Welcome to Part 2 of Amazing Facts!
The makers http://www.gingerfox.co.uk/ have given permission for me to share these statements with you. Read through each one and make a note of whether you think it is true or false. The answers are at the end of the statements. Please publish your score on FB or Disqus?
31. Elizabeth Taylor was married eight times, three times to Richard Burton, Burton was Taylor’s first husband and also her fourth, after the death of Eddie Fisher in an air crash. The couple were married for a third time shortly before burton’s death.
32. Benjamin Franklin once proposed that the US national symbol should be a turkey.
33. English is the second most-widely spoken language in the world, after Mandarin Chinese.
34 While the city of Rome burned, the emperor Nero was singing and playing the violin at a wild party, hence ;fiddling while Rome burns’.
35. Cartoon legend Bart Simpson is actually voiced by a woman.
36. A man who stole a pair of boots at knifepoint was convicted when he wore the boots to his trial.
37. Miguel Cervantes, the author of 'Don Quixote', lost his left hand as a soldier in the Spanish army.
38. Bee stings were once used as a cure for rheumatism.
39. The original ‘source’ for Dracula was Vlad Tepes, or Drakul, a 15th century prince of Wallachia.
40. Quentin Tarantino got the idea for naming his gangsters after colours in ‘Reservoir Dogs’ from an idea (he later abandoned) in the original script for Marin Scorsese’s ‘Goodfellas’.
41. It is possible to sit in a deckchair and sunbathe on the beach in Paris in the summer.
42. Author Tony Hawkes sold half a million copies of a book recounting his travels around Ireland with a fridge.
43. The last execution for witchcraft in Britain took place as recently as 1910, when Deirdre Molloy was found guilty of poisoning her neighbours by means of witchcraft.
44. Dame Judi Dench won Oscars as royals in consecutive years, first playing Queen Victoria in 'Mrs Brown ' ( Best Actress1998 ) and then as Queen Elizabeth 1 in 'Shakespeare in Love' ( Best Supporting Actress, 1999 )
45. A woman once successfully sued a TV station after they forecast good weather. It rained, and the woman caught a cold.
46. Contrary to popular belief, glass is a solid. Not a very thick liquid.
47. About 50% of the species of tarantula possess a bite which is venomous to humans and can cause paralysis or even death.
48. The trilby hat, a staple of men's fashion in the 20th century,was actually designed as headgear for a woman.
49. The word 'decimation' comes from a brutal Roman military practice of demanding the life of one man in ten in every legion which failed to acquit itself satisfactorily in battle.
50. Mrs Beeton, author of the exhaustive Victorian guide ‘The Book of Household Management’ (1861), wrote the book in her mid- twenties and died aged only 28, little knowing the legacy she would leave.
51. According to the ‘Book of Kings’, David wins Saul’s daughter Michal by killing 200 people and removing their foreskins as a gift for his potential father-in-law.
52. Author Roald Dahl turned down the role of the villainous Dr No in the first James Bond film.
53. The Voluminous beard Charles Darwin is wearing on many portraits was a fake.
54. Tiger Woods got his name from his mother. Kultida is from Thailand, and in her home country her name means ‘little tiger’.
55. Sir Walter Raleigh brought tobacco back to England after a visit to Virginia in 1586.
56. The grandfather of a royal prince was once banned from racing at Henley Regatta because he was too common.
57. Ozzy Osbourne did the tattoos of his name O-Z-Z-Y on his knuckles himself, using a sewing needle.
58. The firework known as the Catherine wheel was named after the martyrdom of Saint Catherine, as captured in Lucas Cranach’s memorable painting.
59. The whisky distiller Jack Daniel died, inevitably, from excessive tasting of his own recipes. Jack’s liver gave way before he had even turned 40.
60. There are more tigers in captivity in the USA than there are living wild in the rest of the world.
31. FALSE. She was married eight times, twice to Burton. She first married when aged only 18, and her third husband, Mike Todd, died in an air crash. She left singer Fisher for Burton in 1964; they divorced in 1974, remarried in 1975 and divorced again in 1976.
32. TRUE. Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers and a true polymath. He was an important scientist and inventor as well as a politician and diplomat and an author of some note. The turkey idea wasn’t his best moment.
33. FALSE. Second is Hindustani which incorporates Hindi and Urdu, and is the official language of both India and Pakistan. Third is Spanish, predominant in South America (except Brazil). English is fourth, but remains the most- learned second language.
34. FALSE. He was over 30 miles away at the seaside. He hurried back to the city but the fire was out of control. Furthermore, violins weren’t developed for centuries-it is more likely that Nero played the bagpipes, which were popular in Rome.
