Things that blow your mind

[Clash, Never a Meter Maid]

All the pretty. The pretty ones.

[Cranjis McBasketball]

the wind being high.

[I'm Team Bayley and Indi]

That Rashida Jones used to ride the same school bus as Nicole Richie, The Kardashians and The Hilton sister, she just seems so different to all of them.

[The Sam]

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed that the Earth was hollow and mole people lived in the center of it. He almost sent a tax payer funded expedition to discover the entrance to the mole people's society (which he believed was in the North Pole) and begin trading with the mole people. However he lost the next presidential election before he could begin, to Andrew Jackson, who didn't believe the Earth was hollow because he believed the Earth was flat. Just as crazy a theory, but it was a lot cheaper.

[Magnus the Magnificent]

Feb 11, 2014 8:42:24 GMT -5 The Sam said:

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed that the Earth was hollow and mole people lived in the center of it. He almost sent a tax payer funded expedition to discover the entrance to the mole people's society (which he believed was in the North Pole) and begin trading with the mole people. However he lost the next presidential election before he could begin, to Andrew Jackson, who didn't believe the Earth was hollow because he believed the Earth was flat. Just as crazy a theory, but it was a lot cheaper.

It's actually true...

[A Platypus Rave]

Feb 11, 2014 8:42:24 GMT -5 The Sam said:

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed that the Earth was hollow and mole people lived in the center of it. He almost sent a tax payer funded expedition to discover the entrance to the mole people's society (which he believed was in the North Pole) and begin trading with the mole people. However he lost the next presidential election before he could begin, to Andrew Jackson, who didn't believe the Earth was hollow because he believed the Earth was flat. Just as crazy a theory, but it was a lot cheaper.

That's just what the Mole People want you to think.

["Gizzark" Mike Wronglevenay]

Feb 10, 2014 19:57:43 GMT -5 BigBadZ said:

Eve and Gwen Stefani

Posts like this, F.A.N. Posts like this are why we are the greatest forum on the internet. I f***ing love this place.

[Amazing Kitsune]

Feb 11, 2014 8:42:24 GMT -5 The Sam said:

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed that the Earth was hollow and mole people lived in the center of it. He almost sent a tax payer funded expedition to discover the entrance to the mole people's society (which he believed was in the North Pole) and begin trading with the mole people. However he lost the next presidential election before he could begin, to Andrew Jackson, who didn't believe the Earth was hollow because he believed the Earth was flat. Just as crazy a theory, but it was a lot cheaper.

This part fascinates me and I'm trying to find out if there's actually a primary source that verifies this. The thing about John Quincy Adams is verifiable, but the thing about Jackson sounds like political slander to me. In the 19th Century it was considerably more understandable to believe that the world was hollow than it was to believe that it was flat.

Edit--A lot of my humble research, still on-going, begins below.

---I'm curious to see if a source exists. Thus far, the oldest thing I've found is a book from 1983 that's called "A Funny Thing Happened on the Whitehouse"

I don't own the book, so I can't see if it quotes any sources for such a claim. This is fun.

--And there's a Cracked Article, quoting the aforementioned book. Cracked typically doesn't look too deeply into sources for their articles, but that is what it is.


--Found alleged source from the 1800s...I'm looking it over now.


--Dixon Wexter, and early 20th Century Historian, allegedly quotes "Andrew Jackson is probably the only President of the United States who did not believe that the earth is round." from a book entitled "A brief and impartial history of the life and actions of Andrew Jackson by a Free Man" that was published in 1831

I cannot find, as of yet, where Dixon Wexter wrote this--as of yet. Be that as it may, it's unimportant. I'm now reading "A brief and impartial history of the life and actions of Andrew Jackson by a Free Man" to see if there's any value in it, considering that appears to be the main source of the story. The phrase, as quoted, does not show up in a search of the work.

---"A brief and impartial history..." appears to be, not surprisingly, more than a little partial. I'm a little ways in and it's critical of everything Jackson ever did. The classic story of Jackson standing up to a British soldier and getting slashed by a sword? Pfft. Any kid would do it!

There has been mention of his education and the author unjustly declares it as poor. He has not, as of yet, mentioned Jackson's theories on the Earth. Even if he does, his credibility is starting to become quite muddy.

I have not decided what I will do if there's no instance of the famous quote in this work.


--- If this is the only major source to back up the "Jackson believes the world is flat" claim, then the claim has no validity. I haven't found the line yet, but it's turned into a violently hostile source.

--My current hypothesis is that the whole thing was more or less made up. Still reading the entire book to be sure, though.

[Deleted]

When Game Freak were making Pokemon Gold & Silver, the game ended up exceeding the capacity of the cartridge before the game was finished. A single programmer was capable of compressing the game to such an extend that the team were able to add the Gen 1 region into the new game since there was so much space.

