Did You Know? Another Twenty Fascinating Facts.

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Another round of twenty fascinating facts for you to survey.

Random as ever there is sure to be something in here that you didn’t know.

Enjoy.

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did you know3

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Duct tape was developed in 1942 for use by the U.S. Army

as a waterproof sealing tape for ammunition boxes.

Duct tape

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There is a Librarian of Congress.

librarian_of_congress_billington

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Because they were unable to prevent the use of the word “spam”

to represent unwanted email messages,

the Hormel company now uses all-capital letters

in referencing its canned pork product.

SPAM

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The phrase “goody two shoes” comes from a fable

written in 1766 by Oliver Goldsmith

about a poor little girl who could only afford one shoe.

goody two shoes

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Aardvark is Afrikaans for earth pig

Aardvark

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Wrigley’s gum was the first product with

a bar code to be scanned at a supermarket.

gum barcode

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Michael Jackson attempted to buy Marvel Comics in the 1990s

because he wanted to play Spiderman.

Michael Jackson Spiderman

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M&M’s stands for Mars and Murrie’s

the last names of the candy’s founders.

M&M_mascots

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Hitler and Napoleon had only one testicle

(each, of course, that is!)

napoleon and hitler

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The speed of sound must be exceeded

to produce a sonic boom.

sonic boom

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41% of women apply body or hand moisturizer

a minimum three times a day

skin-moisturizers-1

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One gallon of used motor oil can ruin approximately

one million gallons of fresh water.

water

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The American Automobile association was formed in 1905

for the sole purpose of warning motorists of police speed traps.

American Automobile Association logo

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One Neptune year lasts 165 Earth years.

neptune

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Former U.S. President Franklin Pierce was arrested

during his term as President

for running over an old lady with his horse,

but the charges were later dropped.

Franklin Pierce

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NASDAQ stand for,

“National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations.”

NASDAQ

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The revolving door was invented in 1888,

by Theophilus Van Kannel.

Revolving_Door

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The Golden Gate Bridge was first opened in 1937.

golden-gate-bridge-at-night2

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The first email was sent out by Ray Tomlinson in 1971

ray-tomlinson-first-email

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The song “Strawberry Fields Forever” sung by the Beatles

refers to an orphanage located in Liverpool.

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Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today The Number Is Fifty-Seven 57

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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Today’s significant number is fifty-seven, or treble nineteen if you are a darts enthusiast.

As usual there is more to it than meets the eye.

Enjoy.

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The Number Fifty-Seven 57

57 

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In religion

  • In the original complete King James Version of the Bible (not the abridged edition some use today), the 57th book is the Gospel of John.
  • The 57th word of the King James Version of the Bible’s Old Testament Genesis = it (light) – Genesis I.1-4
  • In the 57th Psalm, David praises God with his harp in a cave.
  • In Isaiah Chapter 57, God withholds peace to the wicked.

In mathematics

  • Fifty-seven is the sixteenth discrete semiprime and the sixth in the (3.q) family.
  • Although 57 is not a prime number, it is jokingly known as the “Grothendieck prime” after a story in which Grothendieck supposedly gave it as an example of a particular prime number.
  • As a semiprime, 57 is a Blum integer since its two prime factors are both Gaussian primes.
  • 57 is a 20-gonal number.
  • It is a Leyland number since 25 + 52 = 57.
  • 57 is a repdigit in base 7 (111).

In science

  • 57 is the atomic number of Lanthanum (La), the first of the Lanthanides. Lanthanum is a silvery white, malleable, ductile rare-earth metal.

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In space

  • Messier object M57
  • Messier object M57, is a magnitude 9.5 planetary nebula in the constellation Lyra, also known as the Ring Nebula.

Messier object 57 

  • NGC 57
  • The New General Catalogue object NGC 57, an elliptical galaxy in the constellation Pisces.