35. TRUE. Cartwright voices a number of the Simpsons'characters, as well as Chuckie in 'Rugrats'. She was at the centre of a threatened strike by'The Simpsons' voice team, since then their salarys have risen astronomically.
36. TRUE. Charles Taylor from Witchita was that man. He stole the boots, worth $69, and then sat in court with his feet perched cockily on the desk. Taylor was sent to prison wearing just his socks.
37. TRUE. Cervantes was a soldier and lost his hand in service at the Battle of Lepanto. Four years later he was captured by pirates and held for five years. When did he find time to write?
38. TRUE. Most old books of natural cures will feature this odd remedy. perhaps the theory was that the bee sting hurt so much that the patient forgot he or she had rheumatism!
39. TRUE. He was known as Vlad the Impaler after he had 20,000 Turkish prisoners impaled on pikes during his wars against the Ottoman sultan, Mehmed 11. Vlad’s family was in exile in Transylvania for many years, hence the link with that region.
40. FALSE. The earlier film, which did use the device, was ‘The Taking of Pelham 123’ (1979), nut Tarantino’s cult status has ensured that he is credited with the originality behind the device.
41. TRUE. Every year the Paris-Plages turns one bank of the Seine into a sun-soaked chill-out zone for stressed city workers. 'it was the brainchild of Mayor Bertrand Delanoe and began in 2002.
42. TRUE. Hawks made the journey after a drunken bet. His next book, conceived in similar circumstances, concerned his attempts to find and play tennis agains all 11 members of the Moldovian national football team.
43. FALSE. Alice Molland was the last person hanged as a witch, as far back as 1686. Advances in science in the 18th century meant less credence was given to accusations of witchcraft.
44. FALSE. She didn't win for 'Mrs Brown' ( beaten by Helen Hunt in 'As Good As It Gets'). Many thought the Academy tried to compensate by rewarding her the following year for an eight minute cameo as Queen Bess.
45. TRUE. She received compensation for catching a chill and suffering 'undue stress' after the TV station got the weather forecast wrong, leading her to dress in appropriately. Amazingly this wasn't the USA, but Israel.
46. TRUE. Glass is an amorphous solid, which means it has an irregular structure, unlike crystalline solids which have a more orderly structure. The molecules, however,are not so disordered as to allow flow, which defines a liquid.
47. FALSE. Tarantula bites are not fatal, only a severe allergy to the venom (very rare ) can cause complications. That doesn't alter the fact that the bite is extremely painful, so it's best not to agitate the hairy little monsters.
48. TRUE. The first hat with the distinctive indentations at the front of the crown was worn by an actress playing the part of Trilby O'Ferrall in a stage adaptation of George du Maurier's novel Trilby.
49. TRUE. Each group of ten soldiers would draw lots and the nine lucky ones would beat the loser to death, hardly likely to encourage camaraderie within the legions, but a good incentive to put in the extra 10%.
50. TRUE. Isabella Beeton died after contracting a fever while giving birth to her fourth child. The book, a compendium of advice for running a household, including 900 pages of recipes, remains a classic 150 years on.
51. TRUE. Even more disturbingly, Saul only asked for 100, so another 100 Philistines were done away with just for a bit of overkill.
52. FALSE. He does, however, have a connection with the Bond movies, having written the screenplay for ‘You Only Live Twice’. Dahl also adapted Fleming’s only children’s book, ‘Chitty Chitty Bang Bang’, for the big screen.
53. FALSE. However, many of his friends failed to recognise him after he grew it; he had gone 57 years without feeling the need for such effusive facial hair.
54. FALSE. He was born Eldrick Tont Woods. The name comes from an old military friend of his father’s.
55. FALSE. The first reference to tobacco in England was 30 years previously, before Raleigh was born. It came to England via France, where it was introduced by a chap called Jean Nicotine (hence nicotine)
56. TRUE. John Kelly Sr was accused of being a professional, but everyone knew the real reason-- he was a bricklayer. He later became Olympic champion, and fathered Grace Kelly, who married Prince Rainier of Monaco.
57. TRUE. Ozzy also tattooed smiley faces on his knees. He did the tattoos while serving a prison sentence for nicking a telly.
58. TRUE. The patron saint of philosophers was condemned to be torn to pieces on a wheel, but, according to legend, the wheel was destroyed by divine fire. So she was beheaded instead.
59. FALSE. Jack’s death was connected with work, however. Starting work early one day, but unable to remember the safe combination, he kicked the offending object and bruised a toe, which later got infected. He was 65.
60. TRUE. Shamefully, appallingly, true. A Tiger is a relatively inexpensive trophy; even the rarest, most endangered species can be bought for a price.
Amazing Facts Part 1 can be found here. 30 more statements to look at!
I hope you have enjoyed 'learning' some things you may or may not have known!
