Here are 25 kickass random facts. For part 616, click here
1-5 Kickass Random Fact
1. There is a street that is split down the middle by the USA-Canadian border, aptly named Canusa street. People who live in houses on the south side of the street are in the USA, and the north side, in Canada. Crossing the street requires having to report to the border crossing office. – Source
2. Walt Disney accidentally “kidnapped” Richard Nixon by dispatching his monorail train before the Secret Service could get on. The agents ran after the train and attempted to jump on board but the doors had already closed. Monorail pilot Bob Gurr was terrified; Nixon got a kick out of it. – Source
3. The soundtrack for the 2019 miniseries Chernobyl (which concerns the 1986 nuclear disaster) was composed by Hildur Guðnadóttir, who incorporated field recordings from a real power plant in Lithuania, capturing the sounds of pumps, reactors, and turbines. – Source
4. The crime that led Sisyphus to push a boulder was cheating death. He made his wife not bury him properly before he died, chained death, and tricked Persephone into letting him briefly return to earth to scold his wife and ran away instead of returning to hell. – Source
5. Betty White hosted a five-and-a-half-hour long live talk show six days a week from 1949 to 1953. – Source
6-10 Kickass Random Facts
6. In 2018, the US hit a record high of never-married adults. 35% of Americans ages 25 to 50 had never been married, compared to 9% in 1970. – Source
7. Neanderthals, which were traditionally thought of as extremely primitive humans, are now believed to have been extremely intelligent, even comparable to the intelligence of modern humans. They used tools, had social structures, thrived in hostile environments, and lived long lives. – Source
8. Mahatma Gandhi wrote two letters to Hitler, in which he asked him to stop the war cause it would have caused many victims. Neither of the letters he wrote was allowed to be sent by the colonial government. – Source
9. In 2016, the Ripley’s Believe It or Not Museum in Hollywood paid $4.8 million for Marilyn Monroe’s “Happy Birthday, Mr. President” dress that Monroe wore at JFK’s 45th birthday celebration. The purchase cements it as one of the most expensive pieces of pop-culture memorabilia of all time. – Source
10. It is estimated that 16 gorillas were killed during the Rwandan war, but the overall population increased from 320 to 355. Gorillas survived because they moved farther up the mountains, away from violent humans and no faction wanted the bad publicity of being responsible for a gorilla death. – Source
11-15 Kickass Random Facts
11. Selena originally couldn’t speak Spanish and had to learn to sing her songs phonetically. – Source
12. The Driftless Area; a rugged area of Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, and a minor part of Illinois was completely missed by glaciers. It is roughly the size of West Virginia and is home to huge bluffs, deep canyons, and rare species of plants found nowhere else. – Source
13. Michael Jackson is estimated to have donated over half a billion dollars over his lifetime, setting a record for any pop star. – Source
14. During solar eclipses, tree leaves act as pinhole cameras, resulting in trees casting crescent-shaped shadows on the ground. This effect puzzled Aristotle in the 4th Century BC. – Source
15. People can’t eat after a breakup due to the body going into survival mode. There are fewer constrictions and relaxations of the muscles in your stomach and bowels, which consequently slows down the digestion of food. – Source
