their ancient history. If a king once lived there, or a famous battle took place there, the more tourists that a castle will draw, even if it is in ruins. However, there is one castle that doesn't rely all that much on its ancient origins to draw tourists. Doune Castle in Scotland was built in the 13th and 14th centuries, but what keeps it attracting tourists is the fact that Monty Python and the Holy Grail was filmed there.

You see, when the movie was filmed in 1974 (it is celebrating its 50th anniversary this week), many different castles were scouted, but they were governed by agencies, and the National Trust for Scotland withdrew permission for any castle to be used as a film set, especially since it was Monty Python asking. But Doune Castle was in private hands and said yes. In fact, Doune Castle was the actual setting for several of the castles in the story, filmed from different angles. That decision paid off well, since people are still visiting just because their favorite Monty Python movie was filmed there. Read more about the ancient history of Doune Castle at Wikipedia and its pop culture legacy at Cracked.

(Image credit: Wikifan75)

Passover, or Pesach, is April 12 through the 20th this year. The Jewish a cappella group Six13 (previously at Neatorama) has released their annual Passover pop parody song, and this one is set to the tune of "Apt." by Rosé and Bruno Mars.They call it "PSVR." This video tells of the exodus from Egypt that was the origin of Passover and describes the seder meal, and actually makes a lot more sense than the Rosé song (which has a sort of an explanation in the first comment here). At any rate, this song fits nicely with Six13's extensive collection of pop songs converted to Jewish holiday anthems.

Would you eat escargot-flavored ice cream? It might be a good way to prepare for your stay in Paris.

The New York Post reports that EasyJet, a British discount airline, is offering snacks befitting the destinations of its travelers. Those traveling to Paris are served ice cream flavored with garlic and crystallized sugar made to resemble the texture of snail shells.

Travelers to Portugal, Spain, Italy, and Morocco also receive special "jet-lato" flavors. I would enjoy trying the ice cream made to taste like cacio e pepe, a cheese and pasta dish from Italy.

You can see a promotional video for the program on Instagram.

-via Dave Barry

It's time to class up this shindig. Yes, a champagne fountain is nice, but it's also expensive and does not defeat the ennui of the modern party scene. But a pickle fountain will make sure that people talk about your party for years to come.

Born in Space has a roundup of TikTok videos showing people setting up and enjoying pickle fountains at events. The spigots are helpful for those of us who prefer to drink  pickle juice straight from the source. If you insist on staying traditional, you can offer champagne glasses to your guests for this purpose. But don't be surprised if I just stick my whole head under a spigot and open it up.

-via Dave Barry

Hello, Antarctica.

Unlike previously anticipated, from 460 km above, it is only pure white, no human activity is visible. pic.twitter.com/i7JawFYzW2

— Chun (@satofishi) April 2, 2025

Chung Yang, a billionaire investor and, now, astronaut is leading a current a SpaceX private orbital mission. The Times reports that Chun and three companions have a polar orbit, passing both the north and south poles every 46 minutes in their Dragon capsule. They found Antarctica transcendentally beautiful.

The four-person crew is also conducting 22 scientific experiments focused on how the human body reacts to space travel. These experiments include the first-ever X-ray performed on a human in space.

-via Massimo

In their What If? video series (previously at Neatorama), Randall Munroe of XKCD and Henry Reich of MinutePhysics look into wild theoretical questions from fans, no matter how stupid they are. Now, we know that the earth rotates 360° every day. But this question is about rotating it in a different direction, sideways to be exact, changing its orientation completely. To see what would happen, they theoretically made the Greenwich Meridian into the equator. That changes everything, especially the way we see the globe. London is suddenly in the tropics, and India is where Siberia used to be. Antarctica would be a much smaller island without its ice cap. Some places, like where I live, wouldn't change its climate or weather too much, we'd just be in a different hemisphere. If this change were to happen gradually, the earth would adapt, but it it were sudden, it could be a mass extinction event.

Which of Hayao Miyazaki's films is depicted above? Yes, it's Spirited Away!

The palette of a film's most dominant colors can help us recognize it, sometimes instantly. NYC-based illustrator and graphic designer Hyo Taek Kim has, in the past, attracted our attention for his color palettes of Star Wars and Disney films.

