The fable originated with "one of Washington's first biographers, an itinerant minister and bookseller named Mason Locke Weems." When Washington died in 1799, Weems immediately saw an opportunity to fulfill the American public's desire to learn more about the founding father.
Read MoreMERS, also known as MERS-CoV, or Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus, is a virus transferred to humans from infected animals -- in this case, dromedary camels, the ones with one hump. MedicalNewsToday reports that MERS-CoV was first discovered in Saudi Arabia September 20, 2012.
Read MoreFrom afar, the clump looks like debris floating on top of the water, but upon closer inspection, you can see that it's made up of what looks like hundreds of insects clinging for dear life. If the visual of ants happily floating along doesn't scare you, congratulations. What a brave person you are.
Read MoreQueen Elizabeth I had to think very carefully about how she presented herself. She had to appear powerful in order to uphold her royal status and push back against the stereotype of a weak woman, alone and unfit to rule. This is the truth about Queen Elizabeth I's iconic look.
Read MoreTake a second to think about all the things you could do with $110 million. For most people, that number might as well be infinity. Is it even possible to squander over a hundred million bucks in one lifetime, let alone a few years? Ask Antoine Walker.
Read MoreDestiny's Child as most people know it, comprised of Beyonce, Kelly Rowland, and Michelle Williams, started off with different members. One of those former members is LaTavia Roberson. Roberson joined Destiny's Child in the '90s, when it was still called Girl's Tyme.
Read MoreMichael Jackson had a huge 1983. He sold millions of copies of his album Thriller and starred in one of the most popular, famous, and well-produced music videos of all time. This is the untold truth of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video.
Read MoreBefore the death of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, there were few people in this world closer to him than bandmate Dave Grohl and Cobain's wife, Courtney Love. Who knows how close Grohl and Love were to each other before Cobain's passing? But after Cobain's death, things got pretty heated.
Read MoreAccording to eyewitness accounts reported by Vice, after a night's filming, Terrence just dropped his radio and ran into the forest, where he quickly disappeared into the trees. Several search and rescue efforts found no signs of him, and as of this writing, Woods is still missing.
Read MoreAt 6'4" he was effectively a giant for his times. He felled trees, split rails, and drove railroad spikes. He was also quite the wrestler. You wouldn't have wanted to fight this guy in close combat. But that doesn't mean he was the best soldier.
Read MoreThe CDC said there are four different kinds of dengue viruses, and so some people may get the disease up to four times in their lifetime if they're unlucky. While generally considered a mild condition, people do die from dengue. About 400 million are infected with dengue every year.
Read Morenames were being entered into the Hall of Fame left and right, but not the "Macho Man." For years, there was speculation over why Savage had been kept out. Savage left the WWE and hopped over to the WCW in 1994, and many believe it was the drama surrounding the wrestler's exit that kept him out.
Read MoreHere are some crazy true stories of politicians convicted of crimes.
Read MoreLots of bands have that one guy they'd rather you forget, and Bon Jovi is no exception ... well, until very recently. For over a decade, at the height of their fame, the band with some of the biggest hairdos in pop music was living on a prayer that no one would notice the old guy among their ranks: Hugh McDonald.
Read MoreChuck Norris is known for many things. He's Walker, Texas Ranger. He was a world-class martial artist who acted in movies with the famed Bruce Lee. The guy created his own martial arts style and his own fighting league. He's something else, too.
Read MoreYou've heard about Helen Keller and how she managed to become a successful writer and activist despite being deaf and blind. Her life was challenging, but she never truly cared that society believed she wouldn't do well.
Read MoreHart Island has been host prisoners of war, quarantined city dwellers, convicts, the mentally ill, and more. And, almost always, it has been set aside for the burial of New York City's indigent and unclaimed dead. This is the messed up history of New York's Hart Island.
Read MoreIf you know anything about the crazy life of Rick James, who reached super-stardom in the 1980s with hits like "Give It to Me, Baby" and "Super Freak" (and also once caught himself on fire while smoking crack), you won't be surprised to hear that he once physically attacked Carlton.
Read MoreOsbourne met Thelma Riley in 1971 at a nightclub just as his band, Black Sabbath, was really taking off. They soon married and, according to Osbourne, "we had two children, Jessica and Louis. We bought a house for 20,000 pounds, I thought, 'I have arrived.' Not realizing it was a giant mirage."
Read MoreEbola is a pretty nasty disease. The virus can cause symptoms that you'd expect to see in a horror film. The more mild symptoms include fever, body aches, fatigue, and intense vomiting and diarrhea. The more extreme cases include kidney and liver impairment.
Read MoreYellow fever has a history of plaguing humans for centuries. While today a vaccine can protect us, it had a history of affecting Panama Canal construction.
Read MoreWhile in the Great White North, James got by gigging on the drums for jazz bands and immersed himself in a new world of sex, drugs, and music. This is where he began the transformation that would end in the controversial character that the public came to know and love as the flammable Rick James.
Read MoreMichael Musto wrote in a 2017 Village Voice article that White admitted that Arthur "was not fond of me." it was White's positive attitude that caused Arthur to become angry at her. "Sometimes if I was happy, she'd be furious," White said about her costar, a woman she often found reserved.
Read MoreThe CDC cites statistics from the World Health Organization: "in 2018, 228 million clinical cases of malaria occurred, and 405,000 people died of malaria, most of them children in Africa" with underdeveloped immune systems. It is fatal if not treated.
Read MoreA classic example of the comedic double act, straight man Bud Abbott and funny man Lou Costello starred in two movies a year at the peak of their popularity, and went on to influence generations of comedians who followed along after them.
Read MoreWill Lee, the actor who played kindly grocery store owner Mr. Hooper, had died in December 1982. The show's producers were left with a conundrum: How do they address Mr. Hooper's absence from the show to the children who depend on seeing him there?
Read MoreYou're five to eight times as likely to die in a BASE jumping incident than you are in a skydiving accident. The mortality rate averages one death out of every 2,317 jumps, says the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI).
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