If we define a robot as a machine that works like a human being, then the first robots were automata: remarkable moving dolls that could copy human actions, sometimes with amazing facility. For example, one could write a whole sentence using a pen and ink. Automata were made in the 1700s. They worked by clockwork and contained very complex system …

The story of the battle of Troy is told in Homer’s poem the Iliad. About 1200 B.C. a huge, hollow, wooden horse was felt outside the great walls of the mighty city of Troy. Inside, a group of armed men lay hidden. For nine years Troy had been besieged by the Greeks. It appeared they had now abandoned the siege, …

Screech owls are typical owls (Strigidae) belonging to the genus Megascops. The species name Kennicotti was created in honour of American explorer and naturalist Robert Kennicotti. It was officially called Kennicott’s Owl. Twenty-one living species are known at present, but new ones are frequently recognized and unknown ones are still being discovered on a regular basis, especially in the Andes.

The year 1860 is the United States as the year that saw the birth of the Pony Express. The opening up of the West brought the need for faster and faster communications, and the Pony Express riders carried the mail at breakneck speed. They were young men chosen for their light weight, horsemanship and powers of endurance. They had light …

In 1907 a concrete track for testing and racing motor cars opened at Brookelands, near Weybridge in Surrey. It was built by Hugh Locke-King, a motoring enthusiast, at a cost of nearly £250,000. It was the first to be constructed in the world. The track was almost 5 km long, averaged 30 m in width and was banked at the …

In the sixteenth century, every seafaring nation was looking for a sea route to the East Indies either by way of the New World or around Africa. Because Spain commanded the Cape Horn route and Portugal the one around Africa. The rest of Europe had to seek a third alternative. Their seamen hoped to find a passage north-west through or …

Pegasus was the winged horse of Greek mythology – the steed ridden by Bellerophon when he killed the Chimaera, a fearsome, fire-breathing animal. When Bellerophon tried to fly to heaven, Pegasus threw him and was killed. Pegasus became a constellation. Another legend about Pegasus concerns a song contest held by the Muses. The music made Mount Helicon start to grow …

What was a revolt by Indian soldiers, or sepoys, against their British officers and rulers in 1857. One of the immediate causes was the issue of new cartridges. These were believed to contained the fat of cows, sacred to Hindus, and of pigs, which Moslems regarded as defiling. In May eighty-five sepoys at Meerut were court-martialled for refusing to use …

A Norwegian, Fritdjof Nansen, had the idea of building a ship that would be lifted up by the pressure of ice forming around it. It would then drift northwards with the floes, where no ship had ever been before. His famous ship the Fram was the result. He sailed it to northern Siberia and it drifted exactly as he had …

When John Cabot’s ship reached the Newfoundland coast in 1497 he was amazed at the fantastic amount of fish existing in those waters. His account of the vast quantities of cod that could be caught simply by lowering a bucket over the side and scooping them up soon brought fishermen of other countries to the area. When Jacques Cartier explored …