Did you know that Napoleon is generally depicted in paintings with his hand in his pocket?

Painting by Jacques-Louis David,  Napoleon in his study Tuileries, circa. 1812 

Over the years there have been many ideas about why Napoleon Bonaparte has often been depicted in paintings with his hand in his pocket. There have been many theories. Some say he could have been winding his watch, or that painters at the time had trouble drawing hands, or perhaps it was this way due to health issue's such as stomach ulcers. There seems to no definite answer as to why Napoleon was shown like this. However, if you click the link below it will take you to a non profit organization whose goal is to promote the study of the Napoleonic Era. This organization has been able to dig deeper than most on the possible cause of Napoleon’s depiction in these paintings.

Why Napoleans hand is in his pocket by: napoleon-series.org

napoleon-series.org (Home Page)

Did you know?



Picture shot at Chicago Feild Musem by scenicplaces.com Pic of a pterodactyl

Did you know that all dinosaurs had lived on land?  There where no dinosaurs that live in the sea or flew in the air (Until Birds).  That is right, not even the flying pterosaurs (a flying reptile) or the swimming ichthyosaurs (The fish lizard) where dinosaurs.  These creatures did appear during the time of dinosaurs and where distantly related to some species of dinosaurs, but they where no dino's.

Next time you are walking through a museum with your family or friends and looking at different dinosaurs point out that fact when you see something like a large pterodactyl suspended from the ceiling, just say "Hey guys, I bet you that is no dino!"

Check the links below to find out more about these creatures:

Pterosauria Page (Berkeley.edu)
Ichthyosauria Page (Berkeley.edu)

Rainbow Toad Photographed for First Time

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Rainbow Toad Photograph by Indraneil Das, from Conservation International

After 87 years a never photographed Rainbow Toad has been rediscovered in Southeast Asia.This toad known as Sambas stream toad or Bornean rainbow toad, was last seen in 1924.

Read more from National Geographic about this amazing rediscovery below:

National Geographic Rainbow Toad

NASA Discovers Another Moon Around Pluto?

Two photos of Pluto, The circled is the new moon discovered "P4". Credit: NASA, ESA, and M. Showalter (SETI institute)

Using the Hubble Space Telescope Nasa has discovered a additional moon orbiting Pluto. The tiny, new satellite (temporarily named P4") was spotted in a Hubble survey while they where searching for rings around Pluto.

Click the link below to find out more about this new satellite.

Nasa Pluto Moon

Hubble Hits One Millionth!!!!

Artist's concept of that planet, HAT-P-7b  (by: NASA; ESA; G. Bacon, STScI)

History was made on July 4, 2011, as the Hubble Space Telescope hits is one millionth observation while searching for water in a Jupiter class planet's atmosphere.  The Hubble Space Telescope was commissioned on April 24, 1990, and has made multitude of fascinating discoveries since it's launch. 

Read more about this discovery and Hubble Space Telescope below:

NASA Page's "Hubble Millionth"
Hubble Archives

CSA Flags

CSA "Battle Flag" Aka "Rebel Flag", by  georgiainfo

Did you know that the CSA's (Confederate States Of America) "Rebel Flag" (shown above) was actually the CSA Battle Flag?  As commonly mistaken by people today, the "Battle Field" Flag was never meant to represent the CSA as a national flag. 

During the US Civil War at the battle of Bull Run near Manassas Junction, Virginia, Confederate generals had fond the CSA National Flag of 1861-1863 "The Stars and Bars" (shown below) hard to distinguish from the United States National Flag and urged for a new flag to be made for battle field. 

"The Stars and Bars" 1861-1863 CSA National Flag, by scv674.org 

Read More about CSA flags below:
GeorgiaInfo
CSA FLAGS

Apatosaurus And Tyrannosaurus

How many Apatosaurus (AKA Brontosaurus) fell victim to the T-rex? Well, If you answered none, then you are correct. They were actually separated by quite some time. Apatosaurus lived 57 to146 million years ago (During the late Jurassic period), and the T-Rex lived around 85 to 65 million years ago (During the late Cretaceous period). A T-Rex would have never even seen an Apatosaurus, let alone attacked one. 

Time line extract from www.felidmuseum.org

Why is there such a misconception of this, you say? Hollywood movies have most of the blame. A lot of this misconception was derived from old, stop motion, animation films from the early 1900's that showed many scenes of a T-rex attacking an Apatosaurus. We now have this image buried in the back of our minds.

Check out these related links below to read more about this:

www.FeildMuseum.org

enchantedlearning.com