26 Confucius and His 72 Scholars
Confucius had three thousand students, but only 72 mastered what he taught, and he deemed them all scholars of extraordinary ability.
27. After Neil Armstrong died, his wife Carol cleaned his closet and found a cloth bag filled with souvenirs he brought back from the moon, including a movie camera from inside the lunar module and a waist tether. Congress only recently passed a law approving that astronauts can take unneeded equipment home.
28. You can leave your pacemaker with various animal organizations and veterinarian offices when you pass away so that they can use it in dogs that need pacemakers to extend their lives.
29. After attending a Queen concert in Los Angeles, Michael Jackson suggested to Freddie Mercury that the band should release “Another One Bites the Dust” as a single. After doing so, the song became a worldwide hit, spent 15 weeks in the Billboard Top 10, and is Queen’s bestselling single to date.
30. Screwworm, a nasty parasite that can kill hosts, used to be common in the southern USA and Mexico. Programs in place for several decades have virtually eliminated all screwworms up to the Panama-Colombia border.
31 Louis XIV’s Mummified Heart Eaten
Revolutionaries destroyed almost all of Louis XIV’s body during the French Revolution. However, the Archbishop of York kept a piece of his mummified heart and showed it to the Dean of Westminster, who ate it.
32. The 1912 Stockholm Olympics was the last time winners received medals made of 100% solid gold. Since then, first-place medals have been gold-plated.
33. The first emperor of China (221-210 B.C.), who built the Terracotta Army and the Great Wall, also constructed twelve monumental human statues that were 11.5 meters (38 feet) tall and weighed 30 tons each. Around 400 AD, they destroyed the last of these statues.
34. The iconic YMCA dance originated from a misunderstanding. The Village People’s original choreography had them holding their hands above their heads to clap. During an episode of American Bandstand, audience members mistook this for a Y and added the other letters on their own.
35. In the late ’60s, Paul and Linda McCartney used the aliases Mr. and Mrs. Ramone to avoid Beatlemania and the press when checking into hotels. After reading about this, Douglas Colvin (Dee Dee Ramone) named his band “The Ramones,” which became one of the most legendary punk bands of all time.
36 Ducks’ Cannibalism When Bored
Ducks can become cannibalistic when bored, a behavior aggravated by overcrowding, lack of ventilation, and faulty nutrition. The only known way to stop this is to remove the rim at the front of the bird’s upper bill through a process known as beak-trimming.
37. When you cross a zebra and a donkey, the offspring is called a zonkey if it is sired by a male zebra and a female donkey. If the pairing is a male donkey and a female zebra, their offspring is known as a zedonk.
38. Sylvester Stallone originally had the lead role in Beverly Hills Cop. Stallone wanted a big-budget action movie, but the studio changed it to a comedy action film to save money and cast Eddie Murphy instead.
39. Japanese nobles, particularly children of the Imperial Family, still receive their education at Gakush?in. Founded in 1847 to educate children of noble birth, Gakush?in now has limited spots for the public from preschool to university. Many current politicians and generals are alumni of this school.
40. Palmyra Atoll is the only U.S. territory subject to all constitutional provisions, despite having no inhabitants. If a foreigner gave birth on the atoll, the child would be an American citizen.
41 The Slash Border Demarcation
The Slash is a man-made, 6.1-meter-wide, 2,171-kilometer-long track of deforestation that marks portions of the border between Canada and the U.S.
42. In 1963, a Swiss Air plane crash killed 43 residents of Humlikon village, which was about 20% of its 217-person population. The victims included the mayor, the entire town council, all school staff, the postmaster, and their families.
43. The Wada Test is a procedure that temporarily “shuts down” one hemisphere of the brain at a time, allowing the evaluation of each hemisphere’s language and memory capacities individually.
44. Around 2500 B.C., workers buried a 140-foot-long ship in pieces near the Great Pyramid. In 1954, researchers discovered the 1,224 fragments and recently assembled them. Khufu’s Solar Boat “sailed” again in 2021 when a special vehicle moved it to the Grand Egyptian Museum.
45. Olives can make cats playful and excited because they contain nepetalactone, a compound also found in catnip.
15 Most Controversial & Costly Blunders in History
46 Ireland’s Tax Breaks for Artists
Ireland offers tax exemptions or reductions to writers, artists, composers, painters, and other cultural contributors, recognizing their valuable contribution to culture.
47. The Etruscan shrew has the fastest heartbeat of any mammal, at up to 1,500 beats per minute.
48. Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio (2002) was the most expensive film in Italian history and a big success in Italy but bombed in the U.S., receiving 0% on Rotten Tomatoes.
49. Trailerizing is a common technique in which movie trailers use an old pop song, keeping the lyrics but making it slower and moodier. This well-known melody attracts viewers who might otherwise lose interest in the new movie trailer.
50. A comet smells like rotten eggs, urine, burning matches, and almonds. Traces of hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, sulfur dioxide, and hydrogen cyanide were found in the makeup of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. In 2016, promoters even commissioned postcards carrying the scent.
