Old pennies, Underwater cars

last updated 8 January 2015

Walter Husak, a Burbank, Calif., aerospace-parts manufacturer, began collecting coins at 13 when his grandparents gave him some old pennies for doing chores. Last week, Husak’s hobby paid off when he auctioned 301 of his rare cents for $10.7 million—the biggest sale ever of a penny collection. Two examples, one from 1793 and the other from 1794, fetched $632,5900 each. “It was a fabulous night,” said Greg Rohan, president of Heritage Auction Galleries. “Every major coin collector of American cents was either there in person, bidding online, or on the telephone.”

The Swiss company Rinspeed has built the world’s first truly functional underwater car. The craft is a pet project of Rinspeed’s CEO, Frank Rinderknecht, who had been consumed with the idea ever since he saw Roger Moore drive a submersible Lotus Esprit in the 1977 James Bond film The Spy Who Loved Me. Called the “sQuba” (the capital “Q” is a nod to Bond’s gadget expert), the new electric-powered auto can do 77 mph on land, 3 mph on the surface of water, and about 1.8 mph at a depth of 30 feet. It will make its official debut at the Geneva Auto Show next month.

On Jan. 22, Ashley Phillips of Manhattan set down her travel case, containing her 6-month-old cat Georgia, on the platform of the 59th Street Lexington Avenue subway stop. Georgia promptly bolted and disappeared into the underground depths. Phillips thought she would never see her again. But two determined transit workers started combing the area, making meowing sounds to draw Georgia out. After 25 days, they found her nestled in a metal drain between two tracks—a bit thinner and with a scratched nose, but otherwise okay. “I’m still in shock,” said Phillips. “I kind of gave up hope.”