Today I learned that in 1910, the U.S. seriously considered importing hippos and releasing them into the wild to (1) eat invasive water hyacinths and (2) be eaten by Americans. The bill, H.R. 23261, also known as the “American Hippo bill”, was introduced in 1910 by Congressman Robert F. Broussard of Louisiana. Funnily enough, the bill itself makes no mention of hippos. It wasn’t actually about hippos. It was a “give us the money and we’ll figure it out” kind of law. The committee politely thanked everyone for a “very interesting morning” and dispersed. There was no vote. Never.
Category: History
Unveiling the True Terms of Isabella Stewart Gardner’s Will | September 18 2026, 22:26
Earlier today I wrote a post about the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and, like everyone else, I referenced her will: it says that if the trustees change the layout, the entire collection goes to Harvard. This statement is quoted in every article, every guidebook, and every podcast about the 1990 heist. Then I got curious: what else is in the actual document? I went looking — and to my surprise, I found that the will is not publicly available. Everyone refers to it, but you can’t find it: not on the museum’s website, not in archives, nor in legal databases. All I found was a fragment on Scribd, where just the pages I needed were missing.
So I just wrote a letter to the museum archive. I sent it at 3:54 pm. By 3:58 pm, I had received a response — with photos of the original: seventeen handwritten pages on lined paper with red margins, red ribbon, wax seal, and the signature “Isabella Stewart Gardner” dated May 9, 1921, plus a typewritten codicil from 1924.
The most interesting part — the famous stipulation about Harvard is actually much more specific than it is recounted. It kicks in if the trustees display something she did not own at her death, or change the “general arrangement” of items on the first, second, and third floors — “except for the kitchen and adjacent bedrooms on the first floor.” Then everything — the land, the building, paintings, statues, trinkets, furniture, books, and a $1.2 million fund — must be sold by Harvard, and not in Boston, but in Paris, with the proceeds going towards either salary increases for professors or scholarships no less than $1,200 each per year. The fourth floor and the attic are not included in this restriction — that’s where the director lived, to whom she bequeathed an apartment rent-free, $5,000 a year, a month of vacation, and up to two servants paid for by the museum.
The will does not grant free admission to everyone named Isabella — some online sources refer to the will, but no, that’s a marketing ploy. Moreover, it states precisely the opposite: the director himself should nearly personally collect admission fees, “as the greatest public good will be achieved by such a fee,” and the museum should be open only on specific days. So the twenty-five dollars for a ticket is literally her will. She also prohibited “extravagant expenditures” on maintenance, with any excess to be given every five years to two Boston hospitals, one for a free bed.
Every year on April 14th, on her birthday, trustees are required to conduct a memorial service in the chapel at the end of the Long Gallery — the museum still does this to this day. The remainder of her estate was divided between the children’s hospital, child and animal protection societies, with the animal protection society receiving money on the condition that they spend $75 a year on a free stall in memory of the horses Dolly, Pluto, and Lady Betty and $35 on a kennel in memory of the dogs Kitty Wink and Patty Boy.
Free Admission for Isabelles at the ISG Museum: A Legacy of Eccentricity and Art | September 18 2026, 17:33
Hey, if your name is Isabella, you get free admission to the ISG Art Museum in Boston (otherwise $25). Or a discount if you show up in an “Oh, you Red Sox” T-shirt. I’m at the museum right now. You won’t find this information at the ticket counter. It’s not a promotion, but a clause in the will of the founder—Isabella Stewart Gardner, who built herself a Venetian palazzo in the middle of Boston in 1903, stuffed it with Titian, Rembrandt, and Vermeer. She also walked a lion on a leash and came to the conservatory with an “Oh, you Red Sox” band around her forehead—for this very reason, fans in gear still get a discount here.
