In 1897, the Indiana House of Representatives passed a bill mandating that the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle (pi) was 3.2. Now, 112 years later, their neighbors in the Illinois Senate have passed a resolution redefining Pluto as a planet, at least when it passes through the Illinois night sky. Of course, Pluto may not even travel through the Illinois night sky for some time.
posted by grouse on Mar 6, 2009 - 59 comments

This year at the Indiana State Fair: Coco the Colossal Colon.
posted by These Premises Are Alarmed on Aug 8, 2008 - 19 comments

Some advice for Mefites who want to run for Congress: It is probably not a good idea to give a speech at a birthday celebration for Hitler. It is also generally considered tacky to discuss segregation in a positive light. Also, posting anti-Semitic comments, links to David Duke's website, and other scary but interesting articles to your official campaign website is probably not a good idea, even if you actually seem to be a reasonably competent lawyer.
posted by cerebus19 on Apr 25, 2008 - 126 comments

Kelvin Sampson probably gone Sooner than later. Ever since Bob Knight got fired from Indiana University, alumni have been upset that one of his lineage was not brought in to replace him. [more inside]
posted by dragonsi55 on Feb 16, 2008 - 12 comments

Ohio Valley Creative Energy Ohio Valley Creative Energy was founded to provide a heat intensive multi-arts facility for glass, clay, and metal artists that will be powered by methane, AKA landfill gas.
posted by pt68 on Mar 22, 2007 - 3 comments

Homeland Security Ranks Indiana As State With Most Terror Targets

The Homeland Security's National Asset Data Base [PDF] of vulnerable critical infrastructure and key resources "reads like a tally of terrorist targets that a child might have written: Old MacDonald’s Petting Zoo, the Amish Country Popcorn factory, the Mule Day Parade, the Sweetwater Flea Market and an unspecified 'Beach at End of a Street.'" The report noted that Indiana has 8,591 assets listed in the database — more than any other state and 50 percent more than New York. New York had 5,687 listed. Inspector General Richard Skinner finds that the database "is too faulty to accurately help divide federal funds to states and cities."
posted by ericb on Jul 12, 2006 - 66 comments

The Indiana Department of Homeland Security revealed its newest tool for protecting Hoosiers today: a brand new 53-foot mobile command center. It's the EM-50 Urban Assault Vehicle!
posted by augustweed on Jun 8, 2006 - 37 comments

Indiana finally adopts EST+DST tomorrow (discussed previously.) The historic lack of DST meant software hacks for calculating time in Indiana. People running OS X 10.4.5 are ready. Windows Users need to reset their machines for their location, possibly making some calendar entries an hour off. Unix may need a manual update depending on your distribution. Most Indiana users of OS X Panther and OS9 users should fake living in Atlanta. But with 36 years of legacy systems possibly coded and probably configured with an geography-specific hack, I'm expecting things to be a bit messy on Monday. Personally, I'm just hoping that Travelocity gave me the right time for my Thursday flight.
posted by KirkJobSluder on Apr 1, 2006 - 29 comments

People began the prayer session at 10 a.m. by chanting "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus." A judge's ruling barred the Indiana House of Representatives from invoking the name of Jesus or any other specific deity in official prayers. That didn't prevent the lawmakers for holding their own prayer, nor did it keep about 30 people from gathering in the Statehouse rotunda this morning to pray. In fact, the ruling motivated them.
posted by mountainmambo on Jan 5, 2006 - 97 comments

Free music from Muncie!
posted by kenko on Nov 13, 2005 - 13 comments

Welcome to Indiana: married straight parents only. The Indiana state legislature is considering a bill that would make it illegal for anyone other than a married couple to become pregnant by artificial means such as artificial insemination or egg/embryo donation. In addition, couples wishing to have their inseminations approved will have to apply and provide information including criminal history checks and "description of the family lifestyle of the intended parents, including participation in faith-based or church activities."
posted by XQUZYPHYR on Oct 4, 2005 - 78 comments

It's about damn time. Since 1966, Daylight Saving Time has not been in use in Indiana. After decades of attempts to change it, it came down to one flip vote at the proverbial last second to make it happen. Next up, Central Time Zone?
posted by internal on Apr 29, 2005 - 76 comments

Twenty-year sentence for selling two Oxycontin pills "I want to be a good person." said Johnson. "I wish I could have the chance to better myself and repay my debt to society. I want to go to college. ... It was just two little pills. ... This one time, please give me a chance. Please." A small town in Indiana doles out tough sentences and offers classes on the community's out of control drug problem.
posted by billysumday on Feb 8, 2005 - 268 comments

Streaming video documentary films about American traditional music. Great American roots music films for free! Click and watch full length documentaries about the Popovich Brothers Tamburitza band of South Bend Indiana, Louisiana creole fiddler Canray Fontenot, the last Black medicine-show performer, sacred harp singing and much more. An amazing collaboration between folklorists and indie film makers.
posted by zaelic on Mar 8, 2004 - 2 comments

