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Glad You Asked 5.14
By Chris Bennett
Is there an ordinance concerning a vehicle blocking the city sidewalk?
We went to http://www.cityofracine.org and searched through the City of Racine's Municipal Codes.
Section 66-706 deals with parking. The text on the Web site reads as follows: "No person shall park a bicycle upon any sidewalk or upon any roadway in such a manner as to interfere with free passage of vehicles or pedestrians."
Section 66-108 deals with material obstructions. We quote: "No person shall cause the obstruction of any public street, highway, sidewalk, or any other public place or building by the placement of any object or thing which would hinder or impede, or tend to hinder or impede, the free and uninterrupted passage of vehicles or pedestrians."
What is the history of the ice cream cone? It all started in 1904, at the World's Fair in St. Louis, with a Syrian immigrant named Ernest A. Hamwi.
Hamwi, a pastry vendor, sold zalabia - a crisp, sugary, warm treat baked in a waffle iron over an open fire.
Hamwi conceived a delicious union. He wrapped his warm pastry in the shape of a cone and handed it to the adjacent vendor, who stuffed it full of ice cream.
The success of this wonderful treat was immediate. People called them World's Fair Cornucopias, and in the highest form of flattery, every pastry and ice cream vendor grabbed a piece of the ice cream cone-action by fair's end.
The idea spread throughout the world. The world's largest cone manufacturer, Joy Cones, gave us this answer and - oh, yeah - makes 1.5 billion cones each year.
The International Association of Ice Cream Manufacturers recognizes Hamwi as the official inventor of the ice cream cone.
The average American eats 15 quarts of ice cream per year. And manufacturers in the U.S. produced 1,650 million gallons of ice cream in the year 2000.
Does Wisconsin have a "lemon law?" I hope so. Citrus gone bad is something we all fear.
Moving onŠ A "lemon law" is in force in the Badger State. The Department of Transportation web site deals extensively with the lemon law. Check it out at: http://www.dot.wisconsin.gov/safety/consumer/ rights/lemonlaw.htm
How did Piggly Wiggly get its name? Our answer is courtesy of PigglyWiggly.com Clarence Saunders founded Piggly Wiggly in Memphis, Tenn., in 1916.
His idea of a grocery store revolutionized the way you shop for groceries.
Prior to Piggly Wiggly, shoppers gave their grocery list to a clerk, who then gathered the goods for the shopper.
Saunders found this wasteful, and developed a way for shoppers to serve themselves. Piggly Wiggly introduced shopping carts, open shelves and no clerks to shop for the customer.
Saunders' new idea caught on, and he issued both franchises and stock. He controlled Piggly Wiggly through the early 1920s, but lost control through a series of bad stock transactions.
He fielded constant questions about the name; the Web site said Saunders was curiously reluctant to explain its origin.
One story is that he saw, from a train window, several little pigs struggling to get under a fence, and the rhyming name occurred to him then.
Someone once asked him why he picked such an unusual name for his organization. Saunders is reported to have said:
"So people will ask that very question."
Saunders obviously wanted a name worthy of being talked about and remembered, and it's clear he reached his goal.
What is Glad You Asked?
Glad You Asked finds answers to the questions that keep you up at night. Don't lose sleep. Send your questions to at ask@journaltimes.com or call (262) 631-1758.
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