Beyda and Associates

The blue whale, scientifically known as Balaenoptera musculus, is a marine mammal belonging to the suborder of baleen whales. At 98 feet in length and weighing in at 180 metric tons on average, the blue whale is the largest known animal to have ever existed—including the dinosaurs!

Long and slender, the blue whale’s body can be various shades of bluish-grey dorsally and somewhat lighter underneath. Their diet consists almost exclusively of small crustaceans known as krill; an adult blue whale can eat up to 40 million krill in a single day!

Blue whales were abundant in nearly all oceans on Earth until the beginning of the twentieth century. For over one hundred years, they were hunted almost to extinction by whalers until protected in the international community in 1966. A 2002 report estimated that there were only 5,000 to 12,000 blue whales living worldwide.

While you may not get the chance to view the majesty of a blue whale in its natural habitat, many museums around the United States have models of the species. The Natural History Museum in London contains a famous mounted skeleton and life-sized model of a blue whale—both the first of their kind in the world. The American Museum of Natural History in New York City has a full-sized model in its Milstien Family Hall of Ocean Life. The Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California, features a life-size model of a mother blue whale with her calf suspended from the ceiling of its main hall.

Blue whales may be encountered—although rarely—on whale-watching cruises in the Gulf of Maine. They can also be seen off Southern California at peak times of the year, typically July to September. If you are interested in learning more about marine animals, be sure to check out our online educational bookstore, or give Beyda and Associates a call today at (407)438-6700.

Who can forget the story of Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer? Rudolph was the one pulling Santa’s sleigh during terrible winter weather, and saved Christmas for little boys and girls around the world. You may think that Santa owns all of the reindeers in the world, but did you know that they are actually quite common? Reindeers, called caribou in the wild, can be found in arctic areas such as in Russia, Alaska, Canada, and Greenland.

Caribou look like large deer or small elk, but with soft fur, long legs, large hooves, and extremely massive antlers. Unlike deer we see in America, both male and female caribou can grow antlers. Caribou are hardly shy: they are comfortable in approaching humans, unless in a common hunting area. They are capable of sleeping in water, and are nomadic animals that are always on the move.

Caribou stand around four or five feet tall, and can weigh over 500 pounds—that’s a quarter of a ton! These animals are grayish brown with white accents on their neck and back areas; however, the caribou’s most distinguishing characteristic is its antlers, which can grow three feet long.

Caribou eat extremely large quantities of food to increase their internal heat production during the winter. Also to conserve heat, the caribou’s fur consists of hollow hairs rooted in a surprisingly thick layer of fat. Their legs are the most vulnerable, but are protected against harsh winter weather by having two circulation systems.

Caribou are wild animals; once they have been domesticated, they then are called reindeer. If you are interested in more fun animal facts, be sure to check out our wild animal book store! Beyda & Associates carries a wide selection of quality books, DVDs, and CDs at a surprising discount price. Check out our online store or give us a call today at (407)438-6700.

What would life be like today if dinosaurs still existed? Humans would most likely be the minority species, and we would most likely live in fear every day. Thankfully, we don’t have to worry about dinosaurs and can continue our normal routine activities relatively peacefully.

Around 65 million years ago, an asteroid six miles wide crashed into the Earth in what is today Chicxulub, Mexico, causing a crater 120 miles in diameter. The impact caused fires, climate change, and widespread extinctions. The dinosaurs, which had so far managed to survive 180 million years, died out. 70 percent of the species living on Earth at the time became extinct!

So what if the asteroid managed to just miss Earth, continuing along to crash into some other planet millions of miles away? Well, consider this for a moment: sixty-five million years ago, some of the animals and plants we see today were just beginning to emerge. For example, insects that rely on flowers—such as bees—were relatively new on Earth. Many of these life forms thrived after the mass extinction of the dinosaurs. Without the extinction, these species managed to fill ecological niches they may not have been able to fill otherwise.

