31 Grown-Up Bits of Trivia That Just Learned About Taxes and Are Not Too Pleased Right Now

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31 Grown-Up Bits of Trivia That Just Learned About Taxes and Are Not Too Pleased Right Now
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Oysters

Oyster shells were repurposed in 1700s New York to build buildings. CRACKED COM Oysters in the 1700s were so overly abundant and popular in New York City that the discarded shells were repurposed into mortar paste to aid NY's building boom.

Asteroids

The asteroid that killed the dinosaurs did more than just punch a hole in the Earth. CRACKED.COM After the impact, 70% of the world's forests burned, tsu- namis rose to a height of 300ft, and 25 trillion metric tons of debris was ejected into the atmosphere that re- duced sunlight by up to 90% for a decade.

Hats

The Australian Slouch Hat has one side of the brim turned upwards to aid rifle maneuvering. CRACKED.COM The intention of turning up the right side of the hat was to ensure it would not be caught during the drill move- ment of shoulder arms from order arms.

9/11

The only uninterrupted audio recording of the 9/11 attack is from an undercover operation. CRACKED.COM The recording comes from an FBI informant that secretly wore a wire to breakfast with a city official suspected of brib- ery, meeting the suspect at the WTC Marriott.

Kodak

CRACKED.COM Kodak learned about secret nuclear tests by accident. In July 1945, Kodak started noticing that a sensitive film they made was fogged (covered with dark spots). As this was caused by radioactive contamination, they eventually figured out that the likely cause was that holy s#!t someone was setting off nuclear bombs.

Teddy Roosevelt

Teddy Roosevelt loved boxing with random people. Roosevelt liked fisticuffs so much that he had a boxing gym installed in the White House's basement, and would invite pretty much everyone to a bout. Не had to quit the sport after a military aide nearly blinded him in his left eye. CRACKED.COM

Potatoes

GRACKED.COM People used to get poisoning from potatoes. Before modern screening processes, it wasn't uncommon for people to get solanine poisoning from potatoes. Solanine is one of the same ingredients that make deadly nightshade, well, deadly. Green potatoes tend to be chock-full of the nasty stuff.

Paper Airplanes

Paper airplanes have existed for thousands of years. The Chinese have been folding paper into flying shapes for the last 2,000 years. Of course, they didn't call them airplanes- those were more like simple origami birds. Paper planes as we know them today date back to the Civil War, when they were called paper darts. GRACKED.COM

Coca-Cola

A Soviet general got Coca-Cola into the USSR. Coke's imperialistic reputation bugged General Georgy Zhukov, who had taken a liking to the brown sugary beverage during World War II. So through his foreign contacts, he got crates of and colorless Coke sent to him, which he could happily chug without anyone suspecting it wasn't vodka. CRACKED.COM

Nukes

Nukes helped US learn that whale sharks can live over 100 years. The vertebrae of whale sharks have a ring build- up, kind of like trees-but it wasn't known how long those rings take to grow. Cold War nuclear tests helped solve the puzzle-by locating a spike of radioactive isotopes in the vertebrae, we can more easily calculate the growth rate. So ... hooray for nukes? CRACKED.COM

The Flash

The Flash used to be a huge square. Love CONQUERS ALL! In most media incarnations nowadays, Barry Allen is a wisecracking, lighthearted rookie- but back in the day, he was the most stuck-up member of the Justice League. Не was a bowtie-wearing cop who regularly fought hippies and Satanic rockers. GRACKED.COM

Earlobes

Your earlobe wrinkles may predict future heart conditions. Like some sort of science-based palmistry, a crease on your earlobe (known as Frank's sign) may be correlated with a higher rate of coronary artery disease. No one knows how it works, with many assuming the sign results from smoking and other unhealthy habits. CRACKED.COM

Galileo

Galileo mathematically mapped Hell. Long before The Lord of the Rings, nerds liked to argue about Dante's Inferno-and Galileo Galilei outnerded them all. In 1588, a young Galileo gave a series of lectures presenting his calculations about the physical and mathematical properties of Dante's Hell, and poking holes into other fans' theories. CRACKED.COM

Panama Canal

Richard Halliburton paid just 36 cents to cross the Panama Canal in 1928, because he swam it. Не disappeared at sea while attempting to sail a Chinese sailing ship across the Pacific Ocean from Hong Kong to the Golden Gate International Exposi- tion in San Francisco, Cali- fornia. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

