Episode #894

Item #1 Science
Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, was named after the city of her birth, Florence, Italy. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41557-022-01008-w
Item #2 Fiction
When the Nazis were fleeing Italy during WWII, Hitler ordered all the bridges of Florence to be destroyed to slow the Allied advance. However, the private tasked with setting the charges on the Ponte Vecchio deliberately failed to make a proper connection, sparing the bridge.
Item #3 Science
In 1527 anti-Medici rioters dropped a bench from a parapet, striking Michelangelo’s David and breaking off his left arm in three pieces. https://pontecommedia.wordpress.com/2010/08/15/davids-broken-arm/

“What we call rational grounds for our beliefs are often extremely irrational attempts to justify our instincts.” ― Thomas Henry Huxley