Here are 25 kickass random facts. For part 839, click here
1-5 Kickass Random Fact
1. In 2009, a hard ground ball hit Adrián Beltré in the groin which landed him on the 15-day disabled list. In his first game after returning, teammate Ken Griffey Jr. conspired with those in charge of the PA system to have Beltré’s at-bat intro music be the opening march from The Nutcracker Suite. – Source
2. Rapper Redman outed MTV Cribs as completely fake and revealed that MTV would routinely rent out mansions to make guests appear wealthier than they were. – Source
3. TLC was the first all-female group to sell 10 million copies of an album – CrazySexyCool. But they weren’t cool about making $50,000 each for the album while the record company got $75 million. So, they held Arista Records President Clive Davis, hostage, until the NYPD intervened. – Source
4. In 1998, a preservation group began restoring Ben Franklin’s residence in London. During their rehabilitation work, they discovered a secret, windowless room under his garden containing the remains of 15 people. – Source
5. 91% of all the dives to the bottom of the Mariana Trench occurred in the past 4 years. Before that, the only visitors were the original explorers in 1960, and James Cameron in 2012. – Source
6-10 Kickass Random Fact
6. Neil Armstrong completed almost all required coursework towards a master’s degree when he joined NASA in the early 1960s. A semester short, he returned to USC after his moon landing in 1970 to give a one-hour seminar on the technical aspects of landing Apollo’s lunar module to receive his Masters. – Source
7. King Henry II of France participated in a jousting tournament in 1559 to celebrate the marriage of his daughter. A lance splintered on his helmet and pushed wood into his eye and brain. He died ten days later. His death led to the decline of jousting in France. – Source
8. Diogenes was a Greek philosopher who was known for living in a ceramic jar, disrupting Plato’s lessons by eating loudly, urinating on people who insulted him, and pointing his middle finger at random people. – Source
9. Hot thermal pools have killed more people than bears in Yellowstone National Park. 20 deaths v. 8 deaths. – Source
10. The “Leatherman” was a person dressed in a leather suit who would repeat a 365 mile route for over 30 years. He would stop at towns for supplies and lived in various “Leatherman caves”. When archeologists dug up his grave in 2011, they found no remains, only coffin nails. – Source
11-15 Kickass Random Fact
11. The Yamato, the largest battleship ever built, was on a 3,000-man kamikaze mission to beach herself on Okinawa before she was sunk by US forces in April of 1945. – Source
12. Only two people survived a fall through a cumulonimbus cloud. One of the cases suffered severe frostbite and decompression injuries and was trapped in the cloud for more than 30 minutes. – Source
13. Ancient pottery from West Africa have been chemically analyzed, showing organic residue of their diets. The Nok people from 3,500 years ago enjoyed quality nutrition in greens such as African eggplant, okra, cowpea and bombax, and added flavors to starch-based staples. – Source
14. Astrud Gilberto made just $120 for singing The Girl from Ipanema, which was the standard studio musician rate at the time. This was because Stan Getz personally intervened to ensure she got nothing. – Source
15. People that are night owls have an inner clock that runs in cycles longer than 24 h. Like this, their rhythm gets delayed everyday, making it hard to fall asleep and get out of bed. – Source