Some scientists believe that even if the asteroid hadn’t hit, dinosaurs might have become extinct anyway. They believe that some dinosaur species had started to die off long before the asteroid’s impact, and the asteroid was just one ocurrence in an extremely complex sequence of events. Volcanic eruptions and a continuously changing landscape also aided in the extinction of dinosaurs.

Be thankful for the asteroid that hit Mexico, because instead of playing with a miniature T-Rex, you could be running away from the real thing! Like learning fun facts? Beyda and Associates has an online store dedicated to fun, educational learning! Call our educational book store today at (407)438-6700.

Remember that movie, Napoleon Dynamite, where the main character drew a seemingly imagined creature that he appropriately called a liger? Well, that character is actually far from imaginary—ligers really do exist!

A liger is a hybrid cross between a male lion and a tigress. This hybridization is possible due to parents of the same genus, but of a different species. The liger is actually the largest of all known felines. These animals typically enjoy swimming (a characteristic of tigers) and are quite sociable like lions, making them the best of both worlds! There are legends of ligers existing in the wild, but these legends are likely false due to the fact that the habitats of the lion and tiger do not overlap in the wild.

The liger actually has a counterpart, called the tiglon. You guessed it: this creature is a hybrid cross between a male tiger and a lioness, making it the exact opposite of the liger. The tiglon can exhibit characteristics of both parents. They can have spots from the mother and stripes from the father. A male tiglon may also have a mane, but it is not as prominent as those on a lion. The tiglon is not as common as the liger, but in the 19th and 20th centuries, it was reported that this creature was much more common than its counterpart.

Hercules is a famous hybrid feline. Known for being featured in movies and television shows, this famous liger even had a cameo as a guest on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

Interestingly, other hybridizations can allegedly exist in captivity: a leopon, which is a combination of a lion and a leopard, and a lepjag, which is a hybridization of a leopard and a jaguar. If you are interested in learning more fun and educational facts, then our online educational bookstore is perfect for you! We have a wide array of Lions, Tigers & Wild Cats books at a discount price. Give Beyda & Associates a call today at (407)438-6700.

Thomas Edison held 1,093 different patents for all of his many inventions. Many of them, like the light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, were amazing inventions that still have a huge impact on how we live our lives today. However, not everything Edison created was a success; he also had a few failures along the way.

Thomas Edison’s greatest failure came from not being able to create a practical way to mine iron ore. He worked on mining methods in the late 1800s in hopes of being able to provide iron ore to the Pennsylvania steel mills. However, he was never able to create a separator that could extract iron from low-grade ores. Eventually, Edison gave up on the idea, but by then he had lost all the money he had invested in the project.

However, after this Thomas Edison went on to invent the motion picture camera. He called this invention a “Kinetoscope,” using the Greek words “kineto” meaning “movement” and “scopos”, which means “to watch.” He even built a motion picture production studio in New Jersey that was constructed so that it could be moved to stay in direct daylight at all hours of the day.

So, the lesson is – in order to invent something spectacular, it’s ok to fail along the way because these failures will teach you lessons that will help you to achieve even greater things in the future. If you want to learn more about the greatest inventors of all time, check out our Online Educational Book Store. We have many interesting books including the “100 Scientists Book”, “Seven Ideas That Shook the Universe”, “Thomas Edison: A Brilliant Inventor Book”, “Henry Ford, Young Man With Ideas Book”, “The Ben Franklin Book of Easy & Incredible Experiments Book”, and more! Give our educational book store a call today at 407-438-6700 to order your books.

“Look! he said graciously as he jumped into his convertible pocketbook and drove off with his sticky wife. The apprehensive sky started raining gorillas and water bottles as the two happily headed toward their furry hotel.”

Don’t worry – the above paragraph isn’t going to make sense no matter how many times you read it. But it’s not supposed to make sense, and that’s the beauty of Mad Libs!