New Mexico

New Mexico is the only state to have the letters 'USA' written on their license plates. STOP Many Americans don't know New Mexico is part of the United States of America, so the plates have to spell it out by saying New Mexico USA. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Spontaneous Human Combustion

The Spontaneous Human Combustion cases of the 18th to 20th centuries were just drunk people near candles. A two-year forensic investi- gation in 1984 looked into the alleged incidents and found the burned bodies were near fire sources like fireplaces, and a correlation was found between them and the victim's intoxication. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Parasites

10-20% of Americans are infected with a parasite that can cause sexual attraction to cat urine. The brain parasite, from our beloved/tolerated pet cats, makes us 2.5 times more likely to get in a car accident, change personal- ity traits, and it contrib- utes to schizophrenia. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Video Games

After 'Assassin's Creed' flopped at the box office, the 'Mega Man' and 'Sims' movies were scrapped. Disney canceled the vast majority of films under de- velopment after their ac- quisition of 21st Century Fox, including a previously announced 'Magic: The Gathering' film. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Shitterton, England

The town of Shitterton, England, had to change their town sign thanks to thieves. SHITTERTON The town chipped in to have the sign changed to a 1.5 ton boulder to stop peo- ple from repeatedly stealing it every two or three years. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Honey

Two tablespoons of honey would be enough to fuel a bee's entire flight around the world. On average, a honeybee pro- duces 1/12 of a teaspoon of honey over the course of its life. Bees have been making honey since they split from wasps after the first flower- ing plants appeared 130 mil- lion years ago. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

The Eratosthenes of Cyrene

Eratosthenes of Cyrene used a step-counter to calculate the circumference of the Earth in 240 ВСЕ. Ancient people measured long distances by hiring bematists. They were trained to count steps while walking between lo- cations and could measure hundreds of miles with more than 95% accuracy. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Breast Milk

Melatonin levels secreted in breast milk vary depending on the time of day. This helps the baby know when to sleep/wake up and thus regulate its sleep cycle. Babies who are fed formula have a harder time regulating their sleep cycle and are more prone to col- ic. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Space Invaders

From 1978 to 1982, Space Invaders grossed $13 billion, adjusted for inflation. t This made it the best-selling video game and highest-grossing entertainment product at the time, and the highest-grossing video game of all time. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

World War I

A Hungarian soldier never slept again after being shot in the head during WWI. Paul Kern survived the shot that took out his frontal lobe, but when he awoke in the hospital, he never slept again. Kern lived for another 30 years afterwards. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Pyrosomes

There are giant, living tubes in the oceans that can grow to the length of a sperm whale. The worm-like structures, called pyrosomes, are col- onies of individual crea- tures that have banded to- gether for a common pur- pose. They are also biolu- minescent and will glow when touched. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

April Fools’ Day

On April Fools Day 1965, the BBC aired an interview with the inventor of SmelloVision. The man claimed he was a London University profes- sor and cut onions and brewed coffee to prove he could transmit scents through the screen. View- ers called and confirmed that they had received the CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Dogs

Domestic dogs are one of only a few species that can understand pointing. Other animals, includ- ing wolves and other primates, don't under- stand how it works and will only be inter- ested in your out- stretched finger. CRACKED NOW YOU KNOW

Con Men

A con man convinced people that he was the last POW from World War 1, Oskar Daubmann. CRACKED.COM The parents of the real Oskar Daubmann ac- cepted the impostor as their son, despite his different eye color and lack of known fa- cial scar.

Willy Rozier

In 1949, French director Willy Rozier challenged a critic to a duel over comments he had made. CRACKED.COM Rozier won the duel (fought with rapiers, to first blood) in front of jour- nalists and photographers. The film was a hit - and footage of the duel is in- cluded on the film's DVD.

James Bond

Toyota only made 2 convertible 2000GTs. CRACKED.COM They were specially made for use in a James Bond movie because Sean Con- nery was too tall to fit in the standard model.

Bill Gates

Bill Gates' first business was 'Traf-O-Data.' GRACKED.COM This was a company that created ma- chines that recorded the number of cars passing a given point on a road.

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