Wikipedia’s Random Articles — DiCaprio to Calypso
By: Jack A. Goodwin
Tags: History, Fun, Facts, Wikipedia, Discovery

What I find most fascinating with browsing Wiki, is how quickly I look at one article but swiftly find myself reading about something completely unrelated — or is it?

Wikipedia is fantastic, a collection of information about almost anything you can imagine all with hyperlinks, related articles, photos and the ability to amend the content within (pending approvals of course).

If you use your original article as means of getting to another — that’s a link, right? Well, perhaps it’s the faintest of links but we’ll go with it.

Using the Wikipedia’s Random Article button it gives you literally just that — a random page from anywhere in the depths of Wiki. From Wolfgang Weichardt to the 2016 Ottowa Redblacks season, Mazama Falls to Cross Country Skiiing results from 2010.

The question from me is — using that random starting point, can I navigate through to find some truly wonderful/funny/scary/interesting things that I would’ve never known had I not started where I did?

Let’s find out shall we!

KXRY

So we start with radio, KXRY — A non-commercial radio station from Oregon, USA. Turns out, KXRY was a startup company which used popular crowdfunding website Kickstarter in December 2013 to raise $40,000 to help turn on the engines — it worked! After over $100,000 in funding, KXRY began broadcasting in March 2014. Notable hosts included Carl Wolfson, Adam Klugman and Thom Hartmann.

Thom Hartmann

Tom seems to have done many things…He’s an American radio personality, author, former psychotherapist, businessman, and progressive political commentator. As an author Tom has released many noteworthy ones — however one that jumps out is The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight. This book inspired the hit Leonardo DiCaprio documentary The 11th Hour and subsequently Leo has announced that he is making a major motion picture on another one of Tom’s pieces called Legacy of Secrecy.

Leonardo DiCaprio

We all know Leo, so I wanted to see what interesting things I could find from his Wiki page in particular. Some interesting nuggets are:

He founded Appian Way Productions in 2004 which has produced many well known hits such as The Aviator, The Wolf of Wall Street & The Revenant — which — tells me just how much money Leo must be making if he produces AND stars in these things! Appian Way interestingly is named after an Italian road of the same name — known for being one of the oldest and most strategically placed roads in all of Rome connecting it to Brindisi.

Named Leonardo because he first kicked as an unborn whilst his mother was looking at a DaVinci paining in the Uffizi museum in Florence, Italy.

Leo refused an offer to star in 1997 film Boogie Nights as the producer’s #1 choice, Joaquin Phoenix also rejected and Mark Wahlberg got the lead role (recommended by Leo himself). Leo rejected due to the filming of Titanic which launched his international career into another orbit. Similarly Leo rejected the star role in American Psycho to star in The Beach and Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars Episode II due to filming Catch Me If You Can.

Most interesting however was the fact that Leo owns his own island, Blackadore Caye, which is just off the coast of Belize near the Belize Barrier Reef on which he is planning to build an eco-resort.

Belize Barrier Reef

The Reef is a series of coral reefs straddling the coast of Belize and is the second largest coral reef system in the world. It is famously home to the Great Blue Hole.

The Great Blue Hole

The Great Blue Hole is a giant marine sinkhole which has fascinated divers and explorers for centuries. It is considered one of the top 5 diving locations in the world and has a depth of 124m (407ft). In 2012 the Discovery Channel ranked the Great Blue Hole as number one on its list of “The 10 Most Amazing Places on Earth”. Famous explorer Jacques Cousteau made the hole famous as one of the worlds most loved underwater explorers in the 60s-90s.

Jacques Cousteau

Jacques was a bit of a busy man — A French naval officer, explorer, conservationist, filmmaker, innovator, scientist, photographer, author and researcher who studied the sea and all forms of life in water. Much of Jacques’ research was done in his beloved vessel The Calypso which he leased from a British millionaire named Thomas Loel Guinness who had restored the ex-WWII British minesweeper. In 1950 he leased it to Jacques for 1 Franc per year as a token gesture on two conditions — 1) That Jacques never asked him for money and 2) Jacques never speaks on Tom’s involvement.

The Calypso

The ship is named after the Greek mythological figure Calypso, who was a nymph in Greek mythology, who lived on the island of Ogygia, where, according to the Odyssey, she detained Odysseus for seven years. The Calypso survived all of WWII and laid in Malta until she was refurbished to become a mail ship between Marfa and Gozo. After only a few as a ferry ship, Tom Loel Guinness purchased her and immediately leased her to Jacques for research. In 1996 a barge accidentally sunk the Calypso in the port of Singapore — She was later recovered and towed to France. Her ownership is still under lots of scrutiny but she remains, currently (as of May 2020) in Turkey.

John Denver wrote a song about the Calypso in 1975 called “Calypso”.

The Captains Yacht of the USS Enterprise-D on Star Trek is named Calypso, named by star Patrick Stewart.

Bill Murray starred in a film in homage to Jacque’s life called The Life Aquatic.

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To wrap up this article, and bring it home — one last fact about The Calypso was that it was made entirely of Oregon pine, Oregon being the home to the very same KXRY Radio Station.

We’ll go again in #2 and see what random, interesting things we learn then!

Jack A. Goodwin