1. A mule is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse. The offspring of a female donkey and male horse is a hinny.
2. October 26, 1785 marked the arrival in America of a Spanish donkey, specially requested by George Washington to breed American mules…
3. …the donkey was named Royal Gift and was a present from the Spanish King Carlos III.
4. The date of National Mule Day was officially proclaimed by President Ronald Reagan on the 200th anniversary of the gift, October 26, 1985.
5. A horse has 64 chromosomes and a donkey has 62. Mules and hinnies end up with 63.
6. A male mule is called a john; a female mule is called a molly or mare.
7. Mules are almost always infertile but very rarely female mules have been known to give birth.
8. When this happened in Morocco in 2002, locals feared it signalled the end of the world. In Albania in 1994, it was blamed on the spawn of the devil.
9. Aristotle was worried by the mule’s inability to reproduce as it contradicted his view of what constituted the essence of a species.
10. Around 1950, Muffin The Mule became the first toy marketed under licence after TV appearances.