Random Links Thread

[Tank]

4 hours ago, Redondo said:

William Walter "Pudge" Heffelfinger was a strapping 6-foot-3, 205-pound lineman for the dominant Yale teams of 1888 to 1891. He became the first professional football player in 1892, when the Allegheny Athletic Association paid him $500 to play against the rival Pittsburgh Athletic Club.

Heffelfinger also proved to be one of the great ironmen in sports history.

He played competitive football at one level or another well into his 60s, after college as a barnstorming mercenary and in later years as a celebrity figure at charity games.

"In 1916, at age 49, he scrimmaged against the Yale varsity. In 1920, age 53, he played 50 minutes for the East All-Stars against the Ohio State All-Stars at Columbus, Ohio," says the National Football Foundation.

"In 1930, age 63, he made his final appearance in a football uniform in an all-star game at Minneapolis."

Other sources put his last game at age 65, in a charity event for World War I veterans in 1932.

https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/meet-american-first-paid-professional-football-player-pudge-heffelfinger

 

tom brady: challenge accepted.

[Redondo]

First Tesla Semis delivered with new tech and some mystery
500-mile truck's price, weight, power still not public

Tesla delivered its first production Semi trucks on Thursday night to PepsiCo for use at its California facilities.

The all-electric tractor debuted as a concept in 2017 with an eye on entering production in 2019, but its development and later the coronavirus pandemic caused the date to be pushed off.

The truck arrives with many of the specifications originally promised, however, including a range of 500 miles per charge fully loaded.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk boasted at the event that it is more powerful than a diesel, and that it can accelerate to 60 mph in 5 seconds unladen and in 20 seconds with a full load, but did not reveal its exact specifications.

https://www.foxnews.com/auto/first-tesla-semis-delivered-tech-mystery

[Tank]

LOL

 

[Jason]

9 hours ago, Tank said:

LOL

 

Why is she wearing a négligée in her car? 

[JAHV76]

4 hours ago, Jason said:

Why is she wearing a négligée in her car? 

Could be on her way to work?

[Redondo]

Mom dies after pouring gas on firepit in backyard tragedy

Nicole Foltz suffered burns on 95% of her body while pouring gas on a fire in her Tampa-area backyard

[Redondo]

 

Meet the American who created the first department-store Santa: immigrant entrepreneur James Edgar

 

Scottish-born Bay State businessman greeted guests dressed as Santa Claus in 1890, changing the way children celebrate Christmas

 

James Edgar channeled entrepreneurial spirit and a gift for making people smile into changing the way the world celebrates Christmas.

Edgar was the first department-store Santa Claus.

An immigrant from Scotland, he opened the James Edger & Co. department store in downtown Brockton, Massachusetts in the late 1800s.

He had a knack for clever promotion, a love of children and a patriotic zeal for hs adopted homeland, said Johnny Merian, a longtime Brockton businessman, who lights up like a child seeing Santa for the first time when he discusses the local legend.

Merian has long championed the cause of James Edgar. He's working on a book about the first department-store Santa, discussed him at length in the 2011 documentary "Becoming Santa" and has found ways to honor him around the city.

Edgar "was a real-life Santa Claus. He loved his community. He wanted to make people happy," said Merian.

"He lived the universal spirit of Christmas. That spirit still lives here in Brockton today."

The 19th-century entrepreneur often greeted customers while dressed up as various child-friendly characters: a sea captain, a clown, even George Washington.

He donned a Santa Claus suit at his department store for the first time in 1890.

https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/meet-american-created-department-store-santa-immigrant-entrepreneur-james-edgar

[Tank]

one of the best things i ever got to do was be a mall santa one year at the glendale galleria. i was 26. 

my roommate saw an ad in the paper for santas and invited to come along to his interview. sure, i said, why not. we met this lady, and she hired me but not him.

it was an absolute blast, especially the kids who still believed. the most fun was the groups of women who would come along on their dinner break or after work and take a group photo. i was single at the time and enjoyed those moments very much. 

[Redondo]

'ZERO CARBON':US scientists reportedly make major breakthrough in 'limitless' fusion energy

U.S. government scientists at a California laboratory have reportedly made a monumental breakthrough in harnessing the power of fusion energy.

The scientists, working at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, recently achieved a net energy gain in a fusion reaction, the Financial Times reported, citing three people with knowledge of the experiment.

Scientists have been struggling since the 1950s to harness the fusion reaction that powers the sun. But no group has been able to produce more energy from the reaction than it consumes.

Though developing fusion power stations at scale is still decades away, the breakthrough has significant implications as the world seeks to ween itself off of fossil fuels. Fusion reactions emit zero carbon and do not produce any long-lasting radioactive waste. Per The Times, a small cup of hydrogen fuel could potentially power a house for hundreds of years.

