Ultima Thule

It is more difficult to get the public interested in celestial objects when they have names like "2014 MU69." Astronomers tend to name things initially and officially in that way but "sexier" names seem to come later more and more. (see this about that) This is a good thing. This site asks, "What's in a name?" A character from Shakespeare might say it doesn't matter, but I say it matters a lot.

The NASA team that works with the New Horizons exploratory spacecraft gave 2014 MU69 the nickname of Ultima Thule. Much better.

Thule was a mythical island that appeared on some old maps as being at the edge of the known world. It was also labeled as "Tile" on at least one map from 1539 called the Carta Marina. This was a map of what Nordic sailors knew about the world. They placed Thule near the Faroe Islands.

The Faroe Islands are not mythical. They (AKA Faeroe Islands) are a North Atlantic archipelago located 200 miles (320 km) north-northwest of the United Kingdom and about halfway between Norway and Iceland. Today they are an autonomous country of the Kingdom of Denmark with a total area of about 540 square miles and a population of over 50,000.

The direct translation of Ultima Thule is “beyond Thule” and is a very fitting name for something beyond the edges of our currently known world.

If you want to know a bit more about the space exploration side of Ultima Thule, check out this post on one of my other blogs. 

Thule (TILE) near the Faroe Islands - Carta Marina map, 1539.

Kodak

An original Kodak camera

The company we know as Kodak was once known as the Eastman Kodak company. Digital photography and video killed most of their business which ranged from the average consumer to the big Hollywood movie studios. The company is not a big player in either market these days, but it once ruled the American film and photography business.

George Eastman received a patent for the first film camera in 1888. Eastman had been an enthusiastic photographer but found bulky cameras and heavy, breakable glass plates cumbersome and inconvenient. He wanted to make it easier for people to take up photography.

By 1880, he had improved on the previous photographic plate, so he formed his own business. He then developed cellulose film which could be rolled onto a spool which eliminated the need for plates altogether. 

Next, he designed a camera that could make use of a roll of film and he obtained a patent for that invention, which came to be known as the Kodak box camera. The box camera could hold enough rolled film to shoot 100 exposures and it completely revolutionized the art and science of photography. 

The genius of his company is summarized in the slogan he patented - “You press the button. We do the rest.” They sold you the camera, sold you the film, and did the processing and printing. They owned the whole cycle of photography. Even if you did your own developing and printing in a darkroom, you bought their chemicals and paper.

The name “Kodak” is also an invention of George Eastman. It actually has no special meaning. He once explained, “I devised the name myself. The letter ‘K’ had been a favorite with me — it seems a strong, incisive sort of letter. It became a question of trying out a great number of combinations of letters that made words starting and ending with ‘K.’ The word ‘Kodak’ is the result.”

The company known as Eastman Kodak eventually shortened its name to just Kodak. 

By Work-Order Studio to Commons., Public Domain, Link

Tennessee Titans

The Houston Oilers, who played at the Astrodome from 1960-96, moved to Nashville for the 1997 season. They maintained the name Oilers along with an oil derrick logo. After two seasons as the Tennessee Oilers, owner Bud Adams announced that the team would change its nickname since Nashville had no ties to the oil industry as Houston had.

In 1999, the franchise unveiled a new logo as the team was renamed the Tennessee Titans.

"Titans" has some history as a football team name. It had been the earlier name for the current-day NY Giants.

Adams selected the name because "Titans" were powerful ruling figures in Greek mythology and that seemed to fit since Nashville is nicknamed the "The Athens of the South." (Of course, it's also known as "Music City.") The city's own Parthenon is a full-scale replica of the original Parthenon in Athens, Greece.

The Titans' website has quite a bit of information about the franchise's Oiler history.