Chatbot Chat: Fact

Hello. Did you know: The USDA allows the term 'wyngz' for wing-like chicken products that contain no wing meat. Some cats are allergic to humans. To deter nativity scene theft, BrickHouse Security provides free GPS trackers that can be installed in Baby Jesus. A gun with a silencer attached sounds about as loud as a car door being slammed. It's much quieter than the usual "bang!" but it's not as subtle as the little "whoosh" heard in James Bond films. In writing his own tombstone, Thomas Jefferson penned a lengthy memorial listing many of his great accomplishments, from "author of the Declaration of Independence" to "founder of the University of Virginia." However, he did forget one small achievement: the tombstone fails to mention that Jefferson was once president of the United States. Telephone cards first took off in Hawaii, since long-distance charges to the far-flung state were higher there than anywhere else in the country. Wilford Brimley was Howard Hughes' bodyguard. It's not widely publicized, but Mr. Clean has a first name: "Veritably." twelve+one = eleven+two, and 'twelve plus one' is an anagram of 'eleven plus two.' Liquid measurements are different in Britain than in the United States: A fluid ounce is smaller, while pints, quarts, and gallons are larger. Ken Osmond, the actor who played Eddie Haskell in Leave It to Beaver, wasn't the troublemaker in real life. He grew up to become an L.A. policeman. A flu outbreak canceled the 1919 Stanley Cup when too many players were too ill to play past the fifth game. About one in every 30 Americans' births results in twins. Submitted by Pam Rogers - Orlando, FL Composer Erik Satie would only eat white foods. Lisa Kudrow was the original Roz on Frasier. However, she was replaced by Peri Gilpin during rehearsals before the pilot episode. Venus and Uranus rotate on their axes in a different direction than the other six planets. Submitted by Micherre Matras - Norwalk, Connecticut The word 'laser' is an acronym. It stands for 'Light Amplification by the Stimulated Emission of Radiation.' Although the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People clearly stated its mission in its title, W.E.B. Du Bois was the only African American on the NAACP's first board of directors. For years, the pharmaceutical company Bayer held the trademark for the word "heroin" and sold the drug as a cough and headache remedy. null Submitted by Chris Mumaw - Strasburg, VA William Wrigley originally started in the baking powder business. With his powder, he gave a free pack of his gum. He later abandoned the baking powder business when he learned that people were buying it just to get the gum. Submitted by Therese Cabrera - San Francisco, CA The official color of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco is 'International Orange.' In the election of 1968, Wilt Chamberlain endorsed and campaigned for Richard Nixon. According to a law passed in 2007, at least 20% of $one coins produced by the U.S. Mint must feature Native Americans. When Cosmopolitan started it was a very different magazine. Early issues included stories by Henry James and Theodore Roosevelt, and covered topics like climbing Mount Vesuvius and the life of Mozart. The first video uploaded to YouTube featured co-founder Jawed Karim discussing elephants at the San Diego Zoo. In the early stage version of The Wizard of Oz, Toto was replaced by a cow named Imogene. Submitted by Todd Carter - Niceville, Florida The first fax machine was invented over 25 years before the telephone. Submitted by Anthony Sclafani - Washington, DC In 1942, Hollywood actress Hedy Lamarr co-invented spread spectrum communications, the forerunner to today's CDMA cell phone technology. Submitted by Joshua Shelton - Fayetteville, Georgia The term 'jumbo' is taken from the name of one of P.T. Barnum's large circus elephants. Submitted by Brian Bishop - Cleveland, Ohio Sure, people see multiple home runs by the same person in the same game, but did you know that only one man in all of major league baseball history was able to pull off not one, but two grand slams in the same INNING? Fernando Tatis pulled off this feat while playing with the St. Louis Cardinals in the late 1990s. Outside North and South America, the only alligators found in the wild are in China. Both the flesh and the pit of avocados are toxic to most species of birds. Submitted by Justus Wataru - Honolulu, HI The Hawaiian alphabet only has twelve letters: A, E, I, O, U, H, K, L, M, N, P, and W. The Rhodes Scholar program is named for De Beers founder Cecil Rhodes. As president, George Washington pulled in a salary of $25K a year. That's roughly $one million in today's currency. Excited by his newfound purchasing power, Washington started living it up, reportedly buying leopard-skin robes for all his horses and spending seven percent of his income on alcohol. Mushroom clouds can be created by any huge explosion; they aren't specific