The scariest place here is the Dutch Room, where empty frames hang on the walls, but right now it’s under renovation, and instead of empty frames, there are empty rectangles made of painter’s tape. In March 1990, two people in police uniforms entered at night, tied up the guard, and in 81 minutes took out 13 works worth about 500 million dollars, including Rembrandt’s only seascape and Vermeer’s “The Concert”—the most expensive stolen painting in the world. The case is still unsolved, and the reward for information is $10 million. The frames hang empty because the will forbids changing anything in the museum: if you move one thing, the entire collection goes to Harvard for sale 😉
If you know an Isabella—tag her, she gets in free for life 😉
P.S. I requested the museum’s will, they sent me a scan, and there’s a lot of interesting stuff https://www.facebook.com/share/1DJAbebsEH/
Turnspit Dogs: The Forgotten Kitchen Helpers of Britain | August 24 2026, 01:18
It turns out that for several centuries in Britain, they kept a breed of dog with exactly one job — to serve as the drive for a kitchen mechanism. Turnspit dog, a cooking-jack dog. Short-legged, long-bodied, bandy-legged, yet surprisingly powerful. On the kitchen wall, a few meters away from the hearth, hung a wooden wheel nearly a meter in diameter—like a squirrel cage, only larger. A dog was put inside, the wheel connected to the spit by a shaft and chain, and the dog would tirelessly move its legs for hours to rotate the roast over the fire. The first recorded mention dates back to 1576: in John Caius’s treatise on English dogs, they are classified as a separate type, Turnespete. In the 18th century, Linnaeus even gave them a taxonomic name — Canis vertigus, “spinning dog.”
The wheel was hung higher and further from the hearth, so the dog wouldn’t overheat. Not out of sentimentality: in early designs, where it stood right by the fire, dogs hated this job so much that they would run away as soon as they saw the kitchen boy with a piece of meat. A reduction gear — the dog runs fast, the spit turns slowly, perfect for an even crust. In large kitchens, they kept two dogs and rotated them: one spins, the other rests. Hence, according to a persistent legend, the English saying every dog has his day—though etymologists, admittedly, debate this. There was also stimulation, unpleasant to read about: a hot coal could be thrown into the wheel to make the paws move faster.
The breed was doomed by the smokejack—a chimney turbine that spun the spit with the free flow of hot air. Cheap factory mechanisms (clock jacks, a spring with weights, like in floor clocks) and the Victorian cast-iron stove, after which the open hearth completely disappeared from kitchens, delivered the final blows. By the mid-19th century, turnspit dogs became a rarity; by the end of the century, they were gone entirely: no one kept this dog as a companion, they weren’t valued for their temperament to begin with. From Canis vertigus today — only a stuffed specimen named Whiskey in the Abergavenny Museum in Wales and a few rare prints remain. It is written that their bloodlines can be found in Welsh Corgis and Glen of Imaal Terriers, but, as far as I know, this has not been seriously genetically tested.
The Evolution of Mermaids in Russian Folklore: From Legged Creatures to Aquatic Tails | August 08 2026, 02:15
WOW, it turns out that mermaids in Russia actually had legs, and if you asked about the tail, they would tickle you to death or drown the curious in the nearest pond. A specific feature — tousled blonde hair, hence the phrase from Dal “walks like a mermaid.” The name itself, however, is not from the type of blonde hair, but from “rusalki” — a spring commemorative festival.
And the tail actually came from sea maidens (mermaids). Mermaids are an invention of peoples living by the sea. In general, how mermaids merged with them in our perception is unclear, but it happened relatively recently.
Although there is one assumption. In Andersen’s tale, the little mermaid — literally a sea maiden (Den Lille Havfrue). But in Russian translation, it was called “Rusalka.” Lermontov has a poem “The Mermaid” from 1831, where she swims in a river. Surely the modern reader imagines a tail. There’s also a tale by Orest Somov, where the mermaid runs away from her mother, and her unfaithful lover—the Pole, was tickled to death by mermaids.
I illustrate with an 1871 painting by Ivan Kramskoy. With legs and Makovsky’s “Mermaids” (1879) – Makovsky painted it on an estate on the border of Chernigov and Poltava provinces, near Dikanka — that very Gogolian Ukrainian night, i.e., the same literary source as Kramskoy. They would have been very surprised by a tail. Also adding Prushkovsky’s Mermaids” (water nymphs) from 1877. Also attaching a drawing by Ivan Bilibin (1934).
