Facts You Probably don’t Need
- In 1908, the Russian shooting team showed up 12 days late to the Olympics because while the rest of Europe had switched to the Gregorian calendar, they were still using the Julian calendar.
- Halley’s Comet appeared in the sky when Mark Twain was born in 1835. He died on April 21, 1910, just as the comet made its next pass within sight of Earth.
- Paint on a plane can add 600 to 1,200 pounds to the weight of the aircraft.
- There are more castles in Germany than there are McDonalds in America.
- Budapest was once two cities, Buda and Pest. They merged in 1873.
- The longest manned, refueled flight in history was 64 days, 22 hours, and 19 minutes long. The current record was set in 1958 by Robert Timm and John Cook.
- There are more tigers in captivity in the U.S. than in the wild worldwide.
- After hearing that the United States had no elephants, King Mongkut of Siam (present day Thailand) offered to send President Buchanan a pair that could be set loose and populate the country. President Lincoln, Buchanan’s successor, politely declined the offer.
Facts by Sean McVeigh, factologist.
