40 Random Facts That Are Totally Nuts – Part 183

A teenager named Peter Roberts invented a quick-release ratchet and sold his patent to Sears for $10,000, who said that the invention was not worth very much. Sears then went on to make $44 million selling the ratchet. He sued them for fraud and was awarded $1 million.

2. In 1848, an entrepreneur named James Lick arrived in San Francisco with 600 lbs of chocolate to sell. When all of his chocolate sold quickly, he urged his confectioner friend in Peru to come to San Francisco and start his own Chocolate company. That confectioner's name is Domingo Ghirardelli.

3. A teenager named Izaha Akins fooled an entire school, a car dealership, and police officers that he was the youngest elected State Representative ever. He was escorted around the school, given a tour, and even spoke to the high school students about his involvement in politics.

4. The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time for the Nintendo 64 is the only game to ever get a 99 rating on Metacritic making it the best-rated game of all time.

5. A 2002 episode of "The Twilight Zone" addressed the Novikov self-consistency principle of time travel: a woman, played by Katherine Heigl, goes back in time to kill baby Hitler. She succeeds, but his mother adopts a child and raises him as Adolf. He grows up to lead the Nazi Party.

In 2015, scientists dropped a microphone 6 miles down into the Mariana Trench. They were surprised with the results. Instead of quietness, they heard sounds of earthquakes, ships, the distinct moans of baleen whales and the overwhelming clamor of a category 4 typhoon that just happened to pass overhead.

7. In 2005, the Republic of Fiji lost its declaration of independence from Britain. After five long years of searching, Fiji's government finally turned to Britain, who provided them with a photocopy.

8. Leprosy doesn't cause body parts to be damaged or fall off. Instead, the disease damages one's ability to feel pain, causing common accidents to become more damaging. In addition to this, leprosy is only mildly contagious and more than 95% of the world's population are naturally immune.

9. George Washington moved his slaves in and out of Pennsylvania every 6 months to avoid them taking advantage of a law that meant slaves residing in the state longer than half a year could claim freedom.

10. Dwayne Johnson was the 2nd person on earth to publicly report the news of Osama bin Laden's death, only 47 seconds after a navy intel officer leaked it from official sources.

When Usain Bolt broke the 100 m world record at the 2009 Berlin World Championships, the mayor of Berlin awarded him a 12 foot long, 6000-pound piece of the Berlin Wall. Bolt accepted and it is now housed at the Jamaica Military Museum.

12. The Murchison meteorite, which fell to earth in 1969 contained high levels of organic compounds. It came from a parent body that had liquid water, and the amino acids it contained could not have been synthesized on earth because they consisted of both left- and right- isomers.

13. The Golden State Killer attended a public information meeting about his own attacks. A husband stood up and mocked the notion that the killer would attack if a man was present in the home. The killer followed the couple home to see where they live and returned 6 months later to attack them.

14. After realizing his voice would be dubbed, David Prowse, the actor for Darth Vader, often improvised his lines which resulted in his co-stars having to respond to the correct lines anyway. 

15. In the 1980s Janet Jackson was criticized for not writing her own music and being dependent on producers. In response, she wrote and co-produced every song on her following album, which ended up being her best-selling album ever.

Jackie Coogan, the silent film child actor who was famously exploited by his parents for his earnings, found renewed screen success later in life playing Uncle Fester on the Addams Family.

17. Film score composer Hans Zimmer saw the Lion King as a metaphor of a son losing his father at a young age, which tragically also happened to him. "Suddenly I am writing a requiem for my father, and the whole thing became intensely personal”. The score landed him an Oscar for best music.

18. Danny Trejo has been in over 353 movies, and when IMDB tested his knowledge of which movies he had been in, he passed with flying colors.

19. Tupac Shakur was a ballet dancer and played the role of the Mouse King in The Nutcracker.

20. Chimpanzees have been known to steal alcohol, get drunk, then attack humans after mistaking them for monkeys.

In 2006 Prince did a 'Willy Wonka' and made Universal hide 14 purple tickets—seven in the U.S. and seven internationally—inside his latest album, 3121. Fans who found a purple ticket were invited to attend a private performance at Prince's Los Angeles home.

22. Scientists proposed a “Minimal Turing Test” where you get to use only one word to convince others you are human and not a machine. The single word that people found most likely to distinguish a human from a machine based on a new study was the word “poop”.

23. While hospitalized after a 2008 plane crash, Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker was in so much pain that he repeatedly called friends and offered them $1 million to assist him in committing suicide. Hospital staff eventually took his phone away.

24. Scientists have found cancer in a 1.7 million-year-old foot bone and a 2 million-year-old spine from two ancient hominin specimens in South Africa. Before these finds, the oldest dated cancer in a human was only 120,000 years old.

25. An FDA study requested by the military found 90% of more than 100 drugs, both prescription and over-the-counter, were still safe and effective even 15 years after the expiration date. Expiration dates don’t really indicate a point at which the medication is no longer effective or unsafe to use.