1500+ MORE Weird, Wacky, and Fascinating Facts: A Fun Facts Book

By Jonny Katz and Meridith Berk

Be the life of the party offering the wisdom of the ages or just some humorous facts and anecdotes to the delight of your friends. 

Between these pages you'll find hundreds and hundreds of assorted facts, curated from dozens of varied, reliable sources.

You're the smart one. Go ahead and flaunt it with the facts you'll discover in this book.

You'll never need to search for the perfect conversation starter again with tidbits like:

"Did you know someone once tried to pay for a microwave with Monopoly money?"

"Want to hear what happened when a guy tried to fool the breathalyzer by eating his own underwear?"

"Do you know what Audrey Hepburn's real name was?"

"I bet you don't know what's kept in the secret Vatican archives?"

"What country is home to all types of venomous snakes?"

"I can name 12 different types of pasta."

"Guess which dog food company used to own Jack in the Box?"

"Do you know why Walgreens pharmacies grew so fast during the 1920s?"

"Do you know why Mark Zuckerberg chose blue for his website?"

"Bet you don't know how the game of Monopoly helped Allied prisoners escape during WWII?"

"What's cockney slang for wife? For money" For the police?"

"Guess what the favorite pizza topping is in Sweden?"

◆ If you're looking for a book of conversation starters ◆
◆ Trying to find the perfect gift for a friend or loved-one ◆
◆ Enjoying a few quiet moments of fun-filled learning ◆
◆ Gathering knowledge for quiz night ◆

You and your friends will be in for a treat once you've received your copy of this fascinating fact book.

Just to be fair, you may want to order this one (or another fact book by Jonny Katz) for your friends, so they can begin their own sentences with… did you know?. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Meridith Berk
• Release date: Jun 7, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223322214

Book preview

1500+ MORE

Weird, Wacky, and

Fascinating Facts

Another Amazing Book

of

Random Knowledge

By

Jonny Katz

With Special Thanks to

Meridith Berk

––––––––

Copyright 2023

Old Town Publishing

Jonny Katz

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Happy Thought

Advertising and Brands

Some Memorable Slogans

Animal Facts

Cockney Rhyming Slang

Crimes and Criminals

Frying While Intoxicated

Burglary Only Happens at Night?

Beating the Breathalyzer

No Get Out of Jail Free Card for this Guy

I’ll Trade My Salad for Drugs?

Christopher Should Have Stayed Off SnapChat

A Bit Too Vain

How (not) to Hire a Hit Man

He Couldn’t Eat All the Evidence

Too Much Ink

Just Bad Luck

Not The Smartest Friend Request

He Brought a Baseball Bat to a Gun Fight

Those Darned Revolving Doors

An Appetite for Facts

Pasta by Any Other Name

Fun and Games

Health and Human Bodies

I Can’t Believe It’s True (But it is)

Idioms Straight from the Horse’s Mouth

Above Board

Ace in the Hole

Ace Up One’s Sleeve

Achilles Heel

Acid Test

Add Fuel to The Fire

At The Drop of a Hat

Add Insult to Injury

As Bald as a Badger

Axe To Grind

Back To Square One

Baker’s Dozen

Ballpark Amount / In the Ballpark

Bark Up the Wrong Tree

Be Tickled Pink

Bee In Your Bonnet

Behind the Eight Ball

Best Thing Since Sliced Bread

Big Cheese

Bob’s Your Uncle

Break the Ice

Bring Home the Bacon

Bring Someone to Book

Bring to Heel

Bucket List

Brown Study

Burn The Candle at Both Ends

Burning The Midnight Oil

Burst One’s Bubble

Bury The Hatchet

Bury One’s Head in The Sand

Everything Starts Somewhere

It’s a Sign

Funny Signs Are Everywhere

Ripped From the Headlines

Mafia Nicknames

Movies, Stage and Television

And the Oscar Goes To

Music, Art and Writing

Name Game – People Who Changed Their Names

Not the Lowest Form of Humor

Now, That’s Interesting

Our Weird World

Planes, Trains, and Places to Go

Random Facts About Travel

Science and Technology

Stop! Do Not Enter!

