26Longest Wrongful Imprisonment Survivor
Richard Phillips survived the longest wrongful prison sentence in American history by writing poetry and painting with watercolors. He also had the opportunity to kill the man who helped put him away, but he chose not to. He's due to be paid $1.5 million for being wrongfully convicted (as of December 2023).
27. In an 'unfortunate evolutionary coincidence,' the ?-hexatoxins in Sydney Funnel-web spider venom are exceptionally dangerous to humans. A bite can kill a human in as little as 15 minutes.
28. During a 1972 John Lennon/Chuck Berry jam session, the sound engineers muted Yoko's mic.
29. To join the EU, Austria had to lift its blanket ban on members of the Habsburg family entering Austria because it was a violation of human rights.
30. According to a 2019 survey of 4500+ Americans, the average age at which children stop believing in Santa Claus is 8.4 years old. The oldest average comes from the state of Mississippi, at 10.2 years old.
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31Child Prodigy Adragon De Mello
Child prodigy Adragon De Mello's father planned for his son to get a Ph.D. in physics by age 12, win the Nobel Prize by age 16, and then become a Senator, a President, the head of a world government, and ultimately the chairman of an "intergalactic government." He indeed did become the youngest college graduate in US history at age 11, but later went back to junior high school and, at 27, was working at Home Depot.
32. Bob Jones University is a Christian university located in South Carolina where students are only allowed to watch G-rated movies and rock music is banned. It also didn't allow blacks to attend until 1971. From '71 to '76, the only blacks that were allowed were married couples. In '82, they lost a Supreme Court case and had to pay back taxes from '71. Interracial dating wasn't allowed at the university until 2000.
33. While filming the scene in the 1983 movie "A Christmas Story" where Ralphie is dressed as a sheriff, a prop man gave actor Peter Billingsley real Red Man chewing tobacco. Peter, who was 12 years old, didn't know the difference and ingested it. Billingsley's recovery forced production to be shut down.
34. Kenny Rogers was once singing at a private event for a hedge fund manager and was asked to repeat 'The Gambler' over and over, being offered additional pay per song. After a dozen times and having earned $4 million, he refused to sing.
35. When a newly discovered sponge-like fungus was named after SpongeBob SquarePants in 2011, a mycological research journal initially rejected the name for being "too frivolous." When challenged, the scientists stood behind their discovery, saying, "We'll name it whatever we like."