 

  • STS-57
  • STS-57 was a Shuttle-Spacehab mission of Space Shuttle Endeavour that launched 21 June 1993 from Kennedy Space Center, Florida.
  • On board were  Ronald J. Grabe(Commander), Brian Duffy (pilot), and Mission Specialists G. David Low (Payload Commander), Nancy J. Sherlock, Peter J. Wisoff and Janice E. Voss.
  • During the course of the ten-day flight, the astronauts successfully conducted scores of biomedical and materials sciences experiments inside the pressurized SPACEHAB module. Two astronauts participated in a spacewalk and EURECA (European Retrievable Carrier) was retrieved by the crew and stowed inside Endeavour’s payload bay. EURECA was deployed from the Space Shuttle Atlantis in the summer of 1992 and contains several experiments to study the long-term effects of exposure to microgravity.

sts-57-patch 

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In books, music and movies

  • In the first storyboard draft for Pixar’s film Cars, the main character, a race car named Lightning McQueen was going to have number 57 as his racing number, in reference to director John Lasseter’s birthdate, January 12, 1957. But in the final cut, Lightning’s racing number changed to 95.
  • The climax of the movie Eraser occurs on Pier 57
  • C-57D is the designation of the spaceship featured in the movie Forbidden Planet, and is referenced in the movie Serenity as well.

united-planets-cruiser-c-57d-flying-saucer-Forbidden Planet

  • Passenger 57, is a film starring Wesley Snipes
  • There are supposed to be 57 movie references in the movie Scream
  • Havana 57 is a 2012 movie depicting mainstream Cuban life in 1957 and illustrating the destruction Cubans have endured since the Castro regime took power in the Revolution
  • Summer of Fifty Seven is a 2005 novel by Stephen C. Joseph, M.D.
  • Marvel Comics’ character Vision debuts in issue #57 of The Avengers
  • The Fabulous 57 were disk jockeys on WMCA 570 Radio, New York during the 1960s
  • Agent 57 is the name of the master of disguise in the television series Dangermouse

Agent 57

  • Exit 57, a sketch comedy show that aired on Comedy Central from 1995-96 featured Stephen Colbert, Paul Dinello, Jodi Lennon, Mitch Rouse and Amy Sedaris
  • The 57th Overlanders is a fictional brigade mentioned in the television series Firefly.
  • West 57 was a weekly news-magazine show on CBS, 1985–89, hosted by Meredith Vieira
  • The Cartoon Network program Metalocalypse has a fictional television station WHYK-57
  • The Robot Chicken sketch “Pluto Nash Day” notes that 57 people at 20th Century Fox Studios died amid rioting and suicide
  • A Robot Chicken parody of the NBC TV series Heroes uses the episode title “Chapter Fifty-seven: Uncle Glen”
  • Studio 57 was a dramatic anthology series in 1954, starring Brian Keith and Carolyn Jones
  • Incident on 57th Street is a song by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, from their 1973 album, “The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle”
  • 57 Channels (and Nothin’ On), a song by Bruce Springsteen, from his 1992 album “Human Touch”

Bruce Springsteen - Human Touch

  • “57” is the name of a song by Biffy Clyro on their 2002 debut album, Blackened Sky
  • Model Shure SM57 is considered the workhorse of recording microphones
  • Slick 57 is an Alternative country band
  • Studio 57 Productions, record label of Andy Warstar and the Warstars, which produced Alien Porkchops in Brisbane
  • 57th Street is a novel (1971) by George Selcamm about professional musicians, the forces that drive them to search for perfection and recognition along with the hunger for love.

