50 Fascinating Facts about Birthdays

The British king or queen has two birthdays: their real birth date and one assigned to them during the summer, to ensure better weather for the parade.

27. Tenzing Norgay, one of the first two men who reached Mount Everest, didn't know when his exact birthday was. After his ascent of Everest on 29 May 1953, he decided to celebrate his birthday on that day thereafter.

28. There is a copy of the Quran written in Saddam Hussein's blood which he had commissioned for his 60th birthday. Over the course of 2 years he provided up to 57 pints of his blood to complete the more than 336,000 words that make up the text.

29. Pharaoh Ptolemy VIII was married to his sister-wife Cleopatra II. Later when Ptolemy married his niece (Cleopatra’s daughter by another brother), it caused Cleopatra to rebel in support of their 12-year-old son. Ptolemy responded by dismembering their son and sending the pieces to Cleopatra on her birthday.

30. A billionaire hedge fund manager named Raj Rajaratnam once paid Kenny Rogers $4 million to sing The Gambler over and over a dozen times at his birthday party.

Christmas is banned in North Korea and instead of Christmas, the birthday of Kim Jong-suk (grandmother of the current supreme leader of North Korea) is celebrated on Christmas eve. However, some North Korean Christian believers still celebrate Christmas in secret.

32. In the 1800s, a man named James “Shanghai” Kelly used to kidnap men and forced them to work on ships. One year on his birthday he announced he was hosting a free “booze cruise” to celebrate, served opium-laced whiskey to the attendees, then offloaded them onto waiting ships and got 100 men in one night.

33. A Dutch city known as Utrecht celebrated George Orwell's 110 birthday by putting party hats on surveillance cameras.

34. There is a festival called Eeyore's Birthday Party, which is celebrated in honor of the character of the same name from Winnie the Pooh, who believes that everyone has forgotten his birthday.

35. Composer Arnold Schoenberg had a morbid fear of the number 13. On his 76th birthday, an astrologer wrote him a letter of warning reading only “7 + 6 = 13”, causing him to fall into a deep depression and illness, from which he died on Friday the 13th.

Snooty was the world’s oldest captive manatee that used to live at the South Florida Aquarium for almost his whole life until his death in 2017. On his birthday, his care takers used to give him a cake made of fruit and vegetables while the visitors sang him Happy Birthday.

37. On Donald Ducks' 50th birthday, Walt Disney World hatched 50 Peking ducks in front of Donald Duck, so they would think he is their "mother" and follow him around for a birthday celebration parade.

38. Babe Ruth believed that his birthday was February 7, 1894. However, when he applied for a passport he looked up his birth certificate and found his birthday listed as February 6, 1895, nearly a full year later than he thought.

39. Putting candles on birthday cakes dates back to the Ancient Greeks, who often burned candles as offerings to their many Gods and Goddesses. It was their way to pay tribute to the Greek moon goddess, Artemis. Round cakes symbolized the moon. Candles were added to represent the reflected moonlight.

40. Stephen Hawking was born (January 8, 1942) on the 300th anniversary of the death of astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei.

Maroon 5 was banned from China after keyboardist Jesse Carmichael wished the Dalai Lama of Tibet a happy birthday on Twitter.

42. Lombardi's Pizza, the first pizzeria in the US opened in 1905 and still runs to this day. It even offered $0.05 Pizzas for its 100th Birthday.

43. American actress Doris Day believed she was born in 1924 until her 95th birthday when the Associated Press found a birth certificate with the year 1922 on it.

44. Louis Armstrong changed his birthday to July 4th, 1900 in order to make himself appear more patriotic to his fans.

45. On June 12, 1942, Anne Frank received an autograph book from her father for her 13th birthday. That book became her diary.

Two-thirds of the way between your 31st and 32nd birthdays, you will turn one billion seconds old.

47. The famous photo of Albert Einstein sticking out his tongue was taken on his 72nd birthday when he was asked by a photographer to smile for the camera. After smiling a dozen times for previous photos that day, he playfully stuck out his tongue instead.

48. Richard Hammond left his Porsche 911 in traffic and ran 16 miles for his daughter's 4th birthday.

49. People living in Commonwealth countries get a birthday card from the Queen of England when they turn 100, 105, and all birthdays after that.

50. Doljabi is a tradition in Korea that is performed during the child’s first birthday. The child is placed in front of a table with many items and the item they pick up first shows what the child will grow up to be. For example, if they pick money, they will be rich. If they pick a book, they will be smart.