Scatter Brained

C H A P T E R   4

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94
S C A T T E R B R A I N E D
✖  ✖  ✖
One of the most notorious fra-
ternity hazing deaths occurred 
at Kenyon College on 
October 
28,
  1905,  when  hooded  Delta 
Kappa Epsilon brothers tied 
pledge Stuart Pierson to a rail-
road track and ran away, as-
suming  no  more  trains  were 
scheduled that evening. And 
we  all  know  what  happens 
when you assume.
✖  ✖  ✖
You never know what you’re going to fi nd, however, when you 
exhume; so paleontologists digging in Ethiopia were appro-
priately surprised on 
November 24,
 1974, to uncover a 3.18 
million-year-old female hominid of the genius Australopithe-
cus—the oldest protohuman yet discovered. Th
  ey name their 
famous skeleton “Lucy,” a reference to the Beatles song “Lucy 
in the Sky with Diamonds.” (“I’m Looking Th
 rough You” 
seems a more appropriate Beatles nod, but whatever.) “Dia-
monds” it is. . . .
05
  Ice, Ice, Baby—Diamonds
Th
  e world’s largest cut diamond is the pear-cut, 530-carat 
 Cullinan I, which also goes by a more elegant name: “Great 
Star  of  Africa.”  Africa’s  Great  Star,  it  rather  goes  with out 
 
saying, resides in Europe. It’s part of Britain’s Crown 
 Jewels.
Another Avian 
 Conspiracy
The Hooters restaurant chain 
was hatched on 
October 4,
 
1983, in Clearwater, Florida. 
Their heart-stopping chicken 
wings are hawked at more than 
350 locations worldwide, a fa-
vorite of frat boys everywhere.

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95
✖  ✖  ✖
Way back when, diamonds didn’t need advertising cam-
paigns. Th
  e Greeks, poets that they were, believed them to be 
splinters of fallen stars or the teardrops of gods. Plato him-
self guessed they were living beings that embodied celestial 
spirits. And with publicity like that, who needed a shill? By 
1932, however, diamonds had lost some of their luster, with 
annual worldwide sales at a measly $100,000. Diamond  giant 
De Beers decided what their product needed was a new leg-
end, and with the help of Madison Avenue, that’s just what 
they created. Named “slogan 
of the 20th century” by 
Ad-
vertising Age
 magazine, the “a 
diamond is forever” campaign 
convinced millions of wooing 
suitors that there was only 
one way to express their un-
dying devotion—and it wasn’t 
with a sapphire or a ruby. Th
 e 
diamond engagement ring 
became a marketing block-
buster, transforming dia-
monds into a $2 billion-a-year 
business by 1979.
✖  ✖  ✖
When Elizabeth Taylor sat 
down to write her memoir 
in  2001, she didn’t waste 
any pages on her acting ca-
reer or eight marriages. She 
wrote about her diamonds. 
My Love Aff air with Jewelry
 is 
It Really Is Made 
from People
Diamonds are forever, the say-
ing goes—and now you can 
be a diamond forever, too. For 
just a few thousand bucks, 
Chicago’s LifeGem company 
will turn the cremated remains 
of your favorite pet or loved 
one into a reasonably high-
quality “memorial diamond” 
suitable for mounting in a ring 
or necklace. The process repli-
cates the awesome heat and 
pressure needed to create a 
natural diamond, but instead 
of millions of years, it takes 
about six months. One caveat: 
The diamonds tend to be a 
rather unappetizing yellow.