26

This article is about the number. For the novel by Leo McKay, Jr., see Twenty-six (novel).

This article may contain excessive, poor or irrelevant examples. You can improve the article by adding more descriptive text and removing less pertinent examples. See Wikipedia's guide to writing better articles for further suggestions. (March 2010)

← 25 27 → 26
← 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 → List of numbers — Integers 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 →
Cardinal	twenty-six
Ordinal	26th (twenty-sixth)
Factorization
Divisors	1, 2, 13, 26
Roman numeral	XXVI
Binary	110102
Octal	328
Duodecimal	2212
Hexadecimal	1A16

26 (twenty-six) is the natural number following 25 and preceding 27.

In mathematics

26 is the only positive integer that is one greater than a square () and one less than a cube ().^[1]

A rhombicuboctahedron has twenty-six sides.

When a 3x3x3 cube is made of twenty-seven unit cubes, twenty-six of them are visible parts of the exterior layer of cubes.

There are 26 sporadic groups.

Properties of its positional representation in certain radixes

Twenty-six is a repdigit in base three (222) and in base twelve (22).

In base ten, 26 is the smallest number that is not a palindrome to have a square(26^2=676) which is a palindrome.

In science

• The atomic number of iron
• The number of spacetime dimensions in bosonic string theory.

Astronomy

• Messier object M26, a magnitude 9.5 open cluster in the constellation Scutum

• The New General Catalogue object NGC 26, a spiral galaxy in the constellation Pegasus

In religion

• 26 is the gematric number of the name of the God of Israel – YHWH
• According to Jewish chronology, God gave the Torah in the 26th generation since Creation

In sports

The jersey number 26 has been retired by several North American sports teams in honor of past playing greats (or in one case, an owner):

• In Major League Baseball:
  • The Chicago Cubs, for Hall of Famer Billy Williams.
  • The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, for founding owner Gene Autry.
  • The Texas Rangers, for Johnny Oates.
• In the NHL:
  • The Quebec Nordiques retired the number for Hall of Famer Peter Stastny, but when the team moved to Denver and became the Colorado Avalanche, it chose not to honor any of the numbers retired by the Nordiques. Peter Stastny's son, Paul Stastny, plays for the Avalanche and currently wears the number.
• No team in the NBA or NFL has retired the number.

In other fields

Twenty-six is:

• A 2003 novel by Leo McKay, Jr..
• The number of letters in the English and Interlingua alphabets, if capital letters are not distinguished from lowercase letters.
• The number of miles in a marathon rounded down (26 miles and 385 yards).
• Often the number of episodes in a television program each year; this allows one new show per week for half the year, and one rerun per week for the rest of the year.
• The alias of punk rock singer Doc Corbin Dart
• The age at which males can no longer be drafted in the United States
• The "joke throw" in the game of darts, where a player throws 20, 5 and 1 when aiming for 20 (or treble 20). In professional darts, throwing 26 usually results in sneers or laughter from the audience.
• A dice game popular in the midwest United States from the 1930s to 1950s; players had to roll a chosen number 26 times or more, exactly 13 or fewer than 10.^[2]
• In a normal deck of cards, there are 26 red cards and 26 black cards.
• The number of Cantons of Switzerland.
• The number of bones in the normal human Foot and Ankle.

References

• Prime Curios! 26 from the Prime Pages

1. ^ http://www.normalesup.org/~baglio/maths/26number.pdf
2. ^ "Twenty-six." Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica 2007 Ultimate Reference Suite. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, 2007.