Infinite Wisdom

"Where you can do the most execution, sir!"

La Triviata

• Although Belgium had been under German occupation for about six months, by the end of 1940 stock values on the Brussels Bourse had risen about 100 percent, and continued to rise into the new year.
• In 1880, some soldiers in the Indian Territory found that their sutler was selling oranges for $0.25 apiece, unless they wanted "special" ones, which went for a dollar, because they'd been laced with whiskey.
• Hans Surén (1885-1972), a major advocate of the nudist movement in the early twentieth century, served as director of the German army school for physical exercise in the 1920s, and during the Hitler regime his support for nude gymnastics as a way of developing the “Aryan-Olympic Spirit” led to his appointment as “Special Plenipotentiary for the Physical Education of the Rural Population.”
• During the age of muzzle loading firearms it was more common for soldiers to be wounded on the left side of their bodies than the right, for the process of loading and using such a weapon, even in a bayonet attack, exposed the left side to enemy fire more than the right
• When the German airline Lufthansa was formed in 1926, two of the three directors of the new firm were Jewish by subsequent Nazi-era laws, including Erhard Milch, who later became a marshal in the Luftwaffe.
• Reportedly, the great Shawnee war chief Tecumseh enjoyed listening to recitations of Hamlet, and readings from the life of Alexander the Great.
• Between 1560 and 1721, Sweden averaged 1.2 wars per year,  while Denmark averaged only 0.25.
• In 1870 French Army recruit Théophile-Euphrasie Battreau was issued a Chassepot rifle, serial number 187017, which he toted during the Franco-Prussian War, and which, 21 years later, he took off the body of a dead Dahomeyan warrior while serving as a captain in the Foreign Legion, picking it up when he noticed a notch in the stock that had been caused by a German round during the Battle of St. Privat.

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