Mad Libs was invented in 1953 by Leonard Stern and Roger Price, who published the first Mad Libs children’s book in 1958. Mad Libs is a phrasal template word game book based on spontaneous improvisation. One player asks the other for a list of words (adverbs, nouns, adjectives, exclamations, parts of the body, etc.) to substitute for blanks in the story. The result is a hilarious and unrealistic story (that is read aloud) that gets the whole group laughing.

At our online educational book store, we sell many different types of Mad Libs books including Mad Libs From Outer Space, Pirates Mad Libs, and Under the Sea Mad Libs Junior Book. Our Mad Libs books are only $3.99! Order your children’s books today by calling 407-438-6700 today!

At 9PM on Oct. 15, 1951, I Love Lucy went on the air for the first time, and hasn’t been off since. I Love Lucy, the classic American sitcom, is considered by many to be one of the best TV shows of all time. This popular television show was one of the first to be filmed in black and white and in front of a studio audience.

I Love Lucy, staring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, mastered the art of turning reasonable, everyday situations into complete nonsense – a feat familiar to even the best of us. In one episode, Lucy decides to try her hand at working and therefore gets a job at a candy factory. However, later in the episode, you’ll see Lucy stuffing chocolates down her clothes due to a speedy conveyor belt.

At Beyda & Associates, we carry a wide selection of quality Hollywood Classic books, CDs & DVDs at discounted prices. We sell every DVD in the I Love Lucy television series including each individual season and a 50th Anniversary Special DVD of the show. At our online book store, we even sell I Love Lucy books such as “Laughing With Lucy”, “Love Lucy”, and “The I Love Lucy Guide to Life”. Enter coupon code “public” at checkout for 30% off listed prices!

The Simpsons, the longest-running scripted television show in history, is a television show about the satiric adventures of a working class family in the misfit city of Springfield. The Simpsons is meant to portray the typical middle class American family and to parody the American lifestyle and human behavior in general.

The Simpson family is dysfunctional is more ways than can be described. However, the show’s use of situational comedy is quite entertaining, and that is all that matters to American viewers. “D’oh!” – the phrase Homer uses when something bad happens or is about to happen to him – has even become an official word in both the Merriam Webster Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary.

At our educational and entertainment-based online book store, you can find many Simpsons books, CDs, and DVDs. Right now we are even offering a special! Enter the coupon code “public” at checkout for 30% off listed prices on all Simpsons books, CDs, and DVDs!

Lego people have a lot in common with married couples with competitive personalities. The pants are always getting switched around against their will. Lego is Danish for “leg godt” which translates to “play well”. Anyone that’s had the chance to partake in some productive Lego building appreciates the ability to take a Darth Vader head and put it on Harry Potter’s body, giving the denizens of Slytherin a good scare when they are startled by the booming voice of James Earl Jones.

Lego landscapes and universes are as expansive as your imagination, and you can learn about all of them with one of our great Lego books. Once docile plastic creatures that were meant to defend castles and scour the high seas, Legos have taken on far more pressing missions in recent years such as blowing up the Death Star and concocting the last season finale to the “Lost” television series.

To learn more about Lego film, print and sound Beyda & Associates’ offers, call 866-702-3932.

Remembering dates in History is essential to following an enriching and fruitful life. It helps us with appreciating humanity, impressing friends during Jeopardy!, and getting on our in-laws good side by providing them with gifts on their birthdays. Unforgettable moments in living history assist us with putting things into perspective. Where were you the first time Charlie Sheen confidently uttered the phrase “Tiger Blood” on television?

We are all familiar with the phrase “History Repeats Itself”, therefore making History mankind’s area of study with the biggest ego. Boost your cockiness towards events passed with our great book “Where Were You When?”, a collection of 180 events in history that changed everything. Learn more about landing on the moon, the Beatles making their way to the States, and the cataclysmic performance of The Situation at Donald Trump’s Celebrity Roast.

To learn more about History film, print and sound Beyda & Associates’ offers, call 866-702-3932.