Somewhat more technical information found 2 links deep on Apple site http://images.apple.com/osx/preview/docs/OSX_Mavericks_Core_...
With at least one questionable statement: OS X was the first operating system to ship as a single install that could boot into either a 32-bit or 64-bit kernel, either of which could run 32-bit and 64-bit applications at full native performance. OS X now exclusively uses a 64-bit kernel, but it continues to run both 32-bit and 64-bit applications. I believe Solaris was actually the first to do this: http://en.wikiped…
OS X has had this ability since 64-bit PPC days.