In automobilia

  • 57 is the model name of a Maybach car

Maybach Brabus-57 

  • Bugatti also produced models designated T57 including

1938-Bugatti-Type-57C-Stelvio-by-Gangloff 

  • Chevrolet model 57, better known as the ’57 Chevy

57 Chevy 

  • The Romnian ARO IMS-57 was produced from 1957 until 1959; around 2000 units were made. It is considered that ARO IMS-57 was inspired from the Russian model GAZ

ARO-IMS-57_romanian-cars 

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In militaria

  • USS Lake Champlain (CG 57)
  • USS Lake Champlain (CG 57), a Ticonderoga class cruiser in the United States Navy and the third ship to be named Lake Champlain

USS Lake Champlain (CG57) 

  • HMS Andromeda (F-57)
  • HMS Andromeda was a Leander-class frigate of the Royal Navy. She took part in the Falklands War and The Second Cod War and was sold to India in 1995, where she was renamed INS Krishna. She was finally decommissioned in May 2012 at Mumbai, 44 years to the day after her launch.

HMS_Andromeda_DN-SC-90-11423 

  • USS MITSCHER DDG 57
  • The USS Mitscher is a United States Navy guided missile destroyer.

 uss_mitscher_ddg57.

  • Martin B-57
  • A replacement for the Douglas B-26, the Martin B-57 was a light tactical bomberand a by-product of the English Electric Canberra, the first British-built jet bomber, initially flown in 1949.
  • Testing of the 2 imported Canberras revealed design faults that could affect the safety, utility, and maintenance of the future B-57. Then, one of the British planes crashed; Martin’s subcontractors could not meet their commitments; and the J65 prototype engines consistently failed to satisfy USAF requirements. In June 1952, further test flights had to be postponed for a year because of continuing engine and cockpit troubles. As a result, the Korea-bound B-57 did not fly before 20 July 1953, just 7 days before the conflict ended. Production of the crucial RB-57 (reconnaissance version) was also delayed and only entered service in mid-1954
  • Delivered too late for combat in Korea, the RB-57 in May 1963 and the B-57 in February 1965 began to demonstrate under fire in Southeast Asia the basic qualities justifying the Canberra’s original selection. In 1970, other reactivated and newly equipped B-57s, known as Tropic Moon III B-57Gs, were deployed to Southeast Asia, where they made valuable contributions until April 1972.

Martin b-57

 

  • FN Five-seven
  • The FN Five-seven, trademarked as the Five-seveN, is a semi-automatic pistol designed and manufactured by FN Herstal in Belgium. The pistol is named for its 5.7-mm (.224 in) bullet diameter, and the trademark capitalization style is intended to emphasize the manufacturer’s initials—FN.
  • The Five-seven pistol was developed in conjunction with the FN P90 personal defense weapon (the weapon carried by SG-1 in the TV series “Stargate SG-1” and the FN 5.7×28mm cartridge. The P90 was introduced in 1990, and the Five-seven was introduced in 1998 as a pistol using the same 5.7×28mm ammunition. Developed as a companion pistol to the P90, the Five-seven shares many of its design features: it is a lightweight polymer-based weapon with a large magazine capacity, ambidextrous controls, low recoil, and the ability to penetrate body armor when using certain cartridge types.
  • Sales of the Five-seven were originally restricted by FN to military and law enforcement customers, but since 2004, the pistol has also been offered to civilian shooters for personal protection, target shooting, and similar uses. Although offered only with sporting ammunition, the Five-seven’s introduction to civilian shooters was met with vocal opposition from gun control organizations such as the Brady Campaign, and the pistol has been subject to ongoing controversy in the United States.
  • The Five-seven is currently in service with military and police forces in over 40 nations, such as Canada, France, Greece, India, Poland, Spain, and the United States. In the United States, the Five-seven is in use with numerous law enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Secret Service. In the years since the pistol’s introduction to the civilian market in the United States, it has also become increasingly popular with civilian shooters

FN5701 

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Other stuff

  • Heinz 57, is a brand of sauce, and the number of varieties of foods claimed to be produced by the H.J. Heinz Company. In 1896, Henry John Heinz noticed an advertisement for “21 styles of shoes.” He decided that his own products were not styles, but varieties. Although there were many more than 57 foods in production at the time, because the numbers “5” and “7” held a special significance for him and his wife, he adopted the slogan “57 Varieties.” Thus, a new advertising campaign was launched for Heinz 57 Varieties— and the rest is history!

