30 Phenomenal Random Facts To Ponder Over | Random List #31

There is a movement known as Cascadia, whose purpose is to create a nation from British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon becoming the 20th largest country in the world.

2. When Ken McElroy was murdered with at least two different guns, the residents of Skidmore, Missouri refused to identify the shooters. For decades he was known as the 'town bully' due to multiple crimes throughout town, and at that time was on trial for shooting an elderly grocer in the neck.

3. Most of the modern global poultry industry relies on a single breed of chicken (Arbor Acres) from a farm in Connecticut that won the national "Chicken of Tomorrow" competition in the late 1940s and early 1950s.

4. There's a Mediterranean plant (Cistus plant) that can spontaneously self-combust (i.e., a burning bush).

5. The US Embassy in Moscow caught fire in 1977. Sensitive information was stolen by several firefighters who were also KGB agents.

In the 19th Century, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously decided that tomatoes were vegetables.

7. In 2012, a cat named Orlando beat top investment bankers in a year long investment competition, which he chose by throwing his favorite mouse toy at a grid to select companies to invest in.

8. There is an 82-foot tall aquarium that holds more than 1,500 fishes and has a glass elevator that runs up and down the center of the tank. It has to be cleaned by divers 3 or 4 times each day. The German AquaDom is the largest freestanding cylindrical aquarium in the world.

9. In Greek mythology, Zeus thought that the Earth is overpopulated and Trojan War was instigated to depopulate the Earth.

10. The national fruit of Jamaica, the ackee, is poisonous in all but one small portion, and that portion is only safe to eat after the fruit has naturally opened on its own. Eating it prematurely or any other part causes "Jamaican Vomiting Sickness," which can lead to coma or death.

Nicolas Cage lost over $100 Million of his net worth after purchasing 15 homes, including two castles, a private island, four yachts, and a 67 million-year-old dinosaur skull.

12. Everton Football club's official store "Everton Two" is located in the shopping center Liverpool ONE. Its full name is Everton Two - Liverpool ONE.

13. Octopi, octopuses, and octopodes are all correct plural forms of the word octopus.

14. Warner Brothers hated the name "Beetlejuice", and urged Tim Burton to change it to something clever. Burton jokingly suggested calling the movie "Scared Sheetless" and was horrified when the studio actually liked it.

15. The FIFA World Cup trophy is worth nearly $20 million, far more than any other pro-sports trophy. It is made of 6kg (13.5lb) of solid 18k gold. Winning teams are only given a gold-plated replica, the original stays in Zurich.

Despite the ongoing Arab Boycott of Israel since 1948, Israel has achieved a higher GDP than all of the participants except for the oil rich Kuwait and Qatar, and the participants stand to lose $30 billion from not trading with Israel by 2020.

17. The Commodore 64 computer dominated the US computer market during the mid-80s, outselling IBM PC compatibles and Apple computers.

18. Mary of "Mary Had A Little Lamb" was an 83-year-old teacher named Mary F. Sawyer, who brought her pet lamb to the school she taught around the time of the battle of Waterloo.

19. Mathematician Marina Ratner proved her most influential theorem after she turned 50, defying a common notion that only young mathematicians can do great work.

20. World War 2 General George Patton believed that he was a reincarnated ancient Roman soldier, and he also thought that he had served under Napoleon.

China's army holds annual training exercises against a 'Blue Force' equipped to resemble a NATO adversary like the United States. The Blue Force nearly always wins; in 2014, only one visiting brigade was able to defeat it at the cost of 50% casualties.

22. Colonel David Stirling, the founder of the Special Air Service, personally strangled 41 men.

23. The sandwich was supposedly invented by the Earl of Sandwich (John Montagu), who was so addicted to gambling that he refused to leave the table for meals and demanded something he could eat with one hand. It caught on amongst other players, who ordered "the same as sandwich" - thus, "the sandwich".

24. There are only 9 active donors in the community of rare blood donors that have Rh-null blood. Rh-null is considered a universal blood for anyone with a rare blood type within the Rh system.

25. In 2012, the entire village of Sodeto in Spain won a $950 million lottery jackpot except for Costis Mitsotakis because he refused to buy the lottery.