to atomic blasts. Submitted by Mitchell Olewinski - Tinley Park, IL After having an argument with his son about Crazy eight's, Merle Robbins, a barbershop owner and card lover, invented UNO in 1971 in Reading, Ohio. He introduced the game to his family, and after they started playing the game more and more, he decided to have the game printed. A group of eggs, such as those found in a bird's nest, is known as a 'clutch.' In 2003, the European Union came up with a novel solution for lowering soaring unemployment levels in Italy's Campania region. With a grant of one million euros, the EU opened First Tel School, a program designed to train students to become game show hostesses. Unfortunately, fewer than 100 spots were made available to the 1,200 Vanna White wannabes who applied. Visit a waterfall at dusk and you may see moonbows-nighttime rainbows. When the Philadelphia Eagles beat the Dallas Cowboys in sweltering heat in September, 2000, many Eagles credited the ice-cold pickle juice they had guzzled. The city of Neuquén in southwestern Argentina must have been a rather terrifying place to live 90 million years ago. Within an hour's drive of Neuquén lie three important paleontologic sites, each home to record-breaking finds including Argentinosaurus huinculensis, considered the world's largest dinosaur (coming in at 130 feet long and 60 feet tall), Giganotosaurus carolinii, thought to be the world's largest carnivorous dinosaur (46 feet long), and fossilized footprints so large that locals once used them as community barbeque pits. null Submitted by Jon Young - Reidsville, NC Actor Barry Fitzgerald was Oscar-nominated in 1945 for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor for playing a priest in Going My Way. He won the latter but conceivably could have won two Oscars for playing one role. The rules were later changed to prevent this from happening again. Submitted by Joanna Burress - Noblesville, IN John Tyler, the tenth president, had the most children of any president: fifteen. Submitted by Aamir Masood - Islamabad, Pakistan The first Native Americans to help the Pilgrims, named Samoset and Tisquantum ('Squanto'), could both speak English even before having met the settlers. Submitted by Sierra Chaykowski - Kingston, Ontario Louis Riel was hanged on November sixteenth, 1885, for being a traitor against Canada. He is considered today to be the founding father of the Canadian Province of Manitoba. Submitted by Diane Yehle - Charlotte, NC Only one breed of dog is mentioned by name in the Bible: the Greyhound. (Proverbs 30:29-31, King James Version). Submitted by J Bean - Norcal Light from the sun takes approximately eight minutes to reach the Earth. Catherine the Great had private ice slides (the roller coasters of their day) built near her palace. Submitted by Jon Young - Reidsville, NC Actor Barry Fitzgerald was Oscar-nominated in 1945 for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor for playing a priest in Going My Way. He won the latter but conceivably could have won two Oscars for playing one role. The rules were later changed to prevent this from happening again. Reclusive millionaire Howard Hughes put his engineering skills to work in 1941 when he cast Jane Russell as the lead in his film The Outlaw. He designed a special half-cup, underwire, and cantilevered brassiere to highlight her...talent. Dog tags are always worn in pairs in case of the unthinkable; one tag remains with the body, and the other is sent to Mortuary Affairs. Perhaps one of the lowest moments in sports history was perpetrated by the members of the 2000 Spanish Paralympic basketball team. After the team snagged a gold medal, it was revealed that ten of the twelve players had never been tested for disabilities and were, in fact, not handicapped. Tuesday Island, Wednesday Island, Thursday Island, and Friday Island all exist in the Torres Strait off the coast of Australia. In 1907, an ad campaign for Kellogg's Corn Flakes offered a free box of cereal to any woman who would wink at her grocer. 'J' is the only letter of the alphabet not used in the atomic symbol for any element. Former First Brother Roger Clinton had his share of embarrassing incidents, including an appearance in the film Bio-Dome. Mozart's 'Ah! Vous Dirai-je, Maman' might well be his most popular melody - it's the tune used in both 'The Alphabet Song' and 'Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.' The British comedy show Monty Python's Flying Circus had a decidedly American theme song, John Philip Sousa's 'Liberty Bell March.' Submitted by Todd Carter - Niceville, Florida The country with the most feral camels is Australia. Submitted by Felix Page - San Dimas, CA The hood ornament of a Rolls Royce is named 'The Spirit of Ecstasy.' Submitted by John Brown - Atlanta, GA At launch, around 300,000 gallons of water was released beneath the Space Shuttle's engines as a noise suppressant. Mary Ann really was prettier than Ginger, at