The First Book of Factoids | Page 7

the bra was
patented by a George Phelps in 1875. Other bra-like devices were
patented in 1893 and 1889.
During the first world war, in 1917, the US War Industries Board called
on women to stop buying metal-rich corsets. Some 28,000 tons of
metals were thus made available to the war effort.
http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa042597.htm
http://www.patentmuseum.com/ebayhtmls/111mj.html
Burma (Aung San)
Aung San Suu Kyi is a much revered opposition leader in Myanmar
(Burma) (born 1945). She has bravely resisted - and still does - the
murderous military regime in her homeland and has won the 1991
Nobel Peace Prize.
Her mother was ambassador to India in the 1960s. She is cherished by
all her countrymen.
Moreover, Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of an illustrious figure in
Burmese history, a national hero - Aung San, who was murdered in
1947.
Aung San may be a hero to the Burmese but he has collaborated with
the Japanese war-crime tainted military machine throughout the second
world war - though he conveniently switch allegiances to the winning
side five months before the Japanese capitulated.
Aung San raised a Burmese contingent - the "Burma Independence
Army" - to assist the Japanese in their invasion of Burma in 1942. He
was rewarded with the post of minister of defense in Ba Maw's puppet
government (1943-5).
In March 1945, in what amounted to a coup, he opportunistically
defected, together with the Burma National Army, to the Allies, and
worked closely with the British, whom he hitherto claimed to have
been fighting for independence.
When the war was over, he established a private militia, under his
commend - the People's Volunteer Organization. He proceeded to
negotiate Burma's independence from Britain and its first elections. He

was murdered - with his brother and four others - probably by a
political opponent, U Saw, in 1947.
http://www.geocities.com/toekyi/aungsan.html
http://aungsan.com/
C
Caesarean Section
Legend has it that Julius Caesar was cut out of his mother's womb
through the abdomen. In Latin, "caedere" means "to cut".
Caesarean section was mandated in case of the mother's death in the
"Roman Law" wrongly attributed to Numa Pompilius, the second of
Rome's seven kings (said to have ruled 715-673 BC). Stories during the
Renaissance describe "do it yourself" sections by anxious husbands.
But the procedure was unknown to midwives and lithotomists
(specialist removers of bladder stones). Scipione Mercurio (1540-1615)
described the operation in his first text, published in 1596. Four strong
assistants had to hold down the writhing mother while the incision was
done. Another documented case - a failure - dates back to 1610.
Survival rates were, probably, abysmal. The next mention of the
dreaded surgery was in 1793 in Manchester, England. Jane Foster's
pelvis was crushed in an accident and then she survived a Caesarean
section by one, Dr. James Barlow. The baby was less fortunate.
In the meantime, the French obstetrician Baudeloque published a book
describing dozens of cases of successful caesarean section in the
previous 50 years. The book was translated to English.
An Edom, Virginia doctor, Jessee Bennet, recorded in the margin of his
copy that he performed a section on his wife thus:
"14 Jany 1794 JB on EB up 9 Feby walked 15 Feby Cured on 1
March." The mother was sedated with laudanum and placed on two
planks set across two barrels. While at it, the good doctor removed his
wife's ovaries to prevent a recurrence of the ordeal. She lived another
25 years and the baby died at the ripe old age of 77.
http://www.umanitoba.ca/outreach/manitoba_womens_health/hist1b.ht
m
http://www.obgyn.net/displayarticle.asp?page=/urogyn/murphy-book/c
over

Calendars

Orthodox Christians celebrate Christmas on January 7. Their "old new
year" is a week later, on January 14. It is all Julius Caesar's fault ...
The Romans sometimes neglected to introduce an extra month every
two years to amortize the difference between their lunar calendar and
the natural solar year. Julius Caesar decreed that the year 46 BC should
have 445 days (some historians implausibly say: 443 days) in order to
bridge the yawning discrepancy that accumulated over the preceding
seven centuries. It was aptly titled the "Year of Confusion".
To "reset" the calendar, Julius Caesar affixed the New Year on January
1 (the day the Senate traditionally convened) and added a day or two to
a few months.
He thus gave rise to the Julian Calendar, a latter day rendition of the
Aristarchus calendar from 239 BC. After his assassination, the month
of Quintilis was renamed Julius (July) in his honor.
The Julian calendar estimated the length of the natural solar year (the
time it takes for the earth to make one orbit of the sun) to be 365 days
and 6 hours. Every fourth year the extra six hours were collected and
added as an extra day to the year, creating a leap year of 366 days.
But the calendar's