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For those of you who thought you understood history - here's some new insights. ------ Mary Ann >> >> The World According to Student Bloopers >> >> Richard Lederer >> St. Paul's School >> >> One of the fringe benefits of being an English or History teacher is >> receiving the occasional jewel of a student blooper in an essay. I have pasted >> together the following "history" of the world from certifiably genuine student >> bloopers collected by teachers throughout the United States, from eight grade >> through college level. Read carefully, and you will learn a lot. >> >> The inhabitants of Egypt were called mummies. They lived in the Sarah >> Dessert and traveled by Camelot. The climate of the Sarah is such that the >> inhabitants have to live elsewhere, so certain areas of the dessert are cul- >> tivated by irritation. The Egyptians built the Pyramids in the shape of a huge >> triangular cube. The Pramids are a range of mountains between France and >> Spain. >> >> The Bible is full of interesting caricatures. In the first book of the >> Bible, Guinesses, Adam and Eve were created from an apple tree. One of their >> children, Cain, asked "Am I my brother's son?" God asked Abraham to sacrifice >> Issac on Mount Montezuma. Jacob, son of Issac, stole his brother's birthmark. >> Jacob was a partiarch who brought up his twelve sons to be partiarchs, but they >> did not take to it. One of Jacob's sons, Joseph, gave refuse to the Israelites >> >> Pharaoh forced the Hebrew slaves to make bread without straw. Moses led >> them to the Red Sea, where they made unleavened bread, which is bread made >> without any ingredients. Afterwards, Moses went up on Mount Cyanide to get the >> ten commandments. David was a Hebrew king skilled at playing the liar. He >> fougth with the Philatelists, a race of people who lived in Biblical times. >> Solomon, one of David's sons, had 500 wives and 500 porcupines. >> >> Without the Greeks, we wouldn't have history. The Greeks invented three >> kinds of columns - Corinthian, Doric and Ironic. They also had myths. A myth >> is a female moth. One myth says that the mother of Achilles dipped him in the >> River Stynx until he became intolerable. Achilles appears in "The Illiad", by >> Homer. Homer also wrote the "Oddity", in which Penelope was the last hardship >> that Ulysses endured on his journey. Actually, Homer was not written by Homer >> but by another man of that name. >> >> Socrates was a famous Greek teacher who went around giving people advice. >> They killed him. Socrates died from an overdose of wedlock. >> >> In the Olympic Games, Greeks ran races, jumped, hurled the biscuits, and >> threw the java. The reward to the victor was a coral wreath. The government >> of Athen was democratic because the people took the law into their own hands. >> There were no wars in Greece, as the mountains were so high that they couldn't >> climb over to see what their neighbors were doing. When they fought the >> Parisians, the Greeks were outnumbered because the Persians had more men. >> >> Eventually, the Ramons conquered the Geeks. History call people Romans >> because they never stayed in one place for very long. At Roman banquets, the >> guests wore garlic in their hair. Julius Caesar extinguished himself on the >> battlefields of Gaul. The Ides of March killed him because they thought he >> was going to be made king. Nero was a cruel tyrany who would torture his poor >> subjects by playing the fiddle to them. >> >> Then came the Middle Ages. King Alfred conquered the Dames, King Arthur >> lived in the Age of Shivery, King Harlod mustarded his troops before the >> Battle of Hastings, Joan of Arc was cannonized by George Bernard Shaw, and the >> victims of the Black Death grew boobs on their necks. Finally, the Magna Carta >> provided that no free man should be hanged twice for the same offense. >> >> In midevil times most of the people were alliterate. The greatest writer >> of the time was Chaucer, who wrote many poems and verse and also wrote liter- >> ature. Another tale tells of William Tell, who shot an arrow through an apple >> while standing on his son's head. >> The Renaissance was an age in which more individuals felt the value of >> their human being. Martin Luther was nailed to the church door at Wittenberg >> for selling papal indulgences. He died a horrible death, being excommunicated >> by a bull. It was the painter Donatello's interest in the female nude that >> made him the father of the Renaissance. It was an age of great inventions and >> discoveries. Gutenberg invented the Bible. Sir Walter Raleigh is a historical >> figure because he invented cigarettes. Another important invention was the >> circulation of blood. Sir Francis Drake circumcised the world with a 100-foot >> clipper. >> >> The government of England was a limited mockery. Henry VIII found walking >> difficult because he had an abbess on his knee. Queen Elizabeth was the "Vir- >> gin Queen." As a queen she was a success. When Elizabeth exposed herself be- >> fore her troops, they all shouted "hurrah." Then her navy went out and >> defeated the Spanish Armadillo. >> >> The greatest writer of the Renaissance was William Shakespear. Shakespear >> never made much money and is famous only because of his plays. He lived in >> Windsor with his merry wives, writing tragedies, comedies