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Here's An Interesting History Lesson Or Review.

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    Here's An Interesting History Lesson Or Review.

    Railroad tracks.

    Be sure to read the final paragraph, Your understanding of it will
    depend on the earlier part of the content. This is amazing. . . .

    The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet,
    8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number.

    Why was that gauge used? Because that's the way they built them in
    England, and English expatriates built the US railroads.

    Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines
    were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and
    that's the gauge they used.

    Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the
    tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building
    wagons, which used that wheel spacing.

    Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if
    they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of
    the old, long distance roads in England , because that's the spacing of the
    wheel ruts.

    So who built those old rutted roads? Imperial Rome built the first long
    distance roads in Europe (and England ) for their legions. The roads
    have been used ever since.

    And the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts,
    which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon
    wheels.

    Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in
    the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore the United States standard railroad
    gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for
    an Imperial Roman war chariot. Bureaucracies live forever.

    So the next time you are handed a Specification/ Procedure/ Process and
    wonder "What horse's ass came up with it?" you may be exactly right.
    Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate
    the rear ends of two war horses. (Two horses' asses.) Now, the twist to the
    story:

    When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two
    big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are
    solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their
    factory in Utah . The engineers who designed the SRBs would have
    preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train
    from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens
    to run through a ! tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that
    tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the
    railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses'
    behinds.

    So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the
    world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two
    thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass. And you thought
    being a horse's ass wasn't important? Ancient horse's asses control almost
    everything....and CURRENT Horses Asses are controlling everything else!!


    Which just goes to show you can make anything sound feasible if you try hard enough !
    "If you can read this, thank a teacher....and since it's in English, thank a soldier"

    #2
    Is this STILL doing the rounds?

    False.

    http://www.snopes.com/history/american/gauge.asp
    Drivelling in TPD is not a mental health issue. We're just community blogging, that's all.

    Xenophon said: "CUK Geek of the Week". A gingerjedi certified "Elitist Tw@t". Posting rated @ 5 lard points

    Comment


      #3
      Originally posted by BrowneIssue View Post
      Is this STILL doing the rounds?

      False.

      http://www.snopes.com/history/american/gauge.asp
      I just got it in email...haven't seen it before though...
      "If you can read this, thank a teacher....and since it's in English, thank a soldier"

      Comment


        #4
        did you also forward it to all of your friends and post it on facebook?
        Coffee's for closers

        Comment


          #5
          Originally posted by daviejones View Post
          I just got it in email...haven't seen it before though...

          Did you know the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

          HTH
          Hard Brexit now!
          #prayfornodeal

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by sasguru View Post
            Did you know the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

            HTH

            I posted it as a topic of discussion, miserable fookers!!!!!
            "If you can read this, thank a teacher....and since it's in English, thank a soldier"

            Comment


              #7
              Actually I'd say much of what they say in their response to the original story backs up the original story.

              They state that the English did not build the US railways but the US did import the technology to do so - this was based on the English gauge. The gauge was based on the width of a carriage because it was carriages which were adapted for use. So the carriage being based on the width of 2 horses was used to determine the UK gauge and as a result the US one. Due to its popularity after the US Civil war it is this UK gauge which was adopted as the standard for the US.

              It also states 'railroads don't run through tunnels only slightly wider than the railroad tracks'. This is wrong - they do. Tunnelling is expensive. How many rail tunnels are a mile wide. None! Why? Because there are no mile wide trains. Tunnels are built with a view to what is going to travel through them. This is one of the reasons why we can’t run double deck trains in the UK as we would have to enlarge all the tunnels
              Rule Number 1 - Assuming that you have a valid contract in place always try to get your poo onto your timesheet, provided that the timesheet is valid for your current contract and covers the period of time that you are billing for.

              I preferred version 1!

              Comment


                #8
                Did you know that if they laid all the railroad tracks in this country end-to-end, it would help.

                IGMC

                Comment


                  #9
                  Originally posted by sasguru View Post
                  Did you know the word gullible isn't in the dictionary?

                  HTH
                  It isn't?

                  Comment


                    #10
                    Originally posted by daviejones View Post
                    I posted it as a topic of discussion, miserable fookers!!!!!

                    Don't you know the rules? Drivel gets posted in TPD.
                    Hard Brexit now!
                    #prayfornodeal

                    Comment

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