The earliest known working windmills turned in Sistan, on today's Iran–Afghanistan border, by the 900s. Their sails spun around an upright shaft to grind grain and lift well water, centuries before Europe's first windmills.
📍 Edinburgh, Scotland
Scottish physicist David Brewster discovered the effect while experimenting with light around 1815 and patented the toy in 1817, naming it from Greek words for 'beautiful form' and 'to look'.
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📍 Muskegon, Michigan, USA
In 1965 Sherman Poppen of Muskegon, Michigan, made the 'Snurfer' (snow + surfer), a binding-free board most consider the snowboard's direct ancestor.
📍 Hasselt, Belgium
The audio cassette was designed at Philips' factory in Hasselt, Belgium, by Lou Ottens's team; he sized it with a wooden block that fitted his jacket pocket. Unveiled in Berlin in 1963, it was licensed to other makers for free.
📍 Fertile Crescent (Zagros & Taurus mountains)
Goats were domesticated about 10,000 years ago in the hills of the Fertile Crescent. The oldest known herded goats come from Ganj Dareh in Iran's Zagros Mountains, where their wild ancestor, the bezoar ibex, still lives.
📍 Eastern China (Shanghai–Wuhan)
Gung ho is Chinese gōnghé, short for 'industrial cooperative', the name of a 1930s movement in China. US Marine officer Evans Carlson took it to mean 'work together' and made it his battalion's motto.
📍 Yunnan, southwest China
Tea drinking may have begun in China's Yunnan region, where leaves of the native tea plant were first used as medicine. Chinese legend credits the mythical ruler Shennong with discovering it.