Around this time of a year you may come to witness an eye-opening process in parts of Utah: it’s known as aerial fish stocking. Yes, they drop fish out of airplanes into bodies of water. Plus: in Traverse City, Michigan, there are still a few more days left of the National Cherry Festival.

Utah is dropping thousands of fish from planes – again (CNN)

National Cherry Festival

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Longtime baseball fans know this is the day each year that former star Bobby Bonilla gets more than a million bucks from the New York Mets, as part of the strangest salary deal the sport's ever seen. Plus: today in 1997, Len Libby’s Chocolates in Maine unveiled an icon, Lenny the chocolate moose.

What is Bobby Bonilla Day? Explaining why the former Met gets paid $1.19M every July 1 (ESPN)

Lenny the Moose (Len Libby)

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Today in 1919, the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, which ended the massive conflict known today as World War I and set a lot of postwar international standards, including standard musical pitch. Plus: the Vent Haven Museum in Kentucky showcases the world of ventriloquism, and this weekend it's hosting a a fun run and walk as The Dummy Run 5K.

High Pitch, Low Pitch and Modern Pitch (Robb Stewart Brass Instruments) 

The Vent Haven 2024 Dummy Run 

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This month in 1908, Anne of Green Gables was published. L.M. Montgomery's books have a lot of fans in Japan, which is why a community in northern Japan built a park called Canadian World, complete with a recreation of Anne's hometown of Avonlea. Plus: starting this Saturday in Washington state, it’s the Buckley Log Show.

Abandoned Avonlea: Anne theme park in Japan now like a ghost town (CBC)

Buckley Log Show 

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Yes, the coconut's tropical, and it didn't migrate, but a 2017 research paper found that “Medieval England was unexpectedly full of coconuts.” So King Arthur and his entourage really could've wandered around in search of the Grail banging coconuts together! Plus: starting this Friday in Oklahoma, it’s the Fort Gibson Sweet Corn Festival.

Coconuts in Medieval England Weren’t as Rare as Monty Python and the Holy Grail Made You Think (The Mary Sue)

Fort Gibson Sweet Corn Festival  

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This month in 1878, a horse named Sallie Gardner ran past a series of cameras in Palo Alto, California. The series of photos those cameras took paved the way for motion pictures. Plus: starting tomorrow in Deridder, Louisiana, it’s the Beauregard Watermelon Festival.

Eadweard Muybridge (International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum) 

Beauregard Watermelon Festival  

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Today in 1982, British Airways Flight 009 made a successful landing in Jakarta, Indonesia, after ash from a nearby volcano had shut down all of the plane’s engines. Plus: today in 2022, six new high school graduates in Port Jefferson, New York had to quickly duck out of the commencement ceremonies to go fight a fire.

When volcanic ash stopped a Jumbo at 37,000ft (BBC)

These high school seniors raced away from graduation to fight a fire (Washington Post)

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This week we’re replaying a few of our sweetest episodes. In this show from January 2020, astronauts on the International Space Station bake chocolate chip cookies. But baking cookies in space is a little different than baking them on Earth. Plus: a new device called the Exolung can keep air flowing for virtually as long as a diver likes. 

⁠Space-baked cookies not chips off old block ⁠(The Columbian)

⁠The Exolung gives divers an 'unlimited' underwater air supply⁠ (Designboom) 

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This week we’re replaying a few of our sweetest episodes. In this show from June 2019, Wilmington, Ohio and Latrobe, Pennsylvania are split over which town was the true birthplace of the banana split. Plus: the mind-melting TV show known as the Banana Splits Adventure Hour was actually supposed to have an entirely different name!

⁠Wilmington Banana Split Festival⁠  

⁠Birthplace of the Banana Split⁠ (Ohio Magazine)

⁠The Banana Split: A Rich History⁠ (Pennsylvania Center for the Book) 

⁠10 tra la la true facts about the Banana Splits⁠ (MeTV)  

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This week we’re replaying a few of our sweetest episodes. In this show from November 2019, we get a look at a meringue that's just about the lightest dessert ever made. Plus: the story of a light-emitting fungus gnat in Brazil, which is maybe not as appetizing as the first story.

⁠World’s Lightest Dessert Is 96 Percent Air, Weighs Just One Gram⁠ (Oddity Central)

⁠First South American insect that emits blue light is discovered⁠ (Eurekalert!)

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