HEINZ 57 Varieties

  • “Prop(osition) 57”, is one of a number of anti-ketchup packet groups on Facebook designed to bring attention to the shortcomings of take-out condiment packaging; its name is a reference to Heinz Co., which debuted a new design in test markets in early 2010
  • 57 is the name of a fast food dinner in Pereira, Colombia
  • Tiffanny produces a stylish wristwatch model t57

tiffany T57  watch

  • 57 is the number of the French department Moselle
  • The Woolworth Building at 233 Broadway, New York City, has 57 floors.

woolworth building

  • Carnegie Hall is a concert hall located at West 57th Street & 7th Avenue in Manhattan, New York City.

Carnegia Hall interior

  • 57th Street & 6th Avenue is an IND subway station in Manhattan, New York City.
  • 57 is the code for international direct dial phone calls to Colombia
  • British scientist John Dalton (1766-1844) who developed the atomic theory of matter, kept a meterological journal for 57 years from 1787 to 1844.
  • The Sweet Fairy Rose is a cupped flower that opens flat into a rosette shape has 57 petals. It is 16 inches tall with mauve light lavender color, and is exceedingly fragrant.

Sweet Fairy Rose

  • During the Crusades, the Knights Templar (founded 1118) who could not attend choir were required to say the Lord’s Prayer 57 times a day.
  • In 1970, Thor Heyerdahl (1914-2002) crossed the Atlantic (3270 nautical miles) from Safi, Morocco to Barbados in 57 days on a reed papyrus boat.

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  • Oh yes,
  • And finally, Barack Hussein Obama, two term President of the United States of America thinks the country he is in charge of has 57 states.

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Significant Number Factoid Friday – Today Number Forty-Two 42

“Fight Against Stupidity And Bureaucracy”

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They’ve been ‘beautiful’,  they’ve been ‘big’  and they’ve been ‘unusual’.  Today we have another  ‘significant’ number, forty-two, so-called because of its use and the beliefs surrounding it.

Enjoy.

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42 Forty-Two

42

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In Religion

  • In Japanese culture, the number 42 is considered unlucky because the numerals when pronounced separately — “shi ni” (four two) — sound like the phrase, “unto death”;
  • There are 42 principles of Ma’at, the Ancient Egyptian personification of physical and moral law, order, and truth. In the judgement scene described in the Egyptian and the Book of the Coming/Going Forth by Day, there are 42 gods and goddesses of Egypt, personifying the principles of Ma’at. These 42 correspond to the 42 Nomes (Governmental Units) of Egypt. If the departed successfully answers all 42, s/he becomes an Osiris;
  • 42 is the number with which God creates the Universe in Kabbalistic tradition; 
  • In Judaism, the number (in the Babylonian Talmud, compiled 375 AD to 499 AD) of the “Forty-Two Lettered Name” ascribed to God. Rab (or Rabhs), a 3rd century source in the Talmud stated “The Forty-Two Lettered Name is entrusted only to him who is pious, meek, middle-aged, free from bad temper, sober, and not insistent on his rights”. 
  • 42 is a sacred Tibetan number and there is also a 42 armed Hindu God;
  • The first book to be printed with movable type, the Gutenberg Bible, is also known as the “42-line Bible”, as the book contained 42 lines per page;
  • The Forty-Two Articles (1552), largely the work of Thomas Cranmer, were intended to summarise Anglican doctrine, as it now existed under the reign of Edward VI..

