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Here are today’s five things to know about farm animals :

  1. Pig insulin is used to control diabetes.
  2. Goats and sheep don’t have teeth on their upper jaw. They have a hard palate that helps them grind their food.
  3. The chicken is the closest living relative to the T-Rex.
  4. Geese are faithful, mate for life, and mourn when their partner dies.
  5. Cows have a memory of about three years.

Today’s Food History

  • 1795 Robert Bakewell died. Bakewell was an agriculturalist who helped revolutionize cattle and sheep breeding in England. He obtained the best animals he could find and then worked with a closed herd, inbreeding only superior animals.
  • 1908 The Model T Ford was introduced at a price of $825. Due to efficient mass production, by 1925 the price of a 2 door Model T was only $260.
  • 1913 A monument to honor sea gulls was erected in Salt Lake City. The gulls had eaten the plague of grasshoppers that threatened the Mormon settlers crops in 1848.
  • 1916 The first Piggly-Wiggly supermarket opened.
  • 1924 James Earl (Jimmy) Carter was born. He was a peanut farmer, and 39th president of the U.S. (He also claimed to have been attacked by a rabbit while canoeing. He beat the rabbit off with a paddle).
  • 1943 Jerry Martini of the music group ‘Sly & The Family Stone’ was born.
  • 1971 Disney World opened at Orlando, Florida.
  • 1972 Louis Leakey died. Anthropologist largely responsible for convincing scientists that Africa was the place to search for human origins, not Java or China. Together with his wife Mary, they made many significant fossil discoveries.
  • 1974 The first McDonald’s restaurant opened in London.
  • 1980 European Community countries banned the use of hormones in cattle feed.
  • 2006 Sometime during October 2006 the population of the U.S. will reach 300 million.
  • 2006 The New Orleans  landmark restaurant, Commander’s Palace, reopened. It had been closed since Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in August, 2005.
  • 2009 McDonald’s closed its 3 locations in Iceland this month due to the ‘complex operational environment.’