"If this is confirmed, we are witnessing a moment of history," said Dr Arthur Turrell, a plasma physicist, told the paper. "Scientists have struggled to show that fusion can release more energy than is put in since the 1950s, and the researchers at Lawrence Livermore seem to have finally and absolutely smashed this decades-old goal."

U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm and under-secretary for nuclear security Jill Hruby are expected to formally announce "a major scientific breakthrough" at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on Tuesday.

[Blarg]

 

 

[Redondo]

 

Meet the American who sowed the seeds of the first American Christmas tree farm

W. V. McGalliard sowed the seeds of a cherished American tradition.

A farmer, developer and entrepreneur from New Jersey, he planted the nation’s first Christmas tree farm in the village of White Horse, in Hamilton Township, in 1901.

McGalliard had hoped to turn some rock-filled land on his property into profit.

This real-life Father Christmas Tree instead changed the way a nation celebrates a cherished holiday. 

"He took a pretty big gamble, yet he showed people you could successfully grow trees on lands where you couldn’t grow traditional crops," National Christmas Tree Association spokesperson Jill Sidebottom told Fox News Digital.

He seeded his pioneering evergreen plantation with 25,000 Norway spruce trees and 5,000 saplings that he purchased from a Mr. Charles Black of Hightstown, New Jersey, according to information provided by Hamilton Township historian Jeffrey Guear.

McGalliard began selling his trees for $1 each when the first were ready, around 1907 or 1908.

"The farm had a 10-acre gravelly field on which it had become impossible to grow a profitable farm crop," authors Ann Kirk Davis and Henry H. Albers wrote in their 1997 book, "The Wonderful World of Christmas Trees."

His risk and innovation lit up American agriculture like the Griswold family home on Christmas Eve.

The U.S. today boasts 15,000 Christmas tree farms. Americans purchase about 30 million trees each Christmas, almost all of them raised on farms.

"The first recorded display of a decorated Christmas Tree was in 1510, in Riga, Latvia," the National Christmas Tree Association (NCTA) reports on its website.

Yet these trees are a relatively modern tradition in the United States.

[Redondo]

Jamaica's state of emergency may threaten its tourism industry as crime continues to increase in the country and local authorities struggle to clamp down on it.

"That is all the government is trying to do," Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness said, adding that Jamaicans "have to hide under their beds, hide their daughters, can’t go to church, and they see their sons and their boyfriends and husbands killed. That’s the reality."

The U.S. State Department on Oct. 5 issued a level 3 travel advisory, indicating that Americans should "reconsider travel" due to an increased risk of crime in the country. The advisory noted that "violent crimes, such as home invasions, armed robberies, sexual assaults and homicides, are common" and that "sexual assaults occur frequently," even at all-inclusive resorts.

https://www.foxnews.com/world/jamaicas-state-emergency-threatens-tourism-industry-local-authorities-struggle-high-crime-rate

[Redondo]

Restaurant owner forgives man who returns Santa statue he drunkenly stole

[Redondo]

https://www.foxnews.com/auto/what-tesla-semi-sounds-like-highway

Edited December 20, 2022 by Redondo

[HanfordGuy]

A tale as old as time…Jeter Skus!!!

 

[Redondo]

 

Police called over elaborate tribute to beloved Christmas movie

 

[Redondo]

Farmer issues bleak prediction on 2023 shortages, prices

[Redondo]

Driver 'miraculously' survives after guardrail impales vehicle during crash

[Tank]

2 hours ago, Redondo said:

Driver 'miraculously' survives after guardrail impales vehicle during crash

That looks like the foot of a t-Rex.

[Blarg]

My parents got a call one night from the Arizona highway patrol informing them that my younger brother Pete had died in a car accident, impaled by a guardrail when the pickup he was driving ran off the road.

Except, Pete wasn't in the truck. He was supposed to go with his buddies that weekend but had to stay home for work. He had lost his wallet in the truck the night before and that is what the Arizona highway patrol was using for an ID since the diver's face was smashed to pieces. 

When he got home that night I think my parents hugged him for a half hour. 

[Redondo]

 

 

Dozens of inmates escape after deadly attack on Mexico jail near El Paso, Texas

[Redondo]

Mexican prison attack death toll up to 17, gang leader one of 25 escapees officials say

[Redondo]

How life was like 50 years ago, compared to now

[gotbeer]

Producers behind Las Vegas Strip shows buy entire desert area to create ‘Circus Town’

I rarely see a Vegas show.  But one I did see was Absinthe.   And it was pretty spectacular.  It would fit in a Circus Town setting.

 

[Redondo]

 

 

'We were right there when it happened': Whale gives birth on video in once-in-a-lifetime sighting