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In The Bible

  • Forty Two, 3½ and 1260 – this is the amount that is given to the wicked or for people to bear fruit. Judgment occurs at the end. It is based on the law that God only expects results after the third year of planting (Leviticus 19: 23-25);
  • This time period appears in many prophecies as 1260 days, 42 months or 3½ years. It is the period that God allows the beast to operate. Notice that this is equal to 6 x 7 months. It is man’s portion of the jubilee cycle; 
  • Two female bears kill forty two children after they ridiculed the prophet of God. 2 Kings 2: 24; 
  • 42 Cities are given to the Levites in addition to six cities of refuge (Numbers 35: 6); 
  • 42 men of Beth-azmaveth were counted in the census of men of Israel upon return from exile (Ezra 2:24); 
  • Israel camped 42 times in the wilderness during the 40 year exodus. 
  • The goat’s hair and linen curtains covering the sanctuary have a length of 42 and 40 cubits. 
  • Jesus was forty two generations from Abraham. (Matthew 1).

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In Mathematics

  • 42 is the product of the first three terms of Sylvester’s sequence; like the first five such numbers it is also a primary pseudoperfect number;
  • 42 is a partition number – the number of different ways 10 can be represented as the sum of natural numbers;
  • 42 is a Størmer number;
  • 42 is a perfect score on the USA Math Olympiad (USAMO) and International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO).
Simple Magic Cube adding to 42
Simple Magic Cube adding to 42

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In Science

  • 42 is the atomic number of molybdenum;
  • 42 is the value of the angle rounded to whole degrees for which a rainbow appears (the critical angle);
  • In 1966, mathematician Paul Cooper theorized that the fastest, most efficient way to travel across continents would be to bore a straight hollow tube directly through the Earth, connecting a set of antipodes, evacuate it (remove the air), and then just fall through. The first half of the journey consists of free-fall acceleration, while the second half consists of an exactly equal deceleration. The time for such a journey works out to be 42 minutes. Remarkably, even if the tube does not pass through the exact center of the Earth, the time for a journey powered entirely by gravity (also known as Gravity train) always works out to be 42 minutes, as long as the tube remains friction-free, as while gravity’s force would be lessened, so would the distance traveled at an equal rate. (The same idea was proposed, without calculation by Lewis Carroll in 1893 in Sylvie and Bruno Concluded.)
Gravity Train Concept
Gravity Train Concept

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In Technology

  • The glyph, or character, corresponding to the number 42 in the ASCII character set, is *, the asterisk, commonly known as the wildcard character;
  • In the TIFF image file format, the second 16-bit word of every file is 42, which is used together with the first word to indicate byte order;
  • In the reiser4 file system, 42 is the inode number of the root directory;
  • In the military IRIG 106 Chapter 10 data recording standard, the hex value 0x464F52545974776F (ASCII “FORTYtwo”) is used as a magic number to identify directory blocks;
  • The GNU C Library, a set of standard routines available for use in computer programming, contains a function—memfrob()—which performs an XOR combination of a given variable and the binary pattern 00101010 (42) as an XOR cipher;
  • 42 is the result given by the web search engines Google and Wolfram Alpha when the query “the answer to life the universe and everything” is entered as a search.

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In Space

  • Messier object M42, a magnitude 5.0 diffuse nebula in the constellation Orion, also known as the Orion Nebula;
  • The New General Catalogue object NGC 42, is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Pegasus;
  • In January 2004, asteroid 2001 DA42 was given the permanent name 25924 Douglasadams, for the author Douglas Adams who popularized the number 42 and died in 2001; 
  • Kepler-42, is a red dwarf in the constellation Cygnus around which orbits the three smallest exoplanets found to date.
Messier-42 also known as the Orion Nebula
Messier-42 also known as the Orion Nebula

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In Politics

  • The 42nd President of the Unites States of America was Democratic Party William (Bill) Jefferson Clinton, from January 20, 1993 to January 20, 2001. Vice President was Al Gore. Remembered more for ‘blow-jobs’ in the White House, Clinton’s Presidency also oversaw the disastrous Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act in 1999, that repealed the parts of the Glass–Steagall Act which had not already been repealed. This 1999 Act took down barriers to competition between traditional banks, investment banks, and insurance companies, in some cases allowing firms to participate in all three markets thus making distinctions between these categories less clear. It has been held largely responsible for the current financial crisis. 
Bill Clinton, 42nd President of the United States of America
Bill Clinton, 42nd President of the United States of America