Secret, Dangerous, Or Just Annoyingly Exclusive Places

Chapel of the Tablet - Ethiopia

Moscow Shadow Metro

The Plants Can Kill

A Secret Formula

Area 51

The Svalbard Seed Vault

Fort Knox

Pluto's Gate at Hierapolis (In Modern Turkey)

Disney Club 33

Bohemian Grove - Monte Rio, California

Vatican Secret Archives

The Venomous Paradise of Snake Island

Heard Island

It’s All in The Game

What Happened? When?

Where on Earth?

Some Fun Geography

Happy Thought

"The world is so full of a number of things,

I’m sure we should all be as happy as kings."

-  Robert Louis Stevenson

Advertising and Brands

There’s a renewable-energy recruitment agency called Earth, Wind & Hire.

The largest Swiss escalator and elevator company goes by the name of Schindler’s Lifts.

A pipe tobacco called Baby’s Bottom was named for the smoothness of its taste - not because of the other thing a baby’s bottom might call to mind.

The car brand BMW stands for Bavarian Motor Works. The company was originally an airplane engine manufacturer before the treaty of Versailles made all German airplane companies cease production.

KFC, Taco Bell, and Pizza Hut are all operated by the same company, Yum! Brands.

Adidas owns Reebok.

One in ten people born in Europe were conceived in an IKEA bed.

Cadillac was founded by a Civil War rifle maker, Henry Leland, in 1902. The company was named after Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac, the French explorer who founded the city of Detroit in 1701.

Samsung initially sold noodles and other produce, it wasn’t until 1970 that the first electrical product was placed on the market by Samsung; a 12 inch Black & White TV.

With Uber Chopper Service you can book an Uber helicopter trip in Dubai.

Building with solid fill Burj Khalifa, in Dubai, the tallest building in the world, was built by the construction division of the Samsung Group.

Hewlett-Packard (HP) could have been PH. Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard tossed a coin to decide whether the company they founded would be called Hewlett-Packard or Packard-Hewlett.

Car with solid fill Volkswagen owns Lamborghini, Audi, Bentley, Porsche, Bugatti, Ducati and ŠKODA.

Amazon was originally named Cadabra.

Meeting with solid fill Starbucks intentionally makes its tables round so individual visitors do not feel as lonely.

Three-quarters of all cars produced by the Rolls Royce company are still on the road today.

Trophy with solid fill Nike was named after the Greek goddess of victory.

Sony’s first product was an electric rice cooker.

Coffee with solid fill Starbucks spends more on health care for employees than on coffee beans.

Foodmaker, Inc. now owns Jack in the- Box and Jack in the Box acquired Del Taco in 2021.

Cat with solid fill From 1963 to 1988, Ralston Purina (The pet food company) owned Jack in the Box.

The Clio Awards are given annually in recognition of creative excellence in advertising, design, and communication.

Domino’s Pizza was started by two brothers, Tom and James Monaghan. However, after 8 months, Tom decided to trade his share of the company for a used Volkswagen Beetle - now, that turned out to be one expensive car.

Starbucks chose a siren as their logo because the company wanted to stick with a nautical theme. Starbuck is the name of the first mate in Moby Dick.

Philadelphia Cream Cheese was first made in New York.

Briefcase with solid fill Louis Vuitton was a French fashion designer in the 1800s. He was also appointed trunk-maker to Empress Eugénie de Montijo, the wife of Napoleon III.

When Prohibition went into effect in the United States in 1920, Walgreens Pharmacies numbered only 20—hardly a nationwide chain. However, getting a doctor’s prescription and having it filled at a pharmacy was one of the few ways alcohol could be procured legally. Doctors could make some extra money on the side by prescribing medicinal whiskey to their patients, and Walgreens was one of the few places that kept it in stock. By the end of the 1920s, there were more than 400 Walgreens stores across the country.

Glasses with solid fill Here are two great optometry store names: Spex in the City, and Eye Carumba.

I’m not sure if I want to get my hair cut here: Jack the Clipper.

I wonder if Barbra knows about this one: Barber Streisand.

