1Robert E. Lee
General Robert E. Lee had a pet hen named "Nellie" who laid an egg for him every day for breakfast. Lee loved the hen so much, he halted his retreat from Gettysburg in order to have his men look for her when he couldn't find her.
2. In the 1910s, there was a US baseball team made up of death-row prisoners, whose executions were delayed so long as they kept winning.
3. Guns 'N Roses once went on tour with a car that broke down, so they hitchhiked to the gig, ate raw onions from a field along the way, made it to Seattle for the gig, and when they finished, the owner refused to pay them. They responded by trying and failing, to burn the club down.
4. Shaquille O'Neal only made 1 three-point shot during his entire professional career in the NBA.
5. In 1973, the members of Led Zeppelin gave drummer John Bonham a Harley Davidson for his 25th birthday, which he promptly rode up and down the hallways of his hotel, causing thousands of dollars in damage. The next day, he wrote a check for the damages and said: "Oh, and keep the bike."
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6Commodore Perry
In 1854, Commodore Perry gifted 110 gallons of American Whiskey to the Japanese emperor. That gift has since evolved into a $6 billion industry, with Japan's Suntory distillery winning 2015's World Whisky of the Year. Today, Suntory owns Jim Beam.
7. Antarctica used to be called Australia until modern-day Australia stole its name in 1824, which left the continent nameless until its current name was adopted in the 1890s.
8. Instead of generating a fever themselves, cold-blooded animals will move themselves to a hotter area to cause fever when they have an infection.
9. A marathon is exactly 26 miles and 385 yards because that happened to be the length of the 1908 London Olympic marathon and not because it is the distance between Marathon and Athens, which is approximately 25 miles.
10. On July 8th, 1941 the Australian cruiser HMAS Sydney along with the rest of her squadron attempted to shoot down the planet Venus thinking it was a high altitude bomber. Venus managed to survive the engagement.
11Agoge
The Agoge was a compulsory training program for all male citizens of ancient Sparta between the ages of 7 to 21. This included not only military training, but also tuition in dancing, singing, stealth and thievery, social skills, and loyalty to Sparta.
12. Broadway vs Off-Broadway is based on the number of seats, with Broadway having over 500, Off-Broadway between 100-499, and Off-Off-Broadway having less than 99.
13. A Greek man named Heron Alexandria, who was born in 10 A.D., invented the first steam engine, called an Aeolipile. His design was forgotten and never used until 1577.
14. 'Chai' means tea. If you say 'chai tea', it literally means 'tea tea'.
15. The First Lady Lou Henry Hoover was the first American woman to earn a geology degree. She spoke 5 languages fluently and is the only first lady to speak an Asian language. She established the American Women's War Relief Fund and founded the National Women’s Conference on Law Enforcement.
16Chōsen Shrine
When Japan occupied Korea, they built Shinto Shrines to enforce “Japanization” of Korea. One of these shrines (the national shrine) was Chōsen Shrine. When Japan surrendered, Korea demolished it and built a monument to An Jung-Geun, the man who assassinated Japan's Prince, Itō Hirobumi.
17. There is a giant statue of Jesus in Poland that distributes WiFi to nearby towns and villages.
18. Sylvester Stallone wrote the script for ‘Rocky’ by hand in 3.5 days. It was shot in 28 days, which Stallone compared to “the gestation time of a waterbug.”
19. A Scottish novelist named J.M. Barrie added the requirement of fairy dust for flying because so many children injured themselves trying to fly after seeing the first production of “Peter Pan.”
20. During the space race, Stanley Kubrick was so worried that humans would soon make the first contact with aliens that he tried to buy an insurance policy for 2001: A Space Odyssey in case audiences found his depiction of aliens ridiculous.
21Firelight (1964)
One of Steven Spielberg's first movies (Firelight (1964)) cost $500 to make and was shown at a local cinema. 500 people came to the movie and it is thought that one accidentally paid $2 (tickets cost $1), gaining Spielberg a total profit of $1 from the film.
22. The star-shaped base of the Statue of Liberty was originally a fort built to defend against the British.
23. Taller people have an increased risk of getting cancer, with the risk increasing by about 10% for every 4 inches in height. This is because taller people have more cells, and therefore there are more chances for something to go wrong.
24. The word "National" in the "National Hockey League" refers to Canada, since for the first 7 years of play, all of the teams in the NHL were located in Canada.
25. In the 1980s, the Naval Investigative Service misunderstood the euphemism "a friend of Dorothy" and believed there was actually a woman named Dorothy at the center of a massive ring of gay military personnel. They searched for her in the hopes she would reveal names of gay military members.
