fun facts

The first airline, DELAG, was established on October 16, 1909, to carry passengers between German cities by Zeppelin airships. Up to November 1913, more than 34,000 people had used the service.

Titanic was running at 22 knots when she hit the iceberg

The citrus soda 7-UP was created in 1929; ‘7’ was selected because the original containers were 7 ounces. ‘UP’ indicated the direction of the bubbles

The fat molecules in goat milk are 5 times smaller than those found in cows milk. It takes 20 mins for the stomach to breakdown as opposed to the hour that it takes to break down cow milk

MTV (Music Television) first aired at 12:01 AM on August 1, 1981. The first video was ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ by the Bugles.

Francis Scott Key was a young lawyer who wrote the poem, ‘The Star Spangled Banner’, after being inspired by watching the Americans fight off the British attack of Baltimore during the War of 1812. The poem became the words to the national anthem

The famous dum-de-dum-dum theme, obstensively from ‘Dragnet’, was actually composed by Miklos Rozsa for the 1946 film noir classic,’The Killers’.

Because radio waves travel at 186,000 miles per second and sound waves saunter at 700 miles per hour, a broadcast voice can be heard sooner 13,000 miles away than it can be heard at the back of the room in which it originated

Mosquito repellents don’t repel. They hide you. The spray blocks the mosquito’s sensors so they don’t know your there

The bagpipe was originally made from the whole skin of a dead sheep

Inventor Samuel Colt patented his revolver in 1836.

It has been recommended by dentists that a toothbrush be kept at least 6 feet (two meters) away from a toilet to avoid airborne particles resulting from the flush!

The first ever indoor organized presentation hockey game was a 2-1 Creighton’s team victory in Montreal on March 3, 1875, in Victoria Skating Rink.

In ancient Rome it was considered a sign of leadership to be born with a crooked nose
It is possible to drown and not die. Technically the term ‘drowning’ refers to the process of taking water into the lungs, not to death caused by that process.

The first known heart medicine was discovered in an English garden. In 1799, physician John Ferriar noted the effect of dried leaves of the common foxglove plant, digitalis purpurea, on heart action. Still used in heart medications, digitalis slows the pulse and increases the force of heart contractions and the amount of blood pumped per heartbeat.

Dry cereal for breakfast was invented by John Henry Kellogg at the turn of the century

In the movie The Phantom Menace, Darth Maul’s voice was also dubbed over. (In Star Wars James Earl Jones did Darth Vadar’s voice.) Also, the actor who played Darth Maul had no previous acting experience. He is a stunt man who came to the set to show George Lucas what the fight scenes would look like.

During World War II, a German U-boat was sunk by a truck. The U-boat in question attacked a convoy in the Atlantic and then rose to see the effect. The merchant ship it sank had material strapped to its deck including a fleet of trucks, one of which was thrown in the air by the explosion, landing on the U-boat and breaking its back

Jeremy Bentham, a British philosopher who died in 1832,left his entire estate to the London Hospital provided that his body be allowed to preside over its board meetings. His skeleton was clothed and fitted with a wax mask of his face. It was present at the meeting for 92 years.

Diet Coke was only invented in 1982.

Methane gas can often be seen bubbling up from the bottom of ponds. It is produced by the decomposition of dead plants and animals in the mud.

There are more than 1,700 references to gems and precious stones in the King James translation of the Bible

The E. Coli bacterium propels itself with a ‘motor’ only one-millionth of an inch in diameter, a thousand times smaller than the tiniest motors built to date by man. The rotation of the bacterial motor comes from a current of protons. The efficiency of the motor approaches 100 per cent.

Henry Ford produced the model T only in black because the black paint available at the time was the fastest to dry.

The liquid inside young coconuts can be used as substitute for blood plasma

Updated: September 12, 2002 — 3:33 am