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May 15 is National Slider Day

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national slider dayToday is National Slider Day, created in 2015 by the marketing geniuses at White Castle. Sadly, NYC Burger Week (May 1 -7) is now defunct, but you can still celebrate your belly bombs anytime during National Hamburger Month.

There’s debate about the origin of the slider. According to White Castle,

In 1921, Billy Ingram launched a family-owned business with $700 and an idea, selling five-cent, small, square hamburgers so easy to eat, they were dubbed Sliders and sold by the sack.

While it may have invented the mini-burger, some sources state that Navy soldiers invented the term “slider” in the 1940s to describe a tiny, greasy burger that slid down easily. The version with cheese was referred to as a “slider with a lid.”

When I say “sources,” I’m referring to the blogosphere, which tends to take other blogs’ assertions as fact without further research. I hesitate to amplify that dodgy story here, but, at presstime, the US Navy has not responded to requests for comment.

In any case, since then, that thin strip of beef topped with onions and pickles has evolved into upscale fare. Trying to ingest a nouveau slider in one bite could present a choking hazard and result in a request that you leave the restaurant immediately.

No matter how you plan to celebrate, have a happy National Slider Day!

May 14 is Underground America Day

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underground america dayToday is Underground America Day, created in 1974 by architect Malcolm Wells. After designing the RCA Pavilion for the 1964 World’s Fair, which would be torn down only two years later, he came to the conclusion that every structure he built needlessly destroyed that which had previously lived in its footprint.

He described his epiphany this way: “I woke up one day to the fact that the Earth’s surface was made for living plants, not industrial plants.”

This led to his espousal of “gentle architecture,” construction in harmony with nature. He built his home and offices underground, wrote several books about environmental design, and lectured at Harvard and elsewhere.

He had a great sense of humor about the day he’d created. “On May 14th each year, hundreds of millions of people all across this great land will do absolutely nothing about the national holiday I declared in 1974, and that’s just the way it should be,” he said.

“It’s a holiday free of holiday obligations. You don’t even have to lose a day of work. But if you’re the partying type, here are some of the ways in which you can observe the big day.”

At some point before his death on November 27, 2009, at the age of 83, Wells penned his own obituary. It makes us wish we’d gotten the chance to know him. Happy Underground America Day!

May 12 is National Nutty Fudge Day

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national nutty fudge day

Today is National Nutty Fudge Day. Where did this tasty treat originate, and how did it get its name?

The creation of American-style chocolate fudge is often credited to student Emelyn Hartridge and her Vassar Fudge recipe. She later revealed in a letter, preserved in the Vassar College Archives, that she had cheated:

Fudge, as I first knew it, was first made in Baltimore by a cousin of a school mate of mine. It was sold in 1886 in a grocery store for 40 cents a pound and my brother Julian bought me my first box. … I secured the recipe and in my first year at Vassar I made it there — and in 1888 I made 30 pounds for the Senior Auction, its real introduction to the college, I think.

Miss Hartridge neglected to name the school chum, her cousin, or the store that sold it in Baltimore. The paper trail ends there, so we’re unable to determine who invented fudge, or at least its chocolate incarnation. Was it a happy accident, a confectionery miracle, or a product of diligent trial and error? The world may never know.

It’s also unclear how fudge earned its name. Delving into the history of the word reveals no easy answers. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the use of fudge as a verb meaning to “put together clumsily or dishonestly” dates to 1771. The word itself may have derived from fadge, “to make suit or fit,” used since the 1570s.

In 1664, Samuel Pepys, whose diaries are used by scholars to illuminate the English Restoration period, wrote of Captain Fudge, a merchant seaman he had engaged to take goods to Tangier before the discovery of his “knavery and neglect.”

After finding the condition of the ship, no master, not above four men, and many ship’s provisions, sayls, and other things wanting, I went back and called upon Fudge, whom I found like a lying rogue unready to go on board, but I did so jeer him that I made him get every thing ready….I confess I am at a real trouble for fear the rogue should not do his work, and I come to shame and losse of the money I did hope justly to have got by it.

We don’t hear of Captain Fudge again, so perhaps he acquitted himself well. But is he the reason “fudge” became a derogatory verb? A pamphlet called Remarks on the Navy, printed in 1700, had this to say:

There was, sir, in our time, one Captain Fudge, commander of a merchantman, who upon his return from a voyage, how ill-fraught soever his ship was, always brought home his owners a good cargo of lies; so much that now, aboard ship, the sailors, when they hear a great lie told, cry out, ‘You fudge it!’

It seems possible that a seaman derelict in his duties may have influenced the English language. As for who invented delicious, sugary fudge: Who cares? Let’s eat some and call it a day. (Well, it is already a day.) If you’re not a fan of nuts, hang in there. National Fudge Day is June 16th!

Happy National Nutty Fudge Day!

May 11 is National Root Canal Appreciation Day

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national root canal appreciation dayToday is National Root Canal Appreciation Day, created in 2005 by Wisconsin dentist Chris Kammer.

Dr. Kammer became known as “America’s Favorite Rock’n’Roll Dentist” in July 2004 when he performed his original rap song “Get Out the Brush” at Madison Mallards collegiate league ballpark, inspiring 5,991 baseball fans to brush their teeth simultaneously.

Sadly, that number was surpassed the following year by 13,380 people at a Colgate-sponsored event at San Salvador’s Cuscatlán Stadium in El Salvador. Yet another Colgate-sponsored event in 2019 nearly doubled that number with 26,382 synchronized brushers and has remained the Guinness World Record ever since.

In April 2005, Dr. Kammer announced he would inaugurate Root Canal Appreciation Day on May 11th by returning to the ballpark and performing a root canal on home plate. He encouraged other dentists to perform root canals in public places. Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle and Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz issued proclamations recognizing the holiday.

We can find no confirmation that he did the procedure; it seems like the kind of publicity stunt that would have a gotten a little, you know, publicity. We found a recent podcast in which he discusses a dental hygiene program that he calls “Gums of Steel.”

We also came across Dr. Kammer’s 2011 audition for American Idol. You didn’t think we’d make you go to bed tonight wondering what “Get Out the Brush” sounds like, did you? It’s mercifully short and every bit as entertaining when watched with the sound off. Either way, it will quickly become obvious why: a) he should keep his day job, and b) we don’t want his hands in our mouths.

Happy National Root Canal Appreciation Day!