I’ve been trying to figure out why Abraham Lincoln was called “Honest.”  I’ve read various explanations.  Some of them seem like folk lore, intended for elementary school teachers to tell their students.  For example, when young Abraham worked as a store clerk, he realized that he overcharged one of his customers by a few pennies.  He then walked a bunch of miles to the person’s house and returned the pennies.  He probably wanted to brag about how the penny featured an image of him…

I also read that when he worked as a lawyer, he would often help poor people for free.  That doesn’t really seem honest, actually. 

The last explanation is incredibly dubious and will most likely not be used by 2nd grade teachers:  Abe Lincoln got the nickname “Honest Abe” for his work as a cockfight official. 

In the three examples, it sounds more appropriate to call him, “Stalker Abe,” “Robin Hood Abe,” and “Creepy Abe.”

Most of us are familiar with Big Ben, one of the most famous landmarks in the United Kingdom.  Peter Pan flew by it (why does Peter Pan keep coming up whenever I try to explain a fact?— sorry). What I didn’t realize was that Big Ben referred to the massive bell inside the clock tower of the Palace of Westminster in London, not the clock itself.  23 feet in diameter, the clock first started ticking on May 31, 1859.  Behind the clock face, we find Big Ben (officially known as the Great Bell).  There are a couple theories behind the nickname.  One is that it’s named after English boxer Ben Caunt, but the most commonly accepted theory is that it’s named after Sir Benjamin Hall, a politician and civil engineer who oversaw the installation of the bell.  There have been instances since its creation, when the clock tower had to slip under the radar.  For 2 years during World War I, the bells were muted and the clock was darkened at night to thwart German zeppelin attacks.  In World War II, the clock was again darkened so it wouldn’t guide the Blitz pilots.  In 1978, the clock was again dimmed following an unexplained infestation of werewolves (of London).