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Brief History Pretty Different Than Reality


The history lessons you didn't receive in High School....


Part I (the B.C. years)

3050 B.C. - A Sumerian invents the wheel. Within the week, the idea is stolen and duplicated by other Sumerians, thereby establishing the business code of ethics.

2900 B.C. - Egyptians create Sphinx, one of Seven Great Wonders of the Ancient, but refuse to talk about it.

1850 B.C. - Britons announce Operation Stonehenge a success after arranging slabs in sufficiently meaningless pattern to confuse scientists for centuries.

1785 B.C. - The first calendar is introduced by Babylonian scientists.

1768 B.C. - Babylonians experience winter in June.

776 B.C. - The world's first known money appears in Persia. World's first known counterfeiter appears in Persia next day.

525 B.C. - The first Olympics are held in Greece. USSR enters six footer with a mustache in women's shot put.

410 B.C. - Rome ends the practice of enslaving debtors, removing biggest single obstacle to the development of the credit card.

404 B.C. - The Peloponnesian war enters 27th year because neither side can find a treaty writer who can spell Peloponnesian.

214 B.C. - Tens of thousands of Chinese people complete 1,500 mile long Great Wall. Neighbor's dog gets through.

1 B.C. - Calendar manufacturers argue over what to call next year.

Part II ( Early A.D.)

79 A.D. - Property in Pompeii turns out to be bad investment.

432 A.D - St. Patrick introduces Christianity to Ireland, thereby giving the natives topic to fight about for the rest of recorded history.

1000 A.D. - Leif Ericsson discovers America; decides it's not worth mentioning.

1043 A.D. - Lady Godiva demonstrates against high taxes, causing all to forget what she is demonstrating against.

1125 A.D. - Arabic numerals are introduced to Europe, enabling peasants to solve how much tax each owes on MMMDCCCLX Lira when you're in the XXXVI percent bracket?

1233 A.D. - Inquisition begins. Practice is so un-Christian it is permitted to continue for only 600 years.

1297 A.D. - World's first stock exchange opens. Few have foresight to buy IBM.

1433 A.D. - Portugal launches African slave trade, proving what a small nation can do with a little ingenuity and much evil.

1456 A.D. - English judge reviews Joan of Arc's case and cancels her death sentence of 1431.

1492 A.D. - Columbus lands in Bahamas, names it San Salvador, and calls natives Indians.

1497 A.D. - Amerigo Vespucci becomes the first to think of naming the new world in honor of himself...the United States of Vespuccia!

1508 A.D. - Michelangelo accedes to Pope's demands to paint ceiling of Sistine Chapel, but refuses to wash the windows.

1513 A.D. - Ponce de Leon finds the Fountain of Youth, but dies of old age trying to remember where.

1522 A.D. - Scientists, who know the world is flat, conclude that

Magellan made it all the way around by crawling across the bottom.

1568 A.D. - Upset by the slander of his good name, Russian leader kills 100,000 peasants to make them stop calling him Ivan the Terrible.

1607 A.D. - Indians laugh themselves silly as first European tourist to visit Virginia tries to register as "John Smith".

1618 A.D. - Britain executes Sir Walter Raleigh, but allow his tobacco plants to live.

1642 A.D. - The first nine students to receive Bachelor of Arts degrees in America, discover there are no jobs available for a kid with a liberal arts education.

1670 A.D. - Pilgrims, busy burning witches, fail to observe golden anniversary of winning religious freedom.

1755 A.D. - Samuel Johnson issues the first English Dictionary, at last providing young children with a source of dirty words.

1758 A.D. - New Jersey is chosen as the site of America's first Indian reservation, giving Indians an idea of living conditions they can expec


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Submitted on: 19 October 1998 by Ropa
Joke ID: 1041


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