Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Wise Up! by Bathroom Readers’ Institute Page B

Drysdale. After he hit you, he’d come around, look at the bruise on your arm, and say, ‘Do you want me to sign it?’”
    —Mickey Mantle
    “I became a good pitcher when I stopped trying to make them miss the ball and started trying to make them hit it.”
    —Sandy Koufax
    “[Sandy Koufax’s] fastball was so fast, some batters would start to swing as he was on his way to the mound.”
    —Jim Murray
    “You know you’re pitching well when the batters look as bad as you do at the plate.”
    —Duke Snider
    “Pitchers, like poets, are born, not made.”
    —Cy Young

Counting Costs
    In 1941, a gallon of regular gas cost 19.2¢.
    Cost to renovate the Statue of Liberty in 1984: $62 million. Yankee Stadium’s 1976 renovations: $167 million.
    If your dog lives to age 11, you will probably have spent more than $13,000 on it.
    It costs a zoo five times more to keep a panda than to keep an elephant.
    Cost of the 13-year Apollo program to put a man on the Moon: $23 billion.
    It costs 3¢ to make a dollar bill—and 7.8¢ to make a half-dollar coin.
    Cost of a cellular phone in 1984: $4,195.
    Estimated cost for having your whole body tattooed: $30,000 to $50,000.
    A fifth of the world’s population earns just $425 a year—the cost of a day’s golf at Pebble Beach.
    The Louisiana Purchase cost the United States just 3¢ an acre.

World Leaders
    Alec Douglas-Home, former prime minister of the United Kingdom (1963–64), was a world-class cricket player.
    From 1951 to 1960, future Ugandan dictator Idi Amin was the country’s light heavyweight boxing champion.
    Richard the Lionheart (1157–99) was a member of the brotherhood of troubadours and wrote song lyrics.
    The CIA once considered killing Fidel Castro by dousing his scuba gear with LSD.
    Lester Pearson, Canada’s prime minister from 1963 to 1968, was asked to play for Britain’s Olympic hockey team.
    Hirohito, Japan’s 124th emperor, was an internationally respected marine biologist.
    Former British prime minister Tony Blair was once in a rock band called Ugly Rumours.
    Adolf Hitler personally saved one Jew from the death camps—the daughter-in-law of composer Richard Strauss.
    Until World War II, Winston Churchill was known mostly for disastrous political failures.
    After he lost the Battle of Waterloo, Napoléon Bonaparte tried to escape to the United States but was captured by a British warship.
    U.S. statesman Alexander Hamilton wasn’t born in the United States but on the Caribbean island of Nevis.
    Beethoven originally dedicated his Symphony No. 3 (titled Eroica , or “heroic” in Italian) to Napoléon because he thought the leader embodied the democratic ideals of the French Revolution. But when Napoléon took on the undemocratic title of “emperor,” Beethoven scratched out the dedication with a knife.

Law & Disorder
    Most common reason for hiring a private detective in the United States: tracking down someone who owes you money.
    In 1976, Bruce Springsteen got arrested for trying to climb over the gates of Graceland.
    John Dillinger was the first criminal designated “Public Enemy Number One” by the FBI.
    Pro wrestler and actor Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson has a degree in criminology.
    Confucius’s day job: he became China’s minister of crime in 501 BC.
    Like they do with movies and TV today, in 19th-century London, many people blamed the growing crime rate on violence in the theaters.
    In 1969, Neil Young and Jimi Hendrix stole a truck to get to Woodstock in time to perform.
    The first law school in the United States: the Litchfield Law School in Connecticut, established in 1773. Its graduates included Aaron Burr, Horace Mann, and John C. Calhoun.
    Alibi means “elsewhere” in Latin.
    The original Draconian (someone who’s extremely harsh or cruel), Draco of Athens, executed people for stealing cabbage.
    Mary Jenkins Surratt was the first woman executed by the U.S. government. She was hanged in 1865 for conspiracy in the assassination of