26Gavel K-9
A K-9 Cadet named Gavel was fired from the Police Academy for being too friendly after months of training. He then got a new job as Vice-Regal Dog for the Office of the Governor in Queensland where he greets visitors, attends official functions and sits in on Governor’s briefings.
27. Actor Clark Gable fought in World War 2 and almost got killed once. When word of this reached MGM, studio executives began to badger the Army Air Forces to reassign him to noncombat duty. Also, Hitler was a fan and offered a sizable reward to anyone who could capture and bring Gable to him unscathed.
28. Aldous Huxley’s descriptions of the effects of alcohol on fetuses in Brave New World predate the scientific recognition of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome by more than four decades.
29. Before 1954, stop signs used to be yellow with black lettering. This was because there was no red dye that would not fade over time. However, by 1954, sign makers began using a fade-resistant porcelain enamel, and it was then declared that stop signs should be red with white lettering.
30. When Japanese pole vaulters Shuhei Nishida and Sueo Oe tied for silver at the 1936 Olympics they refused a tie-breaker. The silver was arbitrarily awarded to Nishida. They had their medals cut in half and then welded together so they each had one “friendship medal” of half silver, half bronze.
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15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History
31Accuracy vs Precision
“Accuracy” is the ability to hit a target, while “Precision” is the ability to achieve the same results over and over. You can be accurate without being precise and precise without being accurate.
32. Skyscrapers shrink over time due to building materials compressing. This shrinkage is large enough that elevator guide rails in the highest skyscrapers need to be mounted to sliding clips, instead of attached solidly, so they can move when the building shrinks instead of warping.
33. A man named Paul Brown invented the upside-down squeeze bottle in 1991. He then sold his product to everyone from shampoo companies to ketchup companies to NASA, and then four years later he sold his company for $13 million.
34. In the film Candyman, Tony Todd negotiated a fee of $1000 for each time he was stung during the bee scene. He walked away with $23000.
35. A Canadian woodworking tool company named ‘Lee Valley’ pays its employees on a “slope”. This means the top paid CEO cannot make more than 10 times the lowest-paid employee. It also means the same CEO gets the same cut of their profit-sharing as the lowest-paid employee.
