This is a reposting of one of Harvey’s classics. There’s a link to the book in the sidebar. — The Editors

Welcome to Fun Facts About the 50 States, where – week by week – I’ll be taking you on a tour around this great nation of ours, providing you with interesting, yet completely useless and probably untrue, information about each of the 50 states.

This week, we’ll be voting for the late Strom Thurmond strictly out of habit as we visit South Carolina. So let’s get started…

• South Carolina became the 8th state on May 23, 1788. The residents didn’t particularly WANT to share a name with North Carolina, but they had little choice after the naming-rights deal with Coca-Cola fell through.
• At 3,560 feet tall, the highest point in South Carolina is Sassafras Mountain. No sassafras actually grows on it, it’s just a fun word to say. Especially with a big, spitty, Daffy Duck lisp: “THATHAFRATH!”
• The state motto of South Carolina is “Aminis Opibusque Parati,” which means “any excuse to shoot a Yankee.”
• The state tree of South Carolina is the Palmetto. Which should not be confused with any old men who carve wooden boys that magically come to life.
• Built in 1909, Campbell’s Covered Bridge near Gowensville is the last bridge in South Carolina still covered by a protective wooden structure instead of just a layer of cigarette butts and beer cans.
• The spotted salamander was selected as South Carolina’s official state amphibian in 1976, an unpopular decision which touched off deadly riots in the state’s frustrated and angry frog communities.
• In 1776, the British attacked the US fort on South Carolina’s Sullivan Island. However, because the walls were made with spongy Palmetto logs, the cannonballs couldn’t break through, and just bounced like Air America payroll checks.
• The official state dance of South Carolina is the Shag. As is the official state double-wide trailer carpeting.
• The first battle of the Civil War took place at Fort Sumter. Historians theorize that it started as an innocent Mac vs. PC argument which spun tragically out of control.
• Hartsville, South Carolina’s Coker Experimental Farms started in 1903 with 30 cotton plants and a goal to breed hardier specimens. Thanks to a lack of genetic variation among the seedlings, the highly inbred offshoots became the Retarded Monster Cotton Plant now used for stuffing Tickle Me Elmo dolls.
• Before being known as “The Palmetto State,” South Carolina used to be known as the Iodine state. For those who don’t know, Iodine is brown and hurts like hell when applied to open wounds. Sorta like a Jesse Jackson press conference.
• The Thoroughbred Racing Hall of Fame in Aiken, South Carolina celebrates the many champion race horses trained in Aiken. The secret of their success can be found in their training motto, “It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you’ll be shipped to the glue factory if you screw up!”
• South Carolina’s Black River gets its dark coloring from high concentrations of organic carbon. Sorta like hippie bathwater. If hippies took baths.
• Batesburg-Leesville, South Carolina, is home to the annual South Carolina Poultry festival and features such events as “Turkey-mounted Jousting” and the ever-popular “Stuffing Chickens Down Your Pants Contest.”
• A Catawba Indian named King Haiglar was invaluable in helping the early settlers of Camden, South Carolina. Today, he remains honored in the form of a life-sized weather vane. This may not sound like much of an honor, but at least they didn’t put him on a dollar coin that no one uses like that loser, Saca-what’s-her-name.
• Tyler Brothers Work Shoe and Boot Co. in Wagener, South Carolina produces 8 major brands of OSHA-approved footwear, including Redwing and Wolverine. They attribute their success to changing their name from “3-Toes BootWorks.”
• Gaffney, South Carolina features a water tower in the shape of a giant peach. In case it ever falls over, they plan to put it in their City Hall building, which was built in the shape of a giant crust-lined pie tin.
• The first boll weevil found in South Carolina is on display at the Pendleton District Agricultural Museum. It sits between the first mosquito to bite Strom Thurmond and a few dead flies picked off the window sill.
• Yeah, well, whaddya expect from an Ag Museum? Da Vinci paintings?
• Spartanburg, South Carolina’s Duncan Park is the oldest minor league baseball stadium in the world. During its 80th Anniversary season in 2006, it finally managed to break through the long-elusive double-digit attendance mark.
• Described as “a cross between a snake and something prehistoric,” the mysterious monster that is said to inhabit South Carolina’s Lake Murray was eventually caught and discovered to be a skinny-dipping Ted Kennedy.
• Mullins, South Carolina, features the state’s largest tobacco market. To compensate for financial losses due to anti-tobacco hysteria, the city has branched out into the lead paint, asbestos, and DDT markets as well.
• Residents of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina, are all well versed in the 300-year-old art of Sweetgrass basket-making. Sure, this doesn’t sound like it’d look good on a resume, but it’ll get you picked over someone with a degree in Women’s Studies EVERY time.
• Every year, flocks of Purple Martins fly back to their home on Bomb Island, South Carolina. The sight of millions of creatures mindlessly chirping and crapping all over the place is truly stunning. It’s sorta like an Occupy Wall Street protest, except without the stultifying air of smug self-righteousness.
• The Riverbanks Zoological Park in Columbia, South Carolina is home to over 2,000 animals, none of which are in cages. They’re kept in place with guilt trips from a crack staff of professional Jewish mothers.
• Legend has it that anyone who drinks from Catfish Creek near Marion, South Carolina will fall in love with the area and never leave. Which is polite way of saying they’re doomed to die of amoebic dysentery.
• In 1852, William Dorn discovered the largest gold mine in South Carolina’s history near the city of McCormick. He foolishly sold the mine in 1860, and used the proceeds to launch his ill-fated chain of “Slaves ‘R’ Us” stores.
• South Carolina was the first state to secede from the Union, on December 20th, 1860, thus fulfilling Governor Jebediah Baldwin’s promise to leave the country if a Republican was elected.
• The 7th President of the US, Andrew Jackson, was born in Lancaster County, South Carolina. He earned his nickname “Old Hickory” when he used a hickory switch to beat the crap out of Alexander Hamilton to win the right to appear on the $20 bill.
• The Reverend Jesse Jackson was born in Greenville, South Carolina in 1941. He’s famed for his ability to use racial guilt to shake down “too white” corporations, and is generally considered the John Gotti of the Affirmative Action Mafia’s protection money racket.
• Oops… meant to type “famous civil rights leader”… sorry ’bout that.