That programmer was Saturo Iwata, CEO and President of Nintendo, who was also pretty much single handedly responsible for saving Earthbound from the rubbish bin.

[Deleted]

-"The Rain, The Park, and Other Things" and "Hair" are both sung by The Cowsills. Weird considering how different both are.

-Barry Manilow did not write "I Write the Songs", Bruce Johnston (of the Beach Boys) did.

-When Paul McCartney first met John Lennon (1957), there was a gravestone nearby of one...Eleanor Rigby. The song was also originally called Daisy Hawkins.

-Robert Todd Lincoln (Son of Abe) once had his life saved by Edwin Booth (John Wilkes Booth brother.)

-Speaking of 19th century theatre, one of its biggest stars was captured on film! Joseph Jefferson first performed on stage as a kid during the Andrew Jackson administration (1833), was family friends with Abe Lincoln from his lawyer days and originated the role of Rip Van Winkle on stage. He also starred in Our American Cousin (the play Lincoln saw when he was shot though Jefferson was overseas at the time.)

[Lila]

booty

[Amazing Kitsune]

Feb 11, 2014 17:17:34 GMT -5 Amazing Kitsune said:

Feb 11, 2014 8:42:24 GMT -5 The Sam said:

John Quincy Adams, the 6th president of the United States, believed that the Earth was hollow and mole people lived in the center of it. He almost sent a tax payer funded expedition to discover the entrance to the mole people's society (which he believed was in the North Pole) and begin trading with the mole people. However he lost the next presidential election before he could begin, to Andrew Jackson, who didn't believe the Earth was hollow because he believed the Earth was flat. Just as crazy a theory, but it was a lot cheaper.

This part fascinates me and I'm trying to find out if there's actually a primary source that verifies this. The thing about John Quincy Adams is verifiable, but the thing about Jackson sounds like political slander to me. In the 19th Century it was considerably more understandable to believe that the world was hollow than it was to believe that it was flat.

Edit--A lot of my humble research, still on-going, begins below.

---I'm curious to see if a source exists. Thus far, the oldest thing I've found is a book from 1983 that's called "A Funny Thing Happened on the Whitehouse"

I don't own the book, so I can't see if it quotes any sources for such a claim. This is fun.

--And there's a Cracked Article, quoting the aforementioned book. Cracked typically doesn't look too deeply into sources for their articles, but that is what it is.


--Found alleged source from the 1800s...I'm looking it over now.


--Dixon Wexter, and early 20th Century Historian, allegedly quotes "Andrew Jackson is probably the only President of the United States who did not believe that the earth is round." from a book entitled "A brief and impartial history of the life and actions of Andrew Jackson by a Free Man" that was published in 1831

I cannot find, as of yet, where Dixon Wexter wrote this--as of yet. Be that as it may, it's unimportant. I'm now reading "A brief and impartial history of the life and actions of Andrew Jackson by a Free Man" to see if there's any value in it, considering that appears to be the main source of the story. The phrase, as quoted, does not show up in a search of the work.

---"A brief and impartial history..." appears to be, not surprisingly, more than a little partial. I'm a little ways in and it's critical of everything Jackson ever did. The classic story of Jackson standing up to a British soldier and getting slashed by a sword? Pfft. Any kid would do it!

There has been mention of his education and the author unjustly declares it as poor. He has not, as of yet, mentioned Jackson's theories on the Earth. Even if he does, his credibility is starting to become quite muddy.

I have not decided what I will do if there's no instance of the famous quote in this work.


--- If this is the only major source to back up the "Jackson believes the world is flat" claim, then the claim has no validity. I haven't found the line yet, but it's turned into a violently hostile source.

--My current hypothesis is that the whole thing was more or less made up. Still reading the entire book to be sure, though.

I finished my simple research of the matter. I have not been able to find a shred of evidence that Andrew Jackson ever believed that the world is flat.

I have found a few sources repeating the claim. Cracked.com has an article entitled, "6 Presidential Secrets Your History Teacher Didn't Mention"

www.cracked.com/article_18945_6-presidential-secrets-your-history-teacher-didnt-mention_p2.html

This article deals primarily with the story about John Quincy Adams nearly funding an expedition to prove the "Hollow Earth" theory. This seems to be where our poster Evil the Sam got his information. It includes the tidbit that "As luck would have it, his successor, Andrew Jackson, was a man who believed the world was flat."

To source this claim, the article uses the following link to a book entitled A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the White House by David E. Johnson and Johnny Ray Johnson (1983) : books.google.co.uk/books?id=T9iQPsfFGgMC&pg=PA11&lpg=PA11&dq=andrew+jackson+flat+earth&source=web&ots=Tl3WoqCBTz&sig=tG-xAPzJrKe6kmfzo5uHxpClI98&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=5&ct=result#v=onepage&q=andrew%20jackson%20flat%20earth&f=false

It makes the statement that "The general (Jackson} believed that the earth was flat..."

