Good Question: 'Reply All' Golden Gophers & Brain Freezes
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- It's over for North Dakota; they've officially gotten rid of the mascot the Fighting Sioux. That got Martha Port in St. Paul wondering: How did the University of Minnesota get the Gophers?
The Gopher mascot is as old as Minnesota. In 1857, Minnesota got the nickname the "Gopher State" after a political cartoon showed nice gophers with the heads of local politicians pulling a train.
The cartoonist was mocking a $5 million plan to build a railroad in western Minnesota.
The golden part of the nickname didn't come until the 1930s, when the team's radio announcer Halsey Hall called them the Golden Gophers, because of their uniforms.
Don Stewart from Maplewood wants to go fishing, but we know if you fish the Mississippi River, you need a Minnesota fishing license.
But when fishing the St. Croix, which lies on the Minnesota/Wisconsin boarder, do you need a Minnesota or Wisconsin license?
When you're fishing a border water, you can have either license from a boat. If you land and fish from the shore, however, you need the license from that state.
My kids don't like ice cream, because of what Annie from Minneapolis wants to know more about: What causes a brain freeze when you're drinking a cold drink?
Harvard Medical School looked into it and their research was just reported on by Live Science.
When ice cream or something really cold hits the roof of your mouth, there's a blood vessel that quickly pumps more blood to the brain.
The quick expansion and constriction of the vessel is probably a self-defense mechanism for the brain. It needs to constantly be working, and it's really sensitive to cold temperatures.
The widening of the blood vessels might be moving warm blood to make sure the brain stays warm.
