English has now become the most universally spoken language in the world. Whether its Russia, China or Japan, even the most rigid of countries have realized the importance of the language. Of course each demographic has their own unique approach to speaking English, such as mixing in different dialects and weaving their own cultural nuances to it. Popular examples are "Hinglish", a breed of Hindi and English and Spanglish, a diffusion of Spanish into English.
There are 26 letters to the English alphabet, each tries to mimic a particular sound. Some letters such as 'E' are the most used throughout, and others such as 'Q' and 'Z' are rarely used, if at all.
There are 50 states in the United States of America, so isn't it obvious to assume that almost all of the alphabets in the English language are used up to name each one of them? Well you're wrong.
To make this trivia a little bit more simpler, we will provide you with just one clue. There is only one letter which is not found in any of the 50 states. This should make the brain teaser quite a bit easier.
If you were to individually search the names of all those 50 states and cross check them with the 26 letters, it will no doubt take up a lot of your valuable time. Do you have the time to write down the names and check with the list of alphabets?
Here's a novel idea. Get a list of all 50 states, (we'll have them named in the picture below). And simply speak out loud the names of each state. That absence of a particular sound will help narrow down your search.
So you read each one of those states out loud didn't you? Did it work? We believe it may have served to confuse you even further, for instance can you distinguish between the sound of 'S' and 'C' or 'Ph' and 'F'? No.
The most obvious answer is to assume the letter 'X'. But Texas and New Mexico are two states which make use of the rather rare alphabet 'X'. The next suspect, 'Z' appears once in Arizona. Even more mind boggling is the use of letter 'V'.
The letter 'Y' may be chalked up as rare and unusable, but the reality is that there are six states in the US which make use of it. New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Wyoming, Maryland and Kentucky.
'Q' is a rare letter, but compared to 'Z' and 'X' it has more uses. Perhaps the most popular use of 'Q' is in the word queen. But quite surprisingly 'Q' couldn't make a cameo in either one of the 50 U.S states.
Was that jaw dropping enough for you? Did it boggle your mind? Who knew right? 'Q' of all letters couldn't debut in either one of the 50 states? But wait, there's more facts, 'Q' is also a fictional character in the James Bond franchise - strange right?
It's one of the few English letters which cannot be transliterated into a different alphabet, allowing a non native English speaker to accurately trace it back into 'English'. It has very little use in the language besides glorifying the Queen.
If you were to isolate the first letters of the months separating June and December, you will be able to spell the word, 'JASON'. June, August, September, October and November. Go on, you should try this cool trick.
English is the official language of the skies and all pilots are required to have competency over it. Failure to do so can result in communication mishaps, and could even result in terrible accidents such midair collisions.
So Q is the second least used letter. Naturally, one becomes curious to know about the letter which has the most use. It is 'S' if you're wondering. Funny you though the vowels would spell the most words, we thought so too.
The further you go back in time, the more difficult you'll find it to understand English speakers of the past. This is because the language as it stands today has evolved significantly, and is a breed of Old High German and Anglo-Norman.