Kim has also created a poster depicting Studio Ghibli fims, including My Neighbor Totoro, Howl's Moving Castle, Princess Mononoke, The Wind Rises, Porco Rosso, Ponyo, Nausicaä, Castle in the Sky, and Kiki's Delivery Service.

-via Spoon & Tamago

With all the medicines, remedies, and supplements available to cure what ails ya, the name Dr. Buckland’s Scotch Oats Essence stands out as being particularly benign and natural. What could be more wholesome for your body than oats? And Scotch oats, to be exact! This patent medicine, introduced in 1886, promised to relieve the pain of "sciatica, headaches, neurasthenia, hysteria, ovarian neuralgia, epilepsy" and even alcoholism and drug addiction. That's a pretty broad range for any medicine. It was quite popular for a short time.

But in 1888, a pharmaceutical magazine published an analysis of Dr. Buckland’s Scotch Oats Essence that revealed its active ingredients were alcohol and morphine. Alcoholics and drug addicts who took it appeared to get better, because they didn't have to seek out other sources of drugs! Further research revealed that there was no such person as Dr. Buckland. Read the story of Dr. Buckland’s Scotch Oats Essence and the medical practitioner who was really behind it at The Quack Doctor. -via Strange Company

(Image source: Boston Public Library)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that men, as a broad generalization, enjoy gazing upon the bosoms of fair maidens. Why is this so? One popular belief is that some cultures sexualize human breasts and thus impose lasvicious desire upon the breasts, whereas other cultures regard breasts as no more inherently sexual than any other part of the body.

Is this belief true? Michal Mikolaj Stefanczyk, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of Wrocław, and his colleagues recently published an article in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior on the subject.

The scholars examined a tribe in Papua New Guinea for which female toplessness was the norm until recently. The found that men who grew up in times when most women were topless were as fascinated with breasts as men who grew up after toplessness became uncommon.

This evidence suggests that a male interest in breasts is innate and, The Times summarizes, not culturally driven. Yet it is also clear that further research of breasts is necessary and appropriate as a scientific endeavor.

-via Dave Barry | Image by Jimmy Johnson

The Grand Prize winner in the 22nd annual Smithsonian Photography Contest shows us a scene from a horror film, in which a giant praying mantis has won a battle against another of its species, having bitten its head off. But this photo hasn't been manipulated; photographer Takuya Ishiguro got down on the ground to shoot pictures of the macabre scene between two normal-sized insects. The closeup shot shows the praying mantises in detail, while the pavement takes on an otherworldly texture. The truck and the signs in the background help to bend the reality of scale.

Click to the right on the Instagram post above to see more winners from the competition in different categories such as People, Travel, the Natural World, and the Reader's Choice Award. Read about the contest and the stories behind the images at Smithsonian. There were more than 30,000 entries, and you can see the 60 finalists here. 

The explosion of channels that came with cable TV more than 40 years ago meant that suddenly there were hundreds and hundreds of people on TV every day, working to fill those channels with 24/7 content. It only stands to reason that some of those folks would end up being arrested for murder, even multiple murders. In some cases, it was only after they were arrested that their TV appearances were discovered in the archives and took on a whole new aura. No, you didn't know there was something suspicious about that fellow when you saw him on a game show- you just think that now that we know the truth. The implication is that any one of those people you see on TV on any given day could be harboring secrets that would give you the willies. Weird History tells us the stories of seven killers who had previously been on TV, mostly for something completely different.

The 26 letters of the Latin alphabet have been around a long time and aren't liable to change anytime soon. The last letter was added to it around 400 years ago, but it's not Z, even though that is the "last letter." Take a guess at which letter it is before you continue with the next paragraph.

The newest of the 26 letters is J, which descended from the letter I. See, in Latin, I was used as both a vowel and a consonant. That consonant in Latin had the Y sound. But as English developed, the I started to be used for words pronounced like a J. At least we think so- we don't have sound recordings, but we can't imagine pronouncing Shakespeare's play as Romeo and Yooliet back in 1597 when it was spelled Romeo and Iuliet. The same with Iesus and Ioseph from the 1611 edition of the King James Bible. To make things easier, they introduced the J, which took quite a few years at the beginning of the 17th century to become standard. Read about the introduction of the J at Word Smarts. -Thanks, WTM!