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Q: Are postal carriers not required to wear uniforms any more?
A: When mail delivery in large cities began in 1863, no official uniforms were worn. Congress passed legislation authorizing use of uniforms by letter carriers on July 27, 1868. The first uniform was blue-gray with black trim. Letter carriers have worn uniforms since 1868. A cap or other headgear was mandatory until December 1972. Uniforms have changed over time to provide greater comfort, especially in hot weather. In 1973, for example, the Postal Service allowed letter carriers to wear knee-length shorts with black knee-length hose during the summer months.
Permanent full-time city letter carriers and other postal employees who deal with the public are required to wear uniforms. New employees have 90 days before the uniform requirement takes effect. Rural carriers are not required to wear uniforms.
Q: Could you please tell me if former President Jimmy Carter ever served on a Navy submarine?
A: President Jimmy Carter was an officer aboard some of the Navy's first nuclear submarines. A 1946 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, the Plains native served in both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets, rising to the rank of lieutenant. Carter was the first submariner to become U.S. president.
Among his sub officer assignments were communications, sonar, electronics, gunnery and supply. He ultimately qualified for command of a submarine.
The U.S. Navy named a submarine the USS Jimmy Carter after the 39th president. His Navy career included assignments to battleships as well.
Q: What is the time difference between the U.S. and France, where the Tour de France is taking place?
A: France is six hours ahead of our Eastern Time Zone, so if it's noon in New York, it's 6 p.m. in Paris. France is in the Central European Time Zone (CET), which is 1 hour ahead of Greenwich Mean Time. Like many European countries, daylight saving time is observed in France, where the time is set ahead by 1 hour in March and set back by 1 hour to CET in October.
The 95th Tour de France began Saturday, July 5 and will end Sunday, July 27 in Paris. It is made up of 21 stages and will cover a total distance of 3,500 kilometers or 2,175 miles, which is just a few miles short of the distance between Atlanta, Ga. and Seattle, Wa.
Q: Would you give a "5th grade" explanation of the dew point and the calculations used to obtain the number?
A: Buzz Bernard, meteorologist with The Weather Channel, explains that humidity is the amount of moisture in the air. Dew point is the temperature to which the air would have to be cooled to condense, or form dew. The higher the dew point, the more humid the air.
Calculating the dew point can be done several ways. One of the many instruments available is a sling psychrometer. It consists of two thermometers mounted together with a handle attached on a chain. One thermometer is ordinary while the other one, a wet-bulb thermometer, has a cloth wick over its bulb.
Another popular method is an algorithm based on the Magnus-Tetens formula using measured air temperature and relative humidity. The formula can be found at www.paroscientific.com/dewpoint.htm
Q: What is the weight of a gold brick at the Fort Knox depository and how much would it be worth today?
A: Each gold brick or bullion stored at Fort Knox is slightly smaller than an average house brick and weighs about 27.5 pounds. Each gold brick is worth around $376,000 based on the July open-market trading price of $940 per troy ounce.
The U.S. Bullion Depository at Fort Knox opened in 1937, and it holds 147.3 million ounces of gold, down from a peak of nearly 650 million ounces in 1941. Other than small test quantities, no gold has been transferred to or from the depository for many years.
Q: Is British Prime Minister Gordon Brown married, divorced or never married?
A: Brown married Sarah Jane Macaulay in 2000 after a lengthy courtship. They have two sons: John, born in 2003, and Fraser, born in 2006. Their daughter, Jennifer, died from a brain hemorrhage at the age of 10 days in 2002. The former treasury chief became Britain's prime minister in June 2007.
Q: We've already heard of the first hurricane for this season. What's the earliest date that a hurricane has formed and come ashore?
A: Hurricane season runs from June 1 through Nov. 30. An early hurricane is defined by the Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory as occurring in the three months prior to the start of the season.
The earliest observed hurricane in the Atlantic was on March 7, 1908; and the latest, Alice, on Dec. 31, 1954.
As for hurricanes that made landfall on the United States, the earliest was Alma, which hit northwest Florida on June 9, 1966; and the latest, a storm that landed Nov. 30, 1925, near Tampa.
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