Weird Facts about Star® Olive Oil

• Olive oil is the oil squeezed from—you guessed it—an olive. Company founder Angelo Giurlani originally gave his olives the brand name Stella, the Italian word for star, but later changed the name to Star to give the company a more American flavor adn increase sales.
• Olive oil is a fragrant, edible oil obtained by pressing and crushing fresh olives.
• As early as 3300 B.C., villages on the Aegean islands were trading olive oil with the Greek mainland and Crete.
• In 1898, Angelo Giurlani and his borthers, all Italian immigrants, founded A. Giurlani & Bro. Inc., to import, pack,and distribute olive oil.
• Today, Italy is the world's leading producer of olive oil, followed by Spain and Greece.
• Olive Oyl is the name of Popeye the Sailor Man's girlfriend.
• According to the Talmud, in 165 B.C.E. a small jar of olive oil burned in the temple of Jerusalem for eight days, astonishing the Maccabees (the Jewish army that had just recaptured the city from the Syrians). The Jewish holiday of Chanukah celebrates that wonder.
• In ancient Egypt and Greece, women were advised to insert olive oil into their vaginas for contraceptive purposes. Olive oil was thought to prevent sperm from entering the uterus. It doesn't.