Upbeat News Thursday
- Editor OGN Daily
- 4 minutes ago
- 4 min read
A smorgasbord of tasty news nuggets to perk up the day.
"At Work As One Thing"
American architect Frank Lloyd Wright is most famous for the hundreds of structures he designed over his seven-decade career. But in addition to sketching out buildings, Wright also created custom furnishings, many of which bear the hallmarks of his signature Prairie style. “It is quite impossible to consider the building as one thing, its furnishings another and its setting and environment still another,” he once wrote. “The spirit in which these buildings are conceived sees all these together at work as one thing.” Now, Sotheby’s has sold one of Wright’s furniture pieces - a rare double-pedestal lamp - for a record-breaking $7.5 million. The sale celebrates “not only a remarkable piece of American design but a landmark moment in the legacy of one of the most visionary architects in history,” says Jodi Pollack, an expert in 20th-century design at Sotheby’s.
Longest Train Journey
The world’s longest train journey takes you from Lagos, a sleepy town in Portugal, across 13 countries and eight time zones to Singapore. The current route of this epic journey was made possible by the completion of the Laos-China Railway in 2021. Nobody has ever made the journey - not because it’s impossible, but because it’s tangled in logistical snags, practical concerns, and philosophical questions. That’s a distance by rail of 11,654 miles (18,755 km), and (if you plan your connections well and don’t miss any) takes about 14 days. Why not be the first?
Coveted 'Beep'
A Canadian kid is proof that scientific discoveries don’t always have to come from grizzled researchers with fancy equipment. 8-year-old Lucas Atchison went on a family trip to Point Farms Provincial Park in Ontario. Armed with a metal detector he had just received as a birthday present, Atchison dutifully scanned the area, hoping to hear that coveted “beep.”
Eventually, he did. Eagerly digging into the site, Lucas uncovered a metal spike, which his father initially dismissed as something used to tie up boats. But the budding archaeologist insisted they dig further. Soon, they uncovered another spike attached to a piece of wood. The father-son pair had likely stumbled on a two-century-old shipwreck. Popular Science reports that archeologists believe the boy may have found the remains of the St. Anthony, a schooner that crashed in 1856.
Race to The Bottom
More than 160 runners have signed up for a 5km race in South Carolina, US, at which "tracksuits are out; birthday suits are in", said Spartanburg's The Post and Courier. The "Buck Creek Streak", which takes place on 14 June, has been an annual fixture at the Carolina Foothills nudist resort for 11 years. "You can go anywhere and do a 5km, but you can't go anywhere and run a 5km naked," said resort board director Tom Crowder.
"Miracle Save"
In a nail-biting mission to secure Voyager 1 before the only antenna that can send commands to the spacecraft goes offline for upgrades, NASA engineers revived thrusters aboard the probe that have been considered dead for more than two decades. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 launched in 1977 to study Jupiter and Saturn, and were originally intended to last just five years. Incredibly, they eventually entered interstellar space. Needless to say, the probes have transcended their mission, and no wonder reviving the thrusters from 15 billion miles away was described as a "miracle save" by Todd Barber, the mission’s propulsion lead at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Polish Coal
Coal produces less than half of Poland’s power for first time since 1800s. According to a report by Forum Energii, an energy think tank, electricity produced from coal in April 2025 amounted to 49.4 percent of the total energy mix.
The Power of Cities
As Austria’s new coalition government scales back climate action, Vienna, home to 20 percent of the country’s population, has continued to make climate legislation a priority. The city is already heating thousands of homes with geothermal energy, installing heat pumps, planting trees, implementing district cooling (a climate-friendly alternative to air conditioning), requiring all new buildings to add solar panels, and improving flooding management by expanding green spaces and ponds. And most recently, the city passed a law to reduce climate pollution to zero by 2040, primarily by replacing natural gas usage with geothermal energy. Vienna’s commitment serves as an important example for other cities as governments across the world fail to fulfil emissions reduction commitments or have deprioritized climate action, given that 70 percent of global CO2 emissions come from cities.
“If you have the courage to begin, you have the courage to succeed.” David Viscott
On This Day
22 May 1849: Future U.S. president Abraham Lincoln was granted a patent for a boat-lifting device; he is still the only U.S. president to have a patent.
Today's Articles
Beneath Our Feet: Scientists share the 'exploration recipe' for powering Earth with clean energy for thousands of years.
You Couldn't Make It Up: Duck caught speeding on traffic camera in Switzerland is a repeat offender.
Recreating The Vibe: The Emerald Isle has exported over 2,000 hand-built, custom-designed Irish pubs around the globe.
Mood Boosting Video
Data Visualisation: NASA's mesmerizing view of Earth's ocean currents.