However, there is no source provided to back up this statement and is intended to be more of an entertaining than a scholarly work.

Not knowing what source was at the root of all of this, I continued to search with my limited resources. I googled the phrase "Andrew Jackson was the only president who believed the world was flat." which gave me access to an essay entitled "The Western Hero" which shed some light on the subject.

xroads.virginia.edu/~ug02/reno/jackson.html

In this essay, the author says: "The historian Dixon Wecter relays a line from A Brief and Impartial History of...Andrew Jackson. By a Free Man , published in 1831: "Andrew Jackson is probably the only President of the United States who did not believe that the earth is round.""

Now we've traced the claim back to Dixton Wecter, a historian from the first half of the 20th Century. Assuming he is being quoted correctly, he was quoting a book entitled A Brief and Impartial History of...Andrew Jackson. By a Free Man which was written by William Joseph Snelling in 1821

It can be found here in its entirety: archive.org/details/abriefandimpart00snelgoog

So, assuming there isn't something I've missed--and there could be--we can trace this claim back to 1821.

Except that we can't.

I've searched the book via search engine and I've read the thing myself. The phrase "Andrew Jackson is probably the only President of the United States who did not believe that the earth is round." does not show up in the book. At all. I've searched for variations and I did not find anything. I read the whole book and I did not see anything.

Even if it was in there and I missed something, it's a very hostile source and you would have to take it with a massive grain of salt.

Unless there is more information to back up this claim--I call bullshit.

My working theory currently is that the whole rumor comes from the writings of Dixton Wecter who either made up the quote or was roughly paraphrasing the William Joseph Snelling's (highly debatable) assertion that Jackson had a poor education.

I've only had access to the internet and I have not done any kind of in-depth research on Andrew Jackson. I am not an expert on the matter. The fact remains that I cannot find a source to back up that claim and all of the parties that do make that claim don't mention a primary source. In the case of Dixon Wecter, his source is legitimate but he apparently completely made up the quote.

It's also possible that the person who wrote The Western Hero is misquoting Wecter, in his defense.

Regardless of how it's explained, there is not much evidence that I can find to state that Andrew Jackson believed the world was flat. It sounds too much like political slander, especially when you consider that ships were routinely sailing around the world in Andrew Jackson's time.

So this is what I was able to find out with my limited resources. I'm pretty confident in what I found, but I could have missed something.

[willywonka666]

Reggie Watts' semi success

[Crappler El 0 M]

Because the wind is high.

[Deleted]

Feb 10, 2014 18:21:51 GMT -5 DiBiase is Good said:

The woman who appears near the end of The Avengers (2013) giving a TV interview about how Capt. America saved her, is the same woman who plays Ellie in The Last of Us.

Ashley Johnson. More importantly, she was Chrissy in Growing Pains.

Growing Pains had an episode where Chrissy imagines a friend, a human sized mouse named Ike. It wasn't until months after I originally watched that episode I realized Ike was played by Kirk Cameron... Who was Mike Seaver. Ike... Mike. That blew my mind. I was 8 at the time.

[Deleted]

The following personalities are still alive and are at least 95 years old or older:
-Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. (95. Alfred on Batman TAS, 77 Sunset Strip, father of Stephanie Zimbalist.)
-Baby Peggy (95. Silent film child star from the 20's.)
-Marjorie Lord (95. Played Danny Thomas' wife on the TV show "Make Room for Daddy.")
-Don Pardo (95. First person to break news on JFK's assassination, original Jeopardy announcer and SNL announcer.)
-Bobby Doerr (95. Red Sox all star second baseman in the HOF. Great friend of Ted Williams.)
-June Foray (96. Part of Jack Benny's crew. Voice actress of several characters.)
-George Gaynes (96. Punky Brewster's grandfather and the commandant in Police Academy.)
-I. M. Pei (96. Modern architect. One of the most significant builders of his time.)
-Vera Lynn (96. Singer from WW II era. Mentioned in Pink Floyd's "Vera" and in Dr. Strangelove.)
-Zsa Zsa Gabor (97. Actress.)
-Kirk Douglas (97. Actor from Spartacus and other films.)
-Olivia de Havilland (97. Actress most known from "Gone with the Wind.")
-Beverly Cleary (97. Author of Ramona, Mouse and the Motorcycle and more.)
-Eli Wallach (98. Actor from Good, Bad, and the Ugly, Magnificent Seven, and Godfather.)
-Irwin Corey (99. Comedian known for his appearances from laugh-in.)
-Luise Rainer (104. Actress who won an oscar in 1936 for "The Great Ziegfeld" and "The Good Earth" in 1937.)

[Mac]

The 10th President of the United States John Tyler who was born in 1790 and was president in 1841-1845 still has living grandchildren.

[bob]

ceiling fans

[salsashark]

[Futureraven: Beelzebruv]

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