← FACTSlides → Random Facts Page #64

The U.S. government gave Indiana University $1 million to study memes.

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Saddam Hussein's son owned an actual iron maiden and used it against people he didn't like.

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King Mithridates VI of Pontus was terrified of being poisoned, so he took small doses of various poisons throughout his life to develop immunity.

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The U.S. Navy was disbanded following the Revolutionary War and brought back years later largely to fight pirates.

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The first openly transgender athlete in a professional American sports team was Harrison Browne of the National Women's Hockey League.

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In Canada, due to a chronic shortage of coinage, playing cards were once used as currency.

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Vladimir Lenin spent 17 years out of Russia after he served 3 years in Siberia for being a revolutionary.

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France opened in 2016 what it claims to be the world's first solar panel road, in a Normandy village.

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On 14th July 1789, the date of the storming of the Bastille, King Louis XVI of France wrote in his diary "rien" (nothing).

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On average, New Yorkers save $1,160 a month and $13,926 annually by relying on public transportation.

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Jonathan Taylor Thomas, a famous 90s child actor, walked away from fame at the height of his career to study philosophy at Harvard.

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The father of Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, was a unicyclist in a circus.

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The average Brit will spend one year and eight months of their life in a bad mood.

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Metrophobia is the fear of poetry.

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If Prince Charles becomes king, he will be the oldest monarch ever crowned in Britain.

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When Winston Churchill paid a visit to the U.S. in 1931, during the height of Alcohol Prohibition, he got around it after being hit by an oncoming car. The doctor prescribed him 6 shots of alcohol at mealtimes.

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Disney World is the second-largest purchaser of explosives in the United States, the first being the U.S. Department of Defense.

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All astronauts must learn how to speak Russian, and all cosmonauts must learn how to speak English.

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Beer cans in Japan have braille on them so blind people don't confuse alcoholic drinks with soft drinks.

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Five years before he won Wimbledon, Fred Perry was world table-tennis champion.

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Al Capone was expelled from school at the age of 14 for hitting a female teacher, and never went back.

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The average temperature of a beehive is the same as a human body. Bees flap their wings to regulate heat.

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When the Declaration of Independence was being drafted, Benjamin Franklin suggested that the word "sacred" be replaced with "self-evident" because he believed that the nation should be founded on reason, not faith.

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You can tell if a duck has bird flu by smelling its droppings.

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Drinking very hot beverages increases your risk of developing cancer.

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The Pentagon has over 5 million square feet of office space and 17 miles of corridors.

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Comparative analysis indicated that chimpanzees and bonobos show population-level right handedness, whereas gorillas and orangutans do not.

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About 1 in 10,000 chickens can change their gender.

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The 4.5 million ties bought each year in America for Father's Day would stretch from New York to Rome.

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Astasis is a lack of motor coordination marked by an inability to stand.

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