Why Hindu's make better teachers than gays. Eric Rasmusen, professor of Economics and Public Policy at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business, has been allowed by the University to continue to update his occasionally homophobic weblog in the interests of free speech. Should this be allowed? Allowing due consideration for free speech, how does this type of speech disrupt open participation in an academic setting?
posted by cohappy on Sep 8, 2003 - 114 comments

Visit Madison, Indiana. Why? We're not New York City! Sure you can be opportunistic about selling gas masks if you're an internet entrepreneur, but what if you're a small town in Indiana and you want to cash in on fear of terrorism. Why, tout what you don't have, of course. "A safe place to visit...When you visit Madison you will discover that we have no tall buildings to fear, no nuclear power plants, airports or anything anyone would want to blow up."
posted by m@ on Aug 15, 2003 - 16 comments

30,000 tons of turkey poop to turn an old mine site in Indiana into wetlands. Memo to self, avoid driving anywhere near Lynnville Indiana anytime soon. This is so neat. I mean what else are you going to do with 30,000 tons of turkey poop?
posted by MAYORBOB on Apr 27, 2002 - 11 comments

Well this is is odd
posted by delmoi on Apr 4, 2002 - 20 comments

Indiana woman sues doctor for cost of raising her daughter. She says the doctor botched the operation to sterilize her, so he should pay up. A lower court has already ruled for her, and it is now in front of the Indiana Supreme Court. I did not know this, but California, New Mexico, Oregon and Wisconsin already have given people the right to costs of child rearing in these circumstances. The first this that comes to my mind is: do you think a child put in this situation would feel unwanted?
posted by internal on Apr 4, 2002 - 21 comments

Rioters complain about tear gas. [Bloominton Hearald-Times, link expires after a week] After Indiana University lost to Maryland in the NCAA finals, drunken fans rioted in the streets forcing police to use tear gas. It was stupid enough to start a riot, but rioters complained that the police offered no warning before deploying tear gas after rioters pelted the police with beer bottles and prevented the fire department from putting out fires in the middle of the street. "They could have easily done that," Raggs said. "If they would have said, 'You have 10 minutes, then we are going to use the tear gas,' people would have gone away." Personally, I think the police showed an amazing level of restraint considering that about half of the state troopers on the scene got hit by flying glass.
posted by KirkJobSluder on Apr 3, 2002 - 23 comments

"IU WINS! IU WINS! For the first time in years, IU is proceeding to the Elite 8, knocking down the number one team in the country. The last time Indiana beat Duke in the tournament in 1987, they went all the way. Could it happen again?" [thanks to SportsFilter for this one. Aw yeah. Ol' Dickie Vitale must be rollin' over in his grave right about now. Oh, wait. He's not dead yet. Or is that just a matter of opinion...baby?]
posted by Bixby23 on Mar 21, 2002 - 18 comments

"Tooonight, we're going to have A TERRRRIBLE time! Boo ha ha ha ha," Sammy Terry used to say, and he was usually right, because he'd then show a movie like "The Monolith Monsters" or "The Tingler." Unless you grew up in Southern Indiana, you probably never heard of Sammy Terry. He was the local host of all B-horror movies, like Elvira only cornier (if that's possible!). His "cohost" was a rubber spider, dangling on a string. And his costume included dishwasher gloves (look closely at the picture). Of course, this being the Internet, someone has a created a Sammy Terry fan site: here. Did anyone else grow up with wacky local shows? I'm not even gonna talk about "Cowboy Bob" and "Janie."
posted by grumblebee on Jan 15, 2002 - 33 comments

The Worst Committee Charge Ever
A rather interesting Story from Normal, Indiana, where after an "animated" 1 1/2-hour meeting Wednesday, the Normal library board voted 5-1 to form a committee to develop suggestions in the wake of a dispute over a board member breast-feeding her toddler at the library during story time. They say about two dozen people were in the audience, some passionately explaining the importance of breast-feeding, including in public, and it gets waaay funnier. And, no, I am not making this up.
posted by Blake on Dec 20, 2001 - 48 comments

Bloink! Leonids touchdown in northwest Indiana.
posted by sandor on Nov 20, 2001 - 19 comments

NYTimes.com reports (or does it?) Bush winning KY and IN
I think this is some kind of mistake, rather than an off-sides. Explanations?
posted by rschram on Nov 7, 2000 - 7 comments

Indianapolis minors can't play violent videogames anymore.
posted by skallas on Oct 13, 2000 - 10 comments

Knight to be fired? I know some can find the news at other links, and the story is still developing, however, I at least thought he would last one more year, and retire on his own. Zero tolerence is enforced and the University warned him. I just wonder if he will be hired anywhere else.
posted by brent on Sep 10, 2000 - 16 comments

Indiana University Bans use of Napster It appears that Indiana University has banned the use of Napster recently. Apparently it was accounting for 50% of IU's Internet traffic. Officials are sighting bandwidth as the reason for the ban. I wonder how many schools will follow suit this semester.
posted by fil! on Feb 14, 2000 - 7 comments