Fast facts


Arizona Daily Wildcat
Tuesday, September 14, 2004

Things you always never wanted to know

  • Assuming that all the offspring survived, 90,000,000,000,000,000,000 flies could be produced in four months by the offspring of a single pair of flies.

  • "Glamorize," "sanitize," "motorize," "vitalize," "finalize," "personalize," "tenderize," "customize" and "comfortize" are all words invented by advertising agencies in the 20th century.

  • Try swallowing this: Dentists in medieval Japan extracted teeth by pulling them out with their fingers.

  • In 1977, more abortions than tonsillectomies were performed in the United States.

  • Albania once issued a stamp to commemorate the world's greatest smoker. His name was Ahmed Zogu and he reputedly smoked an average of 240 cigarettes - 12 packs - a day.

  • The opposite sides of a six-sided die always add up to seven.

  • There are a number of Americans who are related to Napoleon Bonaparte. Napoleon's youngest brother, Jerome, married an American.

  • The Graham Cracker was named after Sylvester Graham (1794 - 1851). A New England minister, Graham not only invented the cracker but also published a journal in Boston that took a rabid stand against tea, coffee, feather beds and women's corsets.

  • Donald Duck comics were once banned from Finland because he does not wear pants.

  • Kirk Douglas' real name was Issur Danielovitch. Dean Martin's was Dino Crocetti.

  • An earthquake in the Shensi Province of China in 1556 killed 830,000 people in less than three hours.

  • In 1868, approximately 100,000 meteorites fell on the Polish town of Pultusk in one night.

  • "Huffcup," "the mad dog," "Father Whoreson," "angel's food," "dragon's milk," "go-by-the-wall," "stride well" and "lift leg" were all common terms for beer in Elizabethan England.