35 Barmy Random Facts You Never Knew About – Part 274

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1Frankenstein Monster

Frankenstein Monster

When people act like Frankenstein's monster, they often stretch their arms out in front of them because of the 1943 movie Frankenstein Meets the Wolf-Man. In the movie, the monster is blinded and has to walk holding his hands in front of him.


2. Construction workers at the new World Trade Center site in NYC stumbled upon the hull of an 18th century Philadelphia sloop active in colonial-era Caribbean trade. Tree-ring scientists at Columbia University found that the wood used to build the ship were felled in 1773.


3. Cinnamon is made from the inner bark of laurel trees and used to be more valuable than gold.


4. Hasbro trademarked the smell of Play-Doh, and in order to do so, they had to explicitly define every nuance of the scent.


5. Carrie Chapman Catt, the women's suffrage leader of the early 20th century, had a special clause in her 1890 wedding prenuptial. It guaranteed her four months of free time every year, so she could campaign to get women the vote in the US.


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6Last duel

Last duel

The last duel in Canada was fought in 1873 over a woman. Upon turning and firing, one duelist fell to the ground. Both duelists unknowingly had blanks loaded in their guns by their seconds. The one-man who fell had fainted due to fear.


7. Thai last names are so long because Thai citizens are not legally allowed to have the same last name as anyone they are not related to.


8. A stretch of Route 66, between Albuquerque and Tijeras, will play "America the Beautiful" as you drive over added grooves in the road. If you drive the speed limit of 45 mph for the quarter-mile stretch, you can hear "America the Beautiful" play through the vibrations in your car's wheels.


9. The creator of chiropractic medicine, D.D. Palmer, had claimed that he had received his chiropractic knowledge from the spirit of a deceased physician named Jim Atkinson and believed chiropractic medicine was a moral obligation and a religious duty.


10. In 1968, US businessman Robert McCulloch bought London Bridge for $2,460,000 plus shipping costs of around $240,000 and moved it to the Arizona desert. Instead of applying the 11% import tax for granite, US customs declared the 137-year-old bridge to be an "antique" and therefore duty-free.


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11Bill of Rights

Bill of Rights

Every night the U.S. Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence are lowered underground into a bomb-proof vault.


12. In Japan, it is a custom for a girl to ask for the second button from the boy’s jacket, if they like the boy. It is thought that the second button is close to the heart, meaning they ask for his heart.


13. Before the start of salt iodization in the 1920s, 47% of schoolchildren in Michigan had goiter and 30% of World War 1 draftees were medically disqualified due to this condition.


14. William Castle was a B-horror movies maker who allowed his audiences to get refunds if a movie was too scary. Many abused it, angering him. The abuse stopped when he made refund seekers go to a “Coward’s Corner” in the theater as a record screamed “Watch the chicken!” and a yellow light followed across the theater.


15. In 1911, a 35-year-old French miner named Augustin Lesage began hearing voices in the dark that convinced him to become a painter. With no prior training, he became very successful and claimed the “spirit voices” guided every one of his 800 paintings.


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16C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis

The death of British author C.S. Lewis went largely unreported by news media because U.S. President John F. Kennedy was assassinated less than an hour later.


17. During his tenure, Theodore Roosevelt had a lion, a coyote, a hyena, a black bear, and a zebra living on White House grounds at various times. Also, he shot 11397 creatures, including endangered animals. He also hired people, to find remains of a Mammoth, which he was successful in procuring.


18. Rod Serling got the idea for the Twilight Zone episode "I Shot an Arrow into the Air" from a conversation with a friend, to whom he paid $500 for the rights. More people would pitch episode ideas to Serling in person over the years, but none were ever produced.


19. In the winter, when it's too cold for the male bees to do their only job (mate) the lady bees kick them out of the hive, where they quickly die in the elements.


20. The two highest-ranked Sumo referees (Gyoji) have a dagger tucked into the belt of their kimono representing their willingness to commit ritual suicide if they get a decision wrong in the ring.


21Rudolf Diesel

Rudolf Diesel

In 1913, Rudolf Diesel, the inventor of the Diesel engine mysteriously died while travelling from Belgium to the UK to meet with the British navy about installing his engines on their submarines. His body was found 11 days later floating in the sea. It’s still unknown if he was murdered.


22. Ancient Greek messengers (hemerodromos: one of the men in the Greek military known as day-long runners) routinely ran hundreds of miles to spread information across the Greek city-states.


23. In 2011, the State of New York proclaimed that Wiffle ball, as well as kickball, freeze tag, and dodgeball were "unsafe" for children and that any summer camp program that included two or more of such activities would be subject to government regulation.


24. In 1964, Andy Warhol directed a feature film where Batman battles Dracula, imaginatively titled “Batman Dracula”. The film was never released as Warhol failed to get permission to use the character from DC Comics.


25. During Victorian England winters, street vendors sold baked potatoes for food and as hand warmers. In London, they sold around 10 tons of potatoes every day from "cans" - small metal boxes on four legs fueled by charcoal.

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