By the way, those who depict mermaids with tails on trees – think about how she climbed up there.
Deciphering Tolstoy: Lost in Translation | August 06 2026, 21:36
I wonder what word our Leo Tolstoy had in mind in “War and Peace,” “lost the wolf” or something harsher? I take the English translation off the shelf, there it’s b——ed, apparently buggered, so it’s definitely “lost the wolf.”
From Bar Joke to Millionaire: The Unbelievable Success of the Pet Rock | August 05 2026, 00:55
Today I found out that the most successful product of Christmas 1975 was a rock. Just a regular rock. Gary Dahl, an advertiser from California, was sitting in a bar and listening to his friends complain about their pets – feeding them, walking them, cleaning up after them – and jokingly said that he had the perfect pet – a rock. It doesn’t need feeding, doesn’t poop, doesn’t die. The joke turned into a business plan over the course of the evening. Dahl bought smooth pebbles from Rosarito Beach in Mexico for about a cent apiece and sold them for $3.95 each. Every rock was shipped in a cardboard carrying box – with air holes “for breathing” and straw bedding inside. And here’s the kicker: the product wasn’t the rock. The product was the accompanying 32-page care and training manual, written stone-faced (pardon the pun): commands like sit” and lie down” are learned instantly, come here” and fetch” are a bit harder, and it executes the command “die” brilliantly.
Within a few months, over a million units were sold, Dahl became a millionaire, he was written about in magazines and invited on television. By early 1976 it was all over, warehouses remained filled with unsold rocks, and attempts to replicate the success with other novelty products failed. Dahl died in 2015, but the Pet Rock brand lives on: the rock in its original packaging can still be purchased today.
(How I came across this. I am currently reading Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and came across the phrase “They were the Pet Rock of parenting.” – referring to Amy’s parents. I did not understand it and went to google what this Pet Rock was.)
The Rise and Fall of the Pet Rock Craze | August 05 2026, 00:55
Today I learned that the most successful Christmas product of 1975 was a rock. Just a regular rock. Gary Dahl, an advertiser from California, was sitting in a bar listening to his friends complain about their pets — feeding them, walking them, cleaning up after them — and jokingly said that he had the perfect pet: a rock. It doesn’t need to be fed, doesn’t poop, doesn’t die. What began as a joke that evening turned into a business plan. Dahl bought smooth pebbles from Rosarito Beach in Mexico for about a cent apiece and sold them for $3.95 each. Each rock came in a cardboard carrying case — with “breathing” holes and straw bedding inside. And here’s the main point: the product wasn’t the rock. The product was the accompanying 32-page care and training manual, written with a stone-faced (pardon the pun) seriousness: the commands “sit” and “stay” are learned instantaneously by the pet, “come here” and “fetch” not so much, and it performs the command “die” brilliantly.
In a few months, more than a million units were sold, Dahl became a millionaire, and he was written about in magazines and invited on television shows. By the beginning of 1976, it was all over, warehouses remained with unsold rocks, and attempts to repeat success with other novelty products failed. Dahl died in 2015, but the Pet Rock brand lives on: you can still buy a rock in its branded box today.
(How I found this out. I’m currently reading Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn and came across the phrase “They were the Pet Rock of parenting.” – about Amy’s parents. I didn’t understand it and went to Google what this Pet Rock was.)
The Art of Beauty Marks in Historical European Portraiture | July 28 2026, 06:34
It is interesting that the artist did not hesitate to place a black beauty spot on the temple of the hawthorn seller in this painting. At that time, it was a very typical accessory. They were applied to cover skin defects and quickly became an essential element of makeup. The black color of the beauty spot fabric created a strong contrast, visually emphasizing the aristocratic paleness and whiteness of the face, and also drawing attention to the eyes. In Europe (including Spain, where Lorenzo Tiepolo worked), there was a complex “language of beauty spots”. Depending on where the piece of fabric was attached, it conveyed a specific message to suitors.
But they probably would not have understood piercings and tattoos 🙂