Name of a now closed florist in Huntington, York: Florist Gump.

A bakery: Bread Pitt.

In Samsung’s Silicon Valley US Headquarters, 34 electrical car charging ports have been installed to persuade staff to drive electrical vehicles and help commuters.

Polish beautician, inventor and entrepreneur Max Factor coined the word makeup in 1920.

About 16% of people follow a brand on social media because they like it, but 45% will unfollow the brand because of too much self-promotion.

Employees have 10 times more followers than the company’s social media profiles.

Out of the top 100 brands, 33% have logos that include the color blue.

Complete transparency of a brand is vital to 94% of consumers.

Carlsberg beer used the Swastika symbol in its logo till 1940 to demonstrate ancient culture and heritage.

A total of 89% of experienced marketers believe brand awareness is crucial.

Panda with solid fill Toblerone’s logo includes a hidden bear, a nod to its home of Bern, otherwise known as The City of Bears.

Brand loyalty is worth 10 times more than a single purchase.

Brand messages are re-shared 24 times more when the employee distributed them.

Stopwatch with solid fill It only takes 10 seconds for a consumer to form the first impression of a logo.

Overall, 72% of brand names are made-up words or acronyms.

J.C. Penney started in the dry goods business as The Golden Rule Store. Penny’s ruling principle was a version of the Golden Rule, pretty much meaning: treat your customers as you would like to be treated.

Due to his red-green colorblindness, Mark Zuckerberg picked the color blue for his website, Facebook.

Pepsi got its name from the digestive enzyme pepsin. It was originally created to treat digestive problems.

A signature color increases brand recognition by 80%.

British Petroleum (BP) once paid $211,000,000 for a logo redesign.

John Walker, the man behind the world-famous Johnnie Walker whiskey, was teetotal. Brilliant business man or teetotal hypocrite?

I bet this tidbit is only known by about 5 people. Yahoo is an acronym of ‘Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle’.

Puma and Adidas were founded by brothers who originally ran a shoe company together but went their separate ways.

Kleenex tissues were being developed for use as filters in gas masks during WWI. When the war ended before the product was ready, Kimberly-Clark redeveloped the product to be softer and the Kleenex brand was born.

IKEA, the Swedish super-store, sells a bookcase somewhere in the world every ten seconds.

That new car smell many people enjoy is actually a symphony of different, possibly toxic, aromas including fresh primer and paint, the smell of new carpeting, fabrics, leather, vinyl, rubber, adhesives, and sealer. The smell is so complex it’s nearly impossible to reproduce.

Twitter’s famous blue bird goes by the name of Larry.

Nike is not a heartless corporation. Although they paid a measly $35 for their now iconic swoosh logo, years later, the company gave the design student who created it a diamond-encrusted ring in the shape of that world-renowned emblem.

McDonald’s originally sold hot dogs, not hamburgers.

Ben and Jerry were initially going to sell bagels.

Lamborghini started out making farm equipment.

The Virgin brand was started in 1970 when Richard Branson and his friend Nik Powell began a mail order record business. They chose the name Virgin, because they had never been in the business before.

Some Memorable Slogans

Some advertising slogans are both brilliant and unforgettable.

Hallmark: When you care enough to send the very best.

Nike: Just do it.

L’Oreal: Because you’re worth it.

Maybelline: Make it happen.

Lay’s Potato Chips: Bet you can’t eat just one.

Burger King: Have it your way.

Bounty: The quicker picker upper

The New York Times: All the news that’s fit to print.

McDonald’s I’m lovin’ it."

Taco Bell: Think outside the bun.

State Farm: Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

Capital One: What’s in your wallet?

Mastercard: For everything else, there’s Mastercard.

M&M’s: Melts in your mouth, not in your hands.

De Beers: A diamond is forever.

Meow Mix: Tastes so good, cats ask for it by name.

California Milk Processing Board: Got milk?

U.S. Marine Corps: The Few. The Proud. The Marines.

Animal Facts

Bees can sting other bees. They usually only do this when they feel threatened or they're protecting their territory.

Dogs sniff good smells with their left nostril. Typically, they use their right nostril to sniff out danger, but when a