least in beauty pageant terms. Gilligan's Island star Dawn Wells was beautiful and talented enough to represent Nevada in the 1960 Miss America pageant. At age 35, Harrison Ford was fitting a door for Francis Ford Coppola when a studio executive asked the handyman to take a break and read lines with actresses who were testing for a new film. The film was Star Wars. Kid gloves get their name because they're made from the hides of young goats. Submitted by Regis Kormick - Peoria, IL William Shatner (Captain Kirk from Stak Trek) could never spread his fingers for the Vulcan greeting unless the studio crew taped or tied fishing line around his fingers. Submitted by Thomas Grayson - Dallas, TX Maine is the only state to border only one state. Call of the Wild author Jack London ran for mayor of Oakland, California, on a socialist party ticket in 1901 and 1905. He lost both times. Submitted by Chris Orr - Red Oak, Iowa Barry Manilow did not write his hit 'I Write the Songs.' Only a few species of piranha are carnivorous; most eat plant matter or insects. The Democratic Republic of Congo is roughly the size of the United States east of the Mississippi River. In 1979, members of the Hatfield and McCoy families faced off once again- on the game show Family Feud. Submitted by Lucina Mendez - Blaine, MN Skin contains pain and temperature receptors, which are only sensitive to extreme hot or cold. The brain experiences both these sensations in the same way. Therefore, very cold and hot temperatures cause the same kind of pain, and the brain has trouble distinguishing between the two. Submitted by Greg Stoloski - Philadelphia, PA The bikini style bathing suit was named for the Bikini atoll in the Pacific. When the suit debuted on July fiveth, 1946, it was named for the island on which nuclear testing was commenced by the U.S. only four days earlier. The suit was so scandalous that a Parisian stripper, Micheline Bernardini, had to be hired to model it. Before Briton Hadden and Henry Luce decided to call their new magazine Time, they were debating calling it either Chance or Destiny. Frank Sinatra was frustrated with his record company in 1960, so he formed his own label, Reprise Records. Many of his buddies (Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr.) released records on Reprise, which is why they often referred to Frank as the Chairman of the Board. While in theatre school in England, actor Gene Wilder won a fencing championship. In 2003, Dennis Gross set the unofficial record for Most Peeps Eaten in 30 Minutes. He polished off 102 Peeps. Submitted by Debbie Foulkes - South Pasadena, CA The first person to successfully go over Niagara Falls in a barrel was 63 year old Annie Taylor, a former school teacher who needed money. She died destitute about 20 years later. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was created by former Wall Street Journal co-founder Charles Dow in 1896. Dow picked twelve important companies from a variety of industries ranging from the U.S. Leather Company to the American Sugar Company. The only company still on the list today is General Electric. The first Ford Mustangs, built in 1964, were nothing more than Ford Falcons with different exterior sheet metal. null Submitted by Claire Gao - Portland, OR Descartes was attracted to cross-eyed women. Lake Nicaragua is the only spot on Earth where freshwater sharks swim in their native habitat. Abraham Lincoln wasn't the only U.S. president with a 'Gettysburg Address.' Dwight Eisenhower owned a farm in the Pennsylvania town. Immune to charges of "looking goofy," basketball player Rick Barry shot his free throws underhanded. The technique was as successful as it was dorky: Barry retired in 1980 with a combined ABA/NBA rate of success of 89.3% at the free-throw line, which at the time was the best in history. Submitted by Penelope Cullen - Forks, Washington One of the first known contraceptives was crocodile dung, used by Egyptians. null null H. Cecil Booth, inventor of the first suction-powered vacuum, first experimented by covering his lips with various fabrics and taking giant gulps of detritus off his floor. At the end of Prohibition, FDR said, 'What America needs now is a drink.' The early recordings made by Motown singers were produced in a studio in a converted house on West Grand Boulevard in Detroit, across from the Henry Ford Hospital. Echo effects were produced by having the singers perform under a large hole cut in the ceiling, leading to a drywalled attic 'echo chamber.' Chemotherapy drugs are designed to kill any rapidly dividing cells. Unfortunately, our hair follicles are some of the fastest-growing cells in the body, which is why most cancer patients lose their hair during treatment. In 1972, Nick Nolte was the cover model on the packaging of Clairol's Summer Blonde hair lightener. When referring to China, make sure to say the People's Republic of China. Leave off 'People's' and you're talking about Taiwan.