That wraps up the South Carolina edition of Fun Facts About the 50 States. Next week we’ll be trampled by herds of stampeding prairie dogs as we visit South Dakota.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m gonna go practice my jousting.

[The complete e-book version of “Fun Facts About the 50 States” is now available at Amazon.com. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can download free Kindle apps for your web browser, smartphone, computer, or tablet from Amazon.com]

This is a reposting of one of Harvey’s classics. There’s a link to the book in the sidebar. — The Editors

Welcome to Fun Facts About the 50 States, where – week by week – I’ll be taking you on a tour around this great nation of ours, providing you with interesting, yet completely useless and probably untrue, information about each of the 50 states.

This week, it’s time to take a wrong turn at the Washington Monument and accidentally wind up in Maryland, so let’s get started…

• Maryland became the 7th state on April 28th, 1788 after it finally agreed to stop trying to invade Delaware to steal its oil.
• The state bird of Maryland is the Oriole, which should NOT be confused with any similarly-named, chocolate-flavored, creme-filled sandwich cookies.
• The state flower of Maryland is the Black-Eyed Susan, or – as it’s referred to by feminists – the “Justifiable Homicide Plant.”
• The highest point in Maryland is Backbone Mountain. It’s 3,360 feet tall, and has never been climbed by a Frenchman.
• The state motto of Maryland is, “Yup, pretty much just a suburb of D.C.”
• Maryland’s nickname of “The Old Line State” is somewhat of a misnomer, since most of its residents prefer to freebase their cocaine.
• Maryland was named after Henrietta Maria, wife of King Charles I of England. They WERE going to call is “Henriettaland,” but decided that sounded too much like some kind of pussycat-puppet-related theme park.
• The lowest point in Maryland is Bloody Point Hole, at 174 feet below sea level. It used to be deeper, but Karl Rove’s been using it a lot lately to dispose of “stifled dissenters,” if you know what I mean.
• Presidential assassin John Wilkes Booth was born in Bel Air, Maryland in 1838. Because of his high-profile crime, all US theaters now have “Marylander detectors” at each entrance as a security precaution.
• Famous abolitionist Frederick Douglass was born in Tuckahoe, Maryland, which – and I can’t emphasize this enough – starts with the letter “T,” so really watch that left index finger while you’re typing.
• Another famous abolitionist – Harriet Tubman – was born in Dorchester County, Maryland and freed over 300 slaves during 20 trips between Maryland and Pennsylvania. Today, many black people honor her heroic journeys by running up and down a wooden court for an hour, symbolically helping basketballs escape slavery by throwing them through “freedom hoops.”
• Gaithersburg, Maryland is home to the National Institute of Standards and Technology. It employs over 3,000 pimply-faced geek-boys, none of whom have yet kissed a real girl.
• National Anthem author Francis Scott Key was born in Frederick, Maryland, where he spent his formative years blowing stuff up and writing poetry about the explosions.
• Baseball Hall-of-Famer Babe Ruth grew up in Baltimore, Maryland, and developed his legendary slugging prowess by working as a knee-cap breaker for local loan sharks.
• The United States Naval Academy was founded on October 10, 1845 at Annapolis, Maryland. Coincidentally, the United States Hooker Academy was founded across the street the next day.
• The first cathedral in the U.S. was built in Baltimore, Maryland in 1821, mostly to clear the streets of the numerous drunken Irishmen passed out in the gutters.
• Annapolis, Maryland once served as the capital of the U.S., but the Congressional building was eventually moved to Washington, D.C. to make room for the United States Hooker Academy.
• The first dental school in the U.S. opened at the University of Maryland in 1840. The early facilities were quite primitive, and the first class taught there was a course in how to make a set of dentures out of duct tape and roofing nails.
• The Concord Point lighthouse is the oldest continuously operated lighthouse in Maryland, because no one in the state is smart enough to figure out how to operate the light switch.
• Maryland was originally populated by confused colonists from Virginia who wandered too far north and got stuck in snowbanks.
• Kind of explains the light switch thing, doesn’t it?
• The highest waterfall in Maryland is Muddy Creek Falls. At 63 feet tall, it’s actually large enough for Michael Moore to fit underneath it, unless he’s laying on his back.
• In 1790 Maryland rounded up all the lawyers in the state and threw them into a fetid swamp near the southern border of the state, now known as Washington, D.C.
• The first successful manned hot air balloon launch occurred in Baltimore, Maryland in 1784. The pilot – Edward Warren – reportedly described his trip as “a great way to peek down the front of women’s dresses.”
• The state song of Maryland is “Maybe We Should’ve Killed Those Lawyers Before We Threw Them In That Swamp.”

