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Mike
Carruthers:
Why
do we call a boxing ring, a ring, when it's actually square?
David Feldman:
The ring was originally used to
describe the spectators who gathered around the boxers - because
in the early days of boxing, there was no ring. The boxers were
on the ground, surrounded by people with no ring posts, no ropes,
no referee.
David Feldman,
author of the book Why
do Pirates Love Parrots?…
And then when
they started putting up the edifice there - they referred to
that as the ring because that was the thing that surrounded
the boxers.
Ever wonder why
slot machines have fruit as symbols?
This was an early
example of product placement. Actually the Bell Fruit Gum Company
(which was a pretty big gum company in the late 19th century)
wanted a gimmick to advertise their wares and they used the
fruits that were in their gum on the slot machine and took it
around from carnivals and county fairs and state fairs. That
was the deal, actually - if you lined up three in a row, you've
won a pack of gum. And that bar symbol that you see on slot
machines - that was actually the logo of Bell Fruit Gum.
And why did pirates
like parrots so much?
Pirates are usually
motivated by money and the same thing with their supposed love
of parrots - they actually brought parrots back from the Caribbean
and sold them in wild bird markets in London and Paris, and
got a pretty penny for them.
Tomorrow, how
did Friday the 13th become unlucky? - I'm Mike Carruthers and
that's Something You Should Know.
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