The US standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used?

Well, because that's the way they built them in England, and English engineers designed the first US railroads. Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the wagon tramways, and that's the gauge they used.

So, why did 'they' use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they had used for building wagons, which used that same wheel spacing. Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break more often on some of the old, long distance roads in England . You see, that's the spacing of the wheel ruts. So who built those old rutted roads?

Imperial Rome built the first long distance roads in Europe (including England ) for their legions. Those roads have been used ever since. And what about the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match or run the risk of destroying their wagon wheels.

Since the chariots were made for Imperial Rome, they were all alike in the matter of wheel spacing. Therefore the United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches is derived from the original specifications for an Imperial Roman war chariot.

Bureaucracies live forever. So the next time you are handed a specification/procedure/process and wonder 'What horse's as came up with this?', you may be exactly right. Imperial Roman army chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the rear ends of two war horses. (Two horses' asses.)

Now, the twist to the story: When you see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. The SRBs are made by Thiokol at their factory in Utah.

The engineers who designed the SRBs would have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory happens to run through a tunnel in the mountains, and the SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track, as you now know, is about as wide as two horses' behinds.

So, a major Space Shuttle design feature, of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system, was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a horse's ass.

And you thought being a horse's ass wasn't important? Ancient horse's as*es control almost everything.

"And now you know the rest of the story".
- Paul Harvey

That was interesting, thanks.

Y2K called and they want their email back. This one is as old as SF.

“Was standard railroad gauge (4’8½”) determined by Roman chariot ruts?
By Cecil Adams Feb 18, 2000, 1:00am EDT

Dear Cecil: I recently was sent this interesting story by an Internet friend. Is this true? Dave Shorr

Cecil replies:

Nothing I like better than getting to the bottom of some well-known bit of netlore. Dave attached the following, which has been making the E-mail rounds over the past year or two:

The U.S. standard railroad gauge (distance between the rails) is four feet, eight and a half inches. That’s an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used? Because that’s the way they built them in England…” Link

Without googling, why is the abbreviation for pounds, LBS and what does lbs stand for?

quote:

Originally posted by darthfuster:
Without googling, why is the abbreviation for pounds, LBS and what does lbs stand for?

Libra poundo.

Libra (represented by scales for weight and balance) was implied that when bartering by weight items couldn't be hollow or made from lesser materials.

Thinking that is why the currency was called the British Pound. Solid and of the right material.

Idunno, maybe I should have used Google after all.