and errors. In one >> of Shakespear's famous plays, Hamlet rations out his situation by relieving >> himself in a long soliloquy. In another, Lady Macbeth tries to convince Mac- >> beth to kill the King by attacking his manhood. Romeo and Juliet are an >> example of a heroic couplet. Writing at the same time as Shakespear was Miquel >> Cervantes. He wrote "Donkey Hote". The next great author was John Milto n. >> Milton wrote "Paradise Lost." Then his wife dies and he wrote "Paradise >> Regained." >> >> During the Renaissance America began. Christopher Columbus was a great >> navigator who discovered America while cursing about the Atlantic. His ships >> were called the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Fe. Later the Pilgrims >> crossed the Ocean, and the was called the Pilgrim's Progress. When they >> landed at Plymouth Rock, they were greeted by Indians, who came down the hill >> rolling their was hoops before them. The Indian squabs carried porposies on >> their back. Many of the Indian heroes were killed, along with their >> cabooses, which proved very fatal to them. The winter of 1620 was a hard one >> for the settlers. Many people died and many babies were born. Captain John >> Smith was responsible for all this. >> >> One of the causes of the Revolutionary Wars was the English put tacks in >> their tea. Also, the colonists would send their pacels through the post with- >> out stamps. During the War, Red Coats and Paul Revere was throwing balls over >> stone walls. The dogs were barking and the peacocks crowing. Finally, the >> colonists won the War and no longer had to pay for taxis. >> Delegates from the original thirteen states formed the Contented Congress. >> Thomas Jefferson, a Virgin, and Benjamin Franklin were two singers of the >> Declaration of Independence. Franklin had gone to Boston carrying all his >> clothes in his pocket and a loaf of bread under each arm. He invented elec- >> tricity by rubbing cats backwards and declared "a horse divided against itself >> cannot stand." Franklin died in 1790 and is still dead. >> >> George Washington married Matha Curtis and in due time became the Father >> of Our Country. Them the Constitution of the United States was adopted to >> secure domestic hostility. Under the Constitution the people enjoyed the >> right to keep bare arms. >> >> Abraham Lincoln became America's greatest Precedent. Lincoln's mother >> died in infancy, and he was born in a log cabin which he built with his own >> hands. When Lincoln was President, he wore only a tall silk hat. He said, >> "In onion there is strength." Abraham Lincoln write the Gettysburg address >> while traveling from Washington to Gettysburg on the back of an envelope. He >> also signed the Emasculation Proclamation, and the Fourteenth Amendment gave >> the ex-Negroes citizenship. But the Clue Clux Clan would torcher and lynch >> the ex-Negroes and other innocent victims. On the night of April 14, 1865, >> Lincoln went to the theater and got shot in his seat by one of the actors in >> a moving picture show. The believed assinator was John Wilkes Booth, a sup- >> posedl insane actor. This ruined Booth's career. >> >> Meanwhile in Europe, the enlightenment was a reasonable time. Voltare >> invented electricity and also wrote a book called "Candy". Gravity was >> invented by Issac Walton. It is chiefly noticeable in the Autumn, when the >> apples are flaling off the trees. >> >> Bach was the most famous composer in the world, and so was Handel. Handel >> was half German, half Italian and half English. He was very large. Bach died >> from 1750 to the present. Beethoven wrote music even though he was deaf. He >> was so deaf he wrote loud music. He took long walks in the forest even when >> everyone was calling for him. Beethoven expired in 1827 and later died for >> this. >> >> France was in a very serious state. The French Revolution was accomplished >> before it happened. The Marseillaise was the theme song of the French Revolu- >> tion, and it catapulted into Napoleon. During the Napoleonic Wars, the crowned >> heads of Europe were trembling in their shoes. Then the Spanish gorrilas came >> down from the hills and nipped at Napoleon's flanks. Napoleon became ill with >> bladder problems and was very tense and unrestrained. He wanted an heir to >> inheret his power, but since Josephine was a baroness, she couldn't bear him >> any children. >> >> The sun never set on the British Empire because the British Empire is in >> the East and the sun sets in the West. Queen Victoria was the longest queen. >> She sat on a thorn for 63 years. He reclining years and finally the end of >> her life were exemplatory of a great personality. Her death was the final >> event which ended her reign. >> >> The nineteenth century was a time of many great inventions and thoughts. >> The invention of the steamboat caused a network of rivers to spring up. Cyrus >> McCormick invented the McCormick Raper, which did the work of a hundred men. >> Samuel Morse invented a code for telepathy. Louis Pastuer discovered a cure >> for rabbis. Charles Darwin was a naturailst who wrote the "Organ of the >> Species". Madman Curie discovered radium. And Karl Marx became one of the >> Marx Brothers. >> >> The First World War, cause by the assignation of the Arch-Duck by a surf, >> ushered in a new error in the anals of human history. >> >