Random Fact Sheet #1 – 40 Awesome Facts You Haven’t Read Anywhere

BuzzFeed writer Benny Johnson was found guilty of plagiarizing over 40 different times before he was fired. He was subsequently hired by National Review as a social media editor.

2. There used to be 4 billion American chestnut trees, but they all disappeared because of a fungus that kills them as saplings.

3. Chevy Chase played drums in college for a band called The Leather Canary, which he referred to as a "bad Jazz band". After leaving, two band members and classmates went on to be successful as the band Steely Dan.

4. Mathematician Paul Erdös regularly took amphetamines, which worried his friends enough that one bet him $500 that he couldn't quit for a month. Erdös won the bet but later claimed mathematics had been set back a month.

5. The "Made in [Country]" mark was first established by the UK in 1887 in order to denounce foreign goods (mostly made in Germany) and encourage consumption of domestic goods. The plan backfired and consumers specifically bought products made in Germany as they were seen as reliable and cheap.

Lodges made by Beavers have two chambers. The floor of the first chamber is a few inches above the water level and is used to dry off after coming out of the water. The floor of the second chamber is above the first, and is used for sleeping and caring for kits (baby beavers).

7. Dry counties (counties where the sale of alcohol is banned) have a drunk driving fatality rate ~3.6 times higher than wet counties.

8. Mr. Rogers sued the KKK for impersonating him.

9. The Weezer song "Mykel & Carli", released in 1994, is about sisters Mykel and Carli Allan who established the band's fan club and are considered the band's biggest fans. Mykel and Carli and younger sister Trisha died in a car accident in 1997; members of Weezer attended their funeral.

10. Winston Churchill was prescribed alcohol to get around American Prohibition

We use "lbs" as shorthand for pounds in English because of the Latin phrase "Libra Poundo", which is also where we derived "pounds" from

12. The Soviets Dropped Cluster Bombs on Finland but Claimed they Were Humanitarian Food Drops. As a Result, The Finns Coined the Term "Molotov Bread Basket" to Describe These Bombs and then the Term "Molotov Cocktail" as "A Drink To Go With The Food"

13. There was a church of Euthanasia whose motto was "Save the planet, kill yourself".

14. Snoop Dogg says the only person that has "out-smoked" him is Willie Nelson, saying, “that’s the only person that’s ever smoked me under the table.”

15. The Japanese considered raw salmon dangerous since Pacific salmon was prone to parasites. Norway had too much salmon and decided to focus on teaching Japanese consumers that Atlantic salmon was safe to eat raw. It took ten years for Salmon sushi/sashimi to finally become popular.

It is illegal to collect or possess eagle feathers in the United States and only enrolled members of a federally recognized Native American tribe may legally possess them.

17. Jonathan Taylor Thomas, the '90s child actor also known simply as JTT, walked away from fame at the height of his career to study philosophy at Harvard.

18. Per kilogram, asparagus has a larger carbon footprint than pork or veal

19. IBM had to delete 'Urban Dictionary' data from the Watson super computer system because the machine started cursing.

20. Esprit d'escalier (literally, staircase wit) is a French term used in English to denote the tendency to think of a witty reply when it is too late, for example when taking the stairs on leaving the scene of a confrontation.

Bill Gates once released mosquitos during a Ted Talk, stating that "poor people shouldn't be the only ones to have this experience."

22. A Roman prostitute named Marozia not only was the mistress of one pope, but her bastard son, two grandsons, two great-grandsons, and one great great grandson all eventually became popes. The era in which they ruled is known by scholars as the "pornocracy".

23. The lead singer of Smash Mouth started a cancer research fund after his son died of acute lymphatic leukemia.

24. Ava Gardner once swam naked in a pool belonging to Ernest Hemingway. He ordered that the water never be changed.

25. Pepsi is being sued because of its Naked Juice marketing. While the juice is marketed as "healthy", it actually has a higher sugar content than an equivalent amount of Pepsi Cola.