Metafilter

Metafilter.com is a link-trading and discussion site I frequent. Sometimes I attempt to make posts that will elicit admiring comments because, well, I want these people I've never met to like me.

This one is about the Detroit Riot of 1863, which nobody ever hears of because of the much larger riot that took place in New York City a few months later. I wrote an award-winning paper about it in grad school.

This one is about the Toledo War of 1835, when Michigan decided to invade Toledo to keep Ohio from stealing it from them. (The area was given to Michigan Territory by the Northwest Ordinance of 1787.) My friend Duncan wrote a paper about it in grad school.

This one is about the guy who invented the equals sign. Yep.

This one is about the theft of "the Mona Lisa of sculpture," Benvenuto Cellini's salt cellar, which was recently recovered. I learned about this in a book written by my favorite art historian.

And this one is about the Brasher Doubloon, the most valuable American coin ever minted. I learned about it while researching a writeup for the 1947 film of the same name, which we were going to show at my theater.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled interesting reading.