The 60-Second Encyclopedia

Did you know? In just one minute the Earth travels 1,100 miles around the sun. Cartwheel champ Brianna Schroeder turns 48 cartwheels. 28,824 photographs are taken (822 of them at Disney World). Over $60,000 is spent on eBay. You lose 8 brain cells, 40,000 skin cells, and one taste bud. (How weird.) A ladybug flaps its wings 60,000 times. 6,805,555 e-mails are sent (35% of them Spam). Jean-Yves Mulot breaks 42 flaming concrete blocks with his bare hand. Whew!

Filled with hundreds of incredible and true facts and statistics, The 60-Second Encyclopedia puts a whole new spin on math, science, nature, the human body, and popular culture, too. And, with a one-minute sandglass packaged with the book and dozens of interactive activities, readers can test what they (or their hamster) can accomplish in the same amount of time it takes "the wave" to move through 1,200 stadium seats. Or the amount of time advertisers paid $4.6 million for during Super Bowl XXXVIII.

In just one minute . . .

• The Franklin Mint produces 36,458 coins.

• Racehorses are halfway around the Kentucky Derby racetrack.

• Giant machines make over 6,000 feet of toilet paper.

• 9 million telephones ring, and over 580,000 messages are recorded on answering machines.

Michael J. Rosen has written, edited, or illustrated a veritable kennel of books, including Workman's Kids' Best Dog Book; Artisan's Horse People, Fishing with Dad, and My Bug; and The Dog Department: James Thurber on Hounds, Scotties, and Talking Poodles and May Contain Nuts: A Very Loose Canon of American Humor. Many of his anthologies have supported humane efforts through the Company of Animals Fund, which he founded in 1990. He lives with his pack on 100 acres in central Ohio.