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In Sport

  • 42 is the jersey number of Jackie Robinson, which is the only number retired by all Major League Baseball teams. Although the number was retired in 1997, Mariano Rivera of the New York Yankees, the last professional baseball player to wear number 42, is currently still using it;
  • 42 is the jersey number of basketball Hall of Famer and one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History James Worthy, small forward for the Los Angeles Lakers, who retired his jersey number in 1995;
  • 42 is the jersey number of football Hall of Famer, Ronnie Lott, safety for the San Francisco 49ers, who retired his jersey number in 2003;
  • 42 is the jersey number of Chicago Bears legend Sid Luckman, which was retired by the Bears; 
  • 42 is the jersey number of Pat Tillman, which was retired on November 13, 2004 by Arizona State University; 
  • 42 is the number of laws of cricket;
  • 42 is the number of kilometers in a marathon;
  • 42 is the number of a NASCAR car owned by Earnhardt Ganassi Racing. It is currently being driven by former F1 star and Indy 500 champion Juan Pablo Montoya;

Earnhardt Ganassi Racing

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In Militaria

  • XB-42
  • The most notable aircraft with the 42 designation was the XB-42 ‘Mixmaster’. This aircraft was developed initially as a private venture and an unsolicited proposal was presented to the United States Army Air Forces in May 1943 which resulted in an Air Force contract for two prototypes and one static test airframe, the USAAF seeing an intriguing possibility of finding a bomber capable of the Boeing B-29 Superfortress’ range without its size or cost.
  • The aircraft was unusual in design in that it had a pair of Allison V-1710-125 liquid-cooled V-12 engines mounted behind the crew’s cabin, each driving one of the twin propellers which protruded from the rear of the aircraft’s fuselage. The pilot and co-pilot sat under twin bubble canopies, and the bombardier sat in the extreme front behind a plexiglass nose.
  • The first XB-42 was delivered to the Army Air Force and flew at Palm Springs, California on 6 May 1944. Performance was excellent, being basically as described in the original proposal; as fast or faster than the de Havilland Mosquito but with defensive armament and twice the bombload. The twin bubble canopies proved a bad idea as communications were adversely affected and a single bubble canopy was substituted after the first flight, a problem that could have been rectified, but the end of World War II changed priorities and the advent of the jet engine gave an alternative way toward achieving high speed.
XB-42 'Mixmaster' and model
XB-42 ‘Mixmaster’ and model

 

  • AG-42
  • The AG-42 rifle (official designation Halvautomatiskt Gevaer 42) was developed by Swedish engineer Erik Eklund while working at company C. J. Ljungman AB. Officially adopted by Swedish army in 1942, this rifle served in Sweden until mid-1960s, when it was replaced in service with 7.62mm AK-4 rifle (license-build HK G3 rifle).
AG-42B Rifle
AG-42B Rifle

 

  • MKb.42
  • In 1939 HWaA (Hitler’s army Weapons command) issued a contract for the development of a “Maschinen karabiner”, or machine carbine (MKb for short), chambered for the new 7.92×33 Kurz cartridge, to the company C.G. Haenel Waffen und Fahrradfabrik.
  • The famous designer Hugo Schmeisser led the Haenel development team, which produced the first working prototypes of new weapon by 1942. The new weapon was intended as a replacement for submachine guns, bolt action rifles and, partly, light machine guns for front troops. The MKb.42(H) could be fitted with standardbayonet, and has a wooden butt. 
mkb 42h-1 rifle
mkb 42h-1 ri

 

