Guest lvdkeyes Posted October 7, 2009 Posted October 7, 2009 CANNON BALLS!!! DID YOU KNOW THIS? It was necessary to keep a good supply of cannon balls near the cannon on old war ships. But how to prevent them from rolling about the deck was the problem. The storage method devised was to stack them as a square based pyramid, with one ball on top, resting on four, resting on nine, which rested on sixteen. Thus, A supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next to the cannon. There was only one problem -- how to prevent the bottom layer from sliding/rolling from under the others.. The solution was a metal plate with 16 round indentations, called, for reasons unknown, a Monkey. But if this plate were made of iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it. The solution to the rusting problem was to make them of brass - hence, Brass Monkeys. Few landlubbers realize that brass contracts much more and much faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped too far, the brass indentations would shrink so much that the iron cannon balls would come right off the monkey. Thus, it was, quite literally, cold enough to freeze the balls off of a brass monkey. And all this time, folks thought that was just a vulgar expression? Quote
Guest fountainhall Posted October 7, 2009 Posted October 7, 2009 Love it! Reminds me of the old limerick - There was a young man of Madras Whose balls were made of brass. In windy weather They clashed together And sparks came out of his (need I go on?) Quote
Bob Posted October 7, 2009 Posted October 7, 2009 Hate to blow the theory - hell, sounded good to me - but apparently there are some disagreements here. I googled the term as it seemed strange to me that they'd use brass, a somewhat expensive product, to act as a tray (however, apparently brass was used on ships for other reasons). For some reason, I can't link the Wikopedia page titled "Brass monkey (colloquial expression)" but just google "Brass Monkey" and then it should show up as a sublink there. The exact "http" link I get is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brass_monkey_(colloquial_expression) but, as I noted, I can't seem to link it directly here. Quote
Bob Posted October 8, 2009 Posted October 8, 2009 It was meant to be a joke. Hmmmm.....now I feel like a complete dolt (oh well, nothing new). (but, honest, Wikopedia spent a fair amount of space debunking so some people are buying it as the real deal). Quote
Bob Posted October 8, 2009 Posted October 8, 2009 Some people will buy anything. Well, I've got company....you posted it on another board we both belong to and you caught another sucker.... Quote
