Here are 25 kickass random facts. For part 500, click here
1-5 Kickass Random Facts
1. Pelorus Jack was a dolphin that used to guide ships through a notoriously dangerous channel in New Zealand. In 1904, someone aboard the SS Penguin tried to shoot Jack with a rifle, he survived and continued to guide all ships except the SS Penguin. – Source
2. A local folk remedy in Boho, Ireland was to place soil from the local church under a pillow while you slept to cure infections. In 2018 a microbiologist found the churchyard’s soil contains a previously unknown strain of streptomyces which can be used to create antibiotics. – Source
3. It is completely legal for women to be topless in Colorado, Wyoming, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Utah. – Source
4. When Japanese actor Mako Iwamatsu, the voice actor of Aku from Samurai Jack, and Iroh from Avatar, died in 2006, many of his voice roles were taken on by soundalike voice actor Greg Baldwin, who’s voice was almost indistinguishable. – Source
5. A restaurant in Bangkok has been constantly cooking and serving from the same soup for 45 years, a form of “perpetual stew”. – Source
6-10 Kickass Random Facts
6. Henry Grimes, a jazz bassist who disappeared in 1970 and was presumed dead. He was found by a social worker in 2002, destitute and with no bass. After people loaned him instruments and money, he made a remarkable comeback, eventually winning a lifetime achievement award in 2016. – Source
7. The women who work in the garment recycling industry in India have a theory that because of a water shortage in the West, it must be cheaper to buy new clothes than to wash them. This explains why so many clothes are discarded barely worn. – Source
8. Scientists discovered a cypress tree in North Carolina that is at least 2,624-years-old, which means the tree was alive for centuries before the advent of Christianity, the Roman Empire, and the English language. – Source
9. During the filming of Poltergeist (1982), the clown doll nearly really killed Robbie Freeling due to an animatronic error when the clown’s arm constricted too tightly around his neck. When the actor started protesting he couldn’t breathe, Spielberg thought he was improve acting. – Source
10. EDS lost a 2010 court case because their star witness, a senior EDS executive, bought his Masters’s degree from an online diploma mill. The opposing lawyer signed his dog up for the same degree, and the dog graduated with a higher score than the EDS executive. The judge ruled against EDS. – Source
11-15 Kickass Random Facts
11. In the 17th century, a man named Lazarus Colloredo was convicted of murder. Lazarus had a parasitic conjoined twin and successfully argued his death would kill his twin, an innocent man. He was pardoned. – Source
12. The BBC created a Radio Soap Opera during WWII specifically for the American market. It was propaganda designed to get the USA to end its neutrality. One of the aims of the show was to appeal to those with a ‘limited mentality’. It ended up being a popular radio show in the US. – Source
13. Mark Spitz, a nine-time Olympic swimming champion, jokingly told a Russian journalist in 1972 that his mustache increased his speed in the water, deflecting water away from his mouth. By 1973 the Russian men’s swimming team had, according to Spitz, all grown mustaches. – Source
14. Joan d’Arc was tried, condemned, and burnt at the stake by the Roman Catholic Church in May 1430. In 1456, the very same church debunked her charges and denoted her as a martyr. Finally, in 1920 she was canonized and became a patron saint of France. – Source
15. The Nigerian government has removed history from the secondary school curriculum as a result of the Nigerian civil war (the Biafran war) being too controversial, where the Nigerian government blockaded and starved 3 million people to death. – Source