  • MG 42
  • A cheaper to produce but much more reliable replacement for the MG 34, the MG 42 was officially adopted as the MG 42, and production commenced in 1941.
  • In general terms, the MG 42 was a great success. It fulfilled the roles of a light machine gun on a bipod, a medium machine gun (on a newly developed Lafette 42 tripod), and an anti-aircraft machine gun, mounted in single and twin installations, ground and vehicle-mounted. 
  • After the WW2 the MG 42, unlike other wartime designs, lived on, as in 1958, the FRG (WestGermany) re-instituted its official armed force, known as the Bundeswehr. 
  • The simplicity, low manufacturing cost and high effectiveness of the MG 3 attracted several other countries, which either bought the guns from Rheinmetall (such as Denmark), or obtained manufacturing licenses and build (or at least have built in the past) the same guns domestically (such as Italy, Iran, Turkey, Pakistan and Yugoslavia). In total, at least twenty armies have used or still are using the MG 3 and its versions.
mg42 machine gun
mg42 machine gun

 

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In Books, Movies & TV

  • The 42nd Parallel is the first of a trilogy of books, (the others being 1919, and The Big Money), written by John Dos Passos and acclaimed by many to be the great American novel;
  • English author Douglas Noel Adams popularized the number 42 in his best known work called the Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. The number 42 and the phrase, “Life, the universe, and everything” have attained cult status on the Internet. If you type the answer to life, the universe and everything into Google (without quotes or capitalising the small words), the Google Calculator will give you 42; also, if you go to Wolfram’s Computational Knowledge Engine and type “answer to life, the universe, and everything”, it provides you with the result 42. Microsoft’s Bing search engine will also give you 42. Alphasmart 3000’s calculator, when given any equation that results in 42, will display, “The answer to life, the universe, and everything”. In the online community “Second Life,” there is a section on a sim called “42nd Life”;
  • In the Stargate Atlantis Season 4 episode “Quarantine”, 42 are the last two digits in Rodney McKay’s password. After John Sheppard explains to Teyla the meaning of the previous twelve digits, she asks him what 42 is. Then, John says, “It’s the ultimate answer to the great question of life, the universe, and everything,” at which point Teyla looks confused;
  • In the TV show Lost, 42 is the last of the mysterious numbers, 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42;
  • In Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange, Alex browses through records in a record store and we see a record of the, at this time fictional, band Level 42;
  • “42” is an episode of Doctor Who, set in real time lasting approximately 42 minutes;
  • “The Kumars at No. 42” is the name of a 2003 BBC television series; 
  • A made for TV movie 42: Forty Two Up – an installment in a series of documentaries wherein the director revisits the same group of British-born individuals every 7 years;
  • On the game show Jeopardy!, “Watson” the IBM supercomputer, has 42 “threads” in its avatar;
  • On the Unusuals TV-show there’s an episode called “42”. Detective Leo Banks recently turned 42. On account of his father, uncle, and grandfather dropping dead at 42, Leo is convinced he’ll share their fate. There were 42s all over the episode.
42nd Parallel by John Dos Passos
42nd Parallel by John Dos Passos

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Other Stuff

  • In New York City, 42nd Street is a main and very popular two-way thoroughfare. Landmarks on it include the Chrysler Building, Grand Central Station, the main branch of the New York Public Library, and Times Square; 
  • Tower 42, originally called the NatWest Tower because it was built for the National Westminster Bank, is the tallest skyscraper in the city of London and the fifth tallest in London as a whole;
  • +42 is the historic Country calling code for the former country of Czechoslovakia; 
  • 42 is the number of US gallons in a barrel of oil;
  • 42 is the number of spots (or pips, circular patches or pits) on a pair of standard six-sided dice;
  • 42 is a free tabloid devoted to technology news in Huntsville, Alabama. It is published by the Huntsville Times and is named for “The Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything”;
  • Fictional comic book superhero Miles Morales is bitten by a genetically altered spider with a red 42 marked on its abdomen. Morales later assumes the role of Spider-Man as a result of the bite and following the death of Peter Parker in the Ultimate Marvel universe from Marvel Comics. Morales also wins a coveted spot in a prestigious charter school after his number (42) is chosen during a lottery.
Miles Morales Spiderman
Miles Morales Spiderman