22 Fascinating Facts To Make Your Head Spin
Even for the trivia buffs, these are some truly obscure facts that you probably haven't heard before.
Everyone likes to impress their friends with a surprising bit of information. Do it too much and you might be labeled as an annoying know-it-all, but a well-placed factoid at the right time can make you look smart in front of the right people. From animals to history to life hacks, here are 25 cool facts that some people know, but others don't.
1.
Because of an old superstition, several ravens are kept at the Tower of London at all times. These ravens are enlisted soldiers of the Kingdom, and have occasionally been dismissed for bad conduct. While wild ravens live for 10-15 years, Tower ravens can live past 40 years.
2.
In 1981, a Turkish man shot Pope John Paul II four times but didn’t kill him. After the Pope recovered, he visited the assassin in prison forgave him. The assassin was pardoned at the Pope’s request and 33 years after his crime, he visited Vatican City and laid flowers on the Pope’s tomb
3.
Trial attorney Mark Lanier offered to settle an asbestos lawsuit against Carborundum for $10,000. They declined and it went to trial. The jury awarded $118,000,000
4.
Ernest Hemingway lived through anthrax, malaria, pneumonia, dysentery, skin cancer, hepatitis, anemia, diabetes, high blood pressure, two plane crashes, a ruptured kidney, a ruptured spleen, a ruptured liver, a crushed vertebra, and a fractured skull
5.
A Canadian child molester who posted about 200 swirled images of his face online molesting kids in Cambodia and Vietnam. German investigators figured out a technique for unswirling the images, leading to his arrest
6.
The Osage Indians were once the richest per capita people in the world due to oil reserves on their land. Congress then passed a law requiring court appointed “guardians” to manage their wealth. Over 60 Osage were murdered from 1921-1925, their land rights passed to the guardian
7.
In 1971, the U.S. left a memorial on the Moon for every astronaut who died in the pursuit of space exploration, including Russian Cosmonauts
8.
Wealthy Chinese hire body doubles to get prosecuted for their crimes; this process is called Ding zui
9.
At the time of WW1, the King of Britain, Russia, and Germany were all first cousins. When asked about WW1, Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany sarcastically remarked, “If my grandmother (Queen Victoria) had been alive, she would never have allowed it.”
10.
During the filming of Ben-Hur, an extra turned blue when he fell into a pond that had dye poured into it. He was kept on the MGM payroll until the color wore off.
11.
Since 2005, the Parents Television Council has deemed Family Guy the Worst TV Show of the Week on at least 40 occasions, and has filed many complaints to the FCC for “oblique sexual innuendo.” Seth MacFarlane responded “it was like getting hate mail from Hitler.”
12.
During the First Opium War of 1839, 19,000 British troops fought against 200,000 Chinese. The Chinese had 20,000 casualties, the British just 69. The war marked the start of the “Century of Humiliation” in China.
13.
In 2011, a Russian suicide bomber received an unexpected text message from her wireless carrier which triggered her belt bomb and killed her instantly.
15.
In order to keep the project a secret, the British army used the innocuous name “mobile water carriers” for a motorized weapons project, which is the reason we call them “tanks.”
16.
Anchorage, Alaska covers nearly 2,000 square miles, making it about the size of the state of Delaware.
17.
At the time of death, Cornelius Vanderbilt was the world’s richest man and left an estate larger than the US treasury. When 120 of his descendants gathered in 1973, there was not a single millionaire among them.
18.
The Galileo probe experienced 230g of deceleration when entering Jupiter’s atmosphere. This is equivalent to a change in velocity from 5000 mph to 0 in one second.
19.
The hip-hop artist MF Grimm was expelled from his high school for assaulting his school dean because the dean owed him drug money.
20.
During the parade of nations at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, Greece always enters the stadium first due to its status as the birthplace of the Olympics.
21.
Adam Sandler’s 2011 movie “Jack and Jill” was nominated for all 10 Razzie Awards and won every single one. Adam Sandler actually won the Razzie for both worst actor and worst actress for that movie.
22.
When the band Korn played “Falling Away From Me” on the South Park episode entitled “Korn’s Groovy Pirate Ghost Mystery,” it was actually the debut of the single, which then went on to be one of their most popular singles.
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