The first fax process was patented in 1843.

The first electronic mail, or “email”, was sent in 1972 by Ray Tomlinson. It was also his idea to use the @ sign to separate the name of the user from the name of the computer.

Charles Macintosh invented the waterproof coat, the Mackintosh, in 1823.

Thomas Edison filed 1,093 patents, including those for the light bulb, electric railways and the movie camera. When he died in 1931, he held 34 patents for the telephone, 141 for batteries, 150 for the telegraph and 389 patents for electric light and power.

The first neon sign was made in 1923 for a Packard dealership.

Andrew Jackson was the first president to ride in a railroad train.

Martin Van Buren was the eighth president, the eighth vice president and lived to see the election of eight different presidents from eight different states.

The first president to be photographed while in office was President James K. Polk, in 1849.

The first telephone was installed in the White House when Rutherford Birchard Hayes was president.

Elizabeth Wallace, Harry Truman’s wife, was the longest living First Lady.

US and European expenditure on pet food is $17 billion per year.

The word millionaire was first used by Benjamin Disraeli in his 1826 novel Vivian Grey.

In 1990, the word “recession” appeared in 1,583 articles in The Wall Street Journal.

80% of millionaires drive second-hand cars.

If California was a country, it would be the 5th largest economy in the world.

Air becomes liquid at about minus 190 degrees Celsius.

Water expands by about 9% as it freezes.

The typical bolt of lightning heats the atmosphere to 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Sound travels through water 3 times faster than through air.

The word “biology” was coined in 1805 by Jean-Baptiste Lamarck.