Well, that wraps up the Maryland edition of Fun Facts About the 50 States. Next week we’ll be swerving off a bridge like a Kennedy as we visit Massachusetts.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go take a hot air balloon ride.

[The complete e-book version of “Fun Facts About the 50 States” is now available at Amazon.com. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can download free Kindle apps for your web browser, smartphone, computer, or tablet from Amazon.com]

This is a reposting of one of Harvey’s classics. There’s a link to the book in the sidebar. — The Editors

Welcome to Fun Facts About the 50 States, where – week by week – I’ll be taking you on a tour around this great nation of ours, providing you with interesting, yet completely useless and probably untrue, information about each of the 50 states.

This week, it’s time to pass out on the floor of the Kennedy compound in Massachusetts, so let’s get started…

• Massachusetts became the 6th state on February 6th 1788, thereby stripping Pennsylvania of its coveted “hardest state name to spell correctly” title.
• The state motto of Massachusetts is “The Yankees Suck!”
• The state flower of Massachusetts is the gin blossom, which made Ted Kennedy’s face a protected state wilderness area.
• The highest point in Massachusetts is Mt. Greylock at 3,500 feet. It was recently re-named “Mt. Whitelock” after it successfully defeated a Balrog.
• Massachusetts was nicknamed the Bay State because its large native population of werewolves spend a lot of time howling at the moon.
• The word Massachusetts is a Narraganset Indian word meaning “Tribal elders say ok. Squaw can marry squaw.”
• Massachusetts has a population of 6 million people, all of whom have a harder time pronouncing the letter “R” than a busload of Japanese tourists.
• The state song of Massachusetts is “The Theme From Brokeback Mountain.”
• Actor Jack Albertson was born in Malden, Massachusetts, and was best known for playing Grandpa Joe in the original version of “Teddy and the Whiskey Factory.”
• Salem, Massachusetts was the site of the infamous witch trials of 1692, where over 50 women were burned at the stake for weighing the same as a duck.
• The first subway system was built in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1897. The subway cars were originally propelled by lashing an Irishman to the front and dangling a potato in front of him.
• The town of Franklin, Massachusetts was NOT named in honor of Benjamin Franklin, as most people think, but rather for the token black kid in the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Special.
• The city of Rockport, Massachusetts contains a house that’s built entirely out of old newspapers. Visitors are requested not to jump to any hasty conclusions regarding why the toilet is made out of the New York Times.
• The birth control pill was invented in Worcester, Massachusetts, and proved to be even more effective at preventing conception than attending a Star Trek Convention dressed as a Klingon.
• Boston, Massachusetts takes its name from an Irish word meaning “crime-ridden cesspool.”
• The first Thanksgiving was celebrated in 1621 after the sword Excalibur was pulled from Plymouth Rock by Arthur, King of the Pilgrims.
• Why, yes, I was watching “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” while researching these fun facts.
• All the Founding Fathers threw tea into Boston Harbor during the Boston Tea Party on December 16th, 1773, except for John Hancock, who was busy writing his name in the snow in letters large enough for King George to read without his glasses.
• Massachusetts was originally settled by the cast of the British TV show, “Survivor: Plymouth.”
• Massachusetts is currently engulfed in a brutal civil war between Dunkin’ Donuts and Krispy Kreme over which is the “One True Donut.”
• The Massachusetts tourism slogan is, “Man, woman, goat – whatever – if you can fit it into a wedding dress, you can marry it here.”
• On this day in 1985, Ted Kennedy successfully drove over a bridge without killing anyone.
• Well, technically he ran over a homeless guy, but that doesn’t really count.
• Soldiers from Massachusetts are the most feared of all American fighting men, since – being true Patriots – they always defeat their enemies with a last-second field goal.

Well, that wraps up the Massachusetts edition of Fun Facts About the 50 States. Next week I’ll be taking a swing through the land of new cars and breakfast cereals as I visit Michigan.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish getting this goat into a wedding dress.

[The complete e-book version of “Fun Facts About the 50 States” is now available at Amazon.com. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can download free Kindle apps for your web browser, smartphone, computer, or tablet from Amazon.com]