44 Random Facts That Are Just too Awesome To Miss – Part 142

Michael Connor Humphreys, who played Forest Gump as a teenager, was initially supposed to learn how to talk like Tom Hanks. Hearing this, Hanks sat down with Humphreys and decided that he would talk in Humphreys’ Mississippi accent instead. He still has tapes of him and Humphreys practicing.

27. Alcohol breath does not come from the stomach. It's comes from the ethanol diffusing out of the blood in the lungs. So eating food, chewing gum, or vomiting won't help mask how much alcohol is in your system if you're breathalyzed.

28. The "Be Prepared" scene featured in The Lion King was based off the 1935 Nazi propaganda film "Triumph of the Will."

29. Reese's peanut butter cups were also originally called "penny cups" since they cost just one cent each when Harry Burnett Reese first started selling them in 1928. The penny cups were so successful that Reese was able to sell them in 5-pound boxes to local retailers.

30. Lynyrd Skynyrd was named after Leonard Skinner, a gym teacher who used to send the band's members to the principal for their long hair. Later, the band used his real estate company's sign and phone number in album artwork, swamping Leonard Skinner Realty in prank calls.

One in eight US workers have worked at McDonald's, among them are Jeff Bezos, Pink, and Jay Leno.

32. Kerning is the art of spacing letters so they are readable. Keming is when you kern letters incorrectly and they blend together.

33. Steve Irwin once discovered a new species of the turtle while on a fishing trip with his father and he had the honor of naming it. It's called Irwin's Turtle (Elseya irwini).

34. In 1861, Giuseppe Garibaldi, known as the hero of the two worlds and the main protagonist in Italian unification, volunteered to president Lincoln and was offered a Major General's commission in the U.S. Army, with only one condition: that the war's objective is declared as slavery's abolition.

35. Melvil Dewey, the inventor of the Dewey Decimal System, was kicked out of the American Library Association for constant unwelcome advances towards women librarians.

Schlitz was the number one beer in America in the early 1950s and then they started changing ingredients to cut costs. By 1975, consumers complained that the beer was forming "snot" in the can, and by 1981 the company folded.

37. Fruit Loops don't have different flavors. They are all the same exact flavor.

38. Bon Jovi has a restaurant (Soul kitchen) that has no price. Guests pay whatever they can or volunteer in exchange for their meal.

39. Grey eyes appear grey due to Mie scattering, the same type of scattering that causes the sky to appear grey on rainy days.

40. Crying is good for you because emotional/stress tears carry higher levels of stress hormones being flushed out of your system and higher levels of mood-regulating manganese.

Artificial intelligence can distinguish authentic Pollock's paintings from fake ones with 93% accuracy.

42. In 1875, three French men traveled to a height of 28,000 feet in a balloon. When it landed only one man remained alive and was permanently deaf.

43. Benito Mussolini’s son Romano Mussolini was a respected Jazz musician who toured internationally with artists including Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Helen Merrill and Chet Baker.

44. Cancer death rates have dropped 26% since 1991, with many major forms reduced by 39% to 52%. This has saved nearly 2.4 million lives.