The Original Snow White: Cannibal Cravings and Red-Hot Shoes
The Brothers Grimm’s Snow White is grimmer than the cartoon — a mother’s cannibal request and an execution by red-hot iron shoes.
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No, “Baa Baa Black Sheep” Is Not About the Slave Trade
Recurring claims that ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’ is about slavery — or was banned for racism — are folklore. Here’s the documented story.
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Is a Child Buried in London Bridge? The Truth Behind the Rhyme
The claim that a child was buried alive in London Bridge to keep it standing is folklore, not fact. Here’s what the evidence says.
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Was Humpty Dumpty Really a Civil War Cannon?
The story that Humpty Dumpty was a cannon at the 1648 siege of Colchester is a modern invention. Here’s what the rhyme actually is.
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“Rule of Thumb” Does Not Come from a Wife-Beating Law
By The Archivist · March 18, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources The popular story, checked against the evidence. The Real Story Popular claim It comes from a law permitting wife-beating. Verdict Myth The record No such law ever existed; 'rule of thumb' always meant rough, practical measurement. The popular claim “‘Rule of…
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Did Coca-Cola Invent the Modern Santa Claus?
By The Archivist · March 11, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources The popular story, checked against the evidence. The Real Story Popular claim Coca-Cola invented Santa's red suit. Verdict Myth The record The red-suited Santa was already standard decades before the 1931 Coca-Cola ads. The popular claim “Santa wears red because Coca-Cola…
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The Real Story of the Teddy Bear
By The Archivist · March 4, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources The teddy bear is the softest object most of us ever owned, and it is named after a president declining to shoot a bear. Almost everyone knows that much. What the greeting-card version leaves out is that the real event on…
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The Original Sleeping Beauty Is Far Darker Than the Fairy Tale
By The Archivist · February 25, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources There is dark, and then there is the seventeenth-century Italian tale that sits at the root of Sleeping Beauty. This is one case where “the original is disturbing” is not an exaggeration for clicks — it is a plain description of…
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The Original Little Red Riding Hood Had No Rescue
By The Archivist · February 18, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources Of all the “the original was darker” claims, Little Red Riding Hood is the one that most deserves to be taken seriously — and the one most often mangled in the telling. The version we hand to children, with a heroic…
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Does “Ring Around the Rosie” Really Come from the Plague?
By The Archivist · February 11, 2025 · Fact-checked against primary and reference sources Watch a group of small children play the ring game — hands joined, spinning in a circle, everyone collapsing in a heap at the end — and you are watching something that has been happening, in one form or another, for…
