Find a fact.

1

Gary Oldman is 13 days younger than Gary Numan.

• The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction — Gary Numan
• Sony Pictures Classics — Gary Oldman
• Gary Numan — Obsession, live at the Hammersmith Apollo

2

A sausage can work as a phone stylus.

• Texas Instruments — Capacitive Sensing Basics
• TED-Ed — Why a sausage can do what your gloves cannot

3

Frank Sinatra was offered the lead in Die Hard.

• Steven E. de Souza — Bristol Bad Film Club interview,19March2015
• American Film Institute — Die Hard

4

Nintendo began in the year the Eiffel Tower was completed.

• Nintendo — Company History
• Official Eiffel Tower history

5

You really can die laughing.

• BMJ — Laughter and MIRTH, full review
• Fatal laughter — 2012 case report, PubMed
• BBC Science Focus — Can you die from laughing?

6

You glow in the dark.

• Kobayashi, Kikuchi and Okamura — Imaging of Ultraweak Spontaneous Photon Emission from Human Body Displaying Diurnal Rhythm, PLOS ONE (2009)

7

Crows hold “funerals”.

• BBC Science Focus — Interview with researcher Kaeli Swift

8

An early fax patent predates Bell’s telephone patent.

• Alexander Bain — US5957A
• National Archives Foundation DocsTeach — Drawing for Improvements in Telegraphy

9

Monopoly began with a warning about landlords.

• Lemelson MIT — Charles Darrow
• National Archives — A Game Board Patent

10

The fear of long words has a 36-letter name.

• BBC Science Focus — What is hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia?
• Merriam-Webster — Sesquipedalian
• University of Arizona Poetry Center — Aimee Nezhukumatathil, recording introduction transcript

11

Atari buried video games in the New Mexico desert.

• Ruggill et al. — Dig? Dug! field notes
• Xbox Wire — Re-live the Big Atari Dig

12

Adidas and Puma were founded by brothers who fell out.

• Adi and Käthe Dassler Memorial Foundation — Chronicle
• Adidas Group — History

13

Segway’s owner died while riding a Segway.

• Sky News — Inquest report, 15 July 2011
• Sky News — Contemporary company statement, 27 September 2010
• Lemelson-MIT — Dean Kamen

14

We are closer in time to T. rex than T. rex was to Stegosaurus.

• American Museum of Natural History — Apex Stegosaurus Fossil

15

The same director made Mad Max and Happy Feet.

• British Film Institute — Where to begin with George Miller

16

IKEA’s name contains a founder, a farm and a village.

• IKEA — The story of IKEA

17

Scientists recovered speech from a silent video of a snack bag.

• MIT News — Extracting audio from visual information

18

Barry Manilow did not write “I Write the Songs”.

• Recording Academy — Song Of The Year 1977
• CNN — The Joy Behar Show: Barry Manilow, 1 December 2009
• NAMM Oral History — Bruce Johnston

19

Scotland’s national animal is the unicorn.

• Royal Collection Trust — Unicorns

20

Mario owes his first appearance to a Popeye game that fell through.

• Nintendo — Iwata Asks: New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Volume 1, page 1

21

In a room of 23 people, a shared birthday is more likely than not.

• Harvard CS50 — Probability: the birthday problem

22

The first scheduled passenger flight by plane lasted 23 minutes.

• IATA — Flying 100 Years
• NASA — Commercial Flight Opens Unlimited Opportunities

23

Looking for 23 can make it seem to be everywhere.

• Robert Anton Wilson — The 23 Phenomenon
• Arnold Zwicky — The Shadow knows

24

Sean Connery was less than 12 years older than his screen son Harrison Ford.

• Sean Connery official website
• Guinness — Oldest top-billed star in a billion-grossing film
• British Film Institute — Sean Connery: 10 films

25

Paper straws can make fizzy drinks foam up.

• Kwak et al. — Biodegradable, Water-Resistant, Anti-Fizzing Paper Straws

26

Bluetooth is named after a Viking king.

• Bluetooth SIG — Origin of the name

27

Samsung built a robot bum to test its phones.

• Samsung Global Newsroom — How Quality Assurance of the Galaxy Note 4 is done in the factory, 24 October 2014

28

The Grateful Dead helped Lithuania’s basketball team reach the Olympics.

• FIBA — Lithuania’s Dream Team

29

A fluffy cloud can hold a million pounds of water.

• USGS — How Much Does a Cloud Weigh?

30

The Killers borrowed their name from a band that didn’t exist.

• Radio X — How did The Killers get their band name?

31

Dolly Parton helped produce Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

• Television Academy — Sandy Gallin
• ComicBook.com — Sarah Michelle Gellar on Dolly Parton and Buffy

32

Active noise-cancelling headphones add sound to make things quieter.

• Bose — How active noise cancellation works

33

Jack Black’s mum helped rescue Apollo 13.

• USC Viterbi — The Great What-Ifs of USC Engineering
• NASA — Apollo 13 Mission Report, September 1970, sections 6.4.2, 8.8, 8.9.1 and 8.9.3
• NASA — Apollo 13 Timeline
• NASA — Apollo 13 Mission Summary
• USC Viterbi — In Memory of Judith Love Cohen, by her son Neil Siegel
• Lemelson Foundation — Judith Love Cohen

34

Barbie’s full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts.

• Mattel Notice of Opposition — USPTO TTAB 91273453
• Mattel — Ken 60th Anniversary Doll

35

Ken’s full name is Kenneth Sean Carson.

• Science Museum Group — African American Dream Glow Ken doll
• Mattel — Ken 60th Anniversary Doll

36

Dr No premiered on the same day “Love Me Do” came out.

• British Film Institute — James Bond’s first scene
• The Beatles — Love Me Do

37

A clothes iron helped create the magnetic stripe on bank cards.

• IBM — The magnetic stripe

38

Toto’s Joseph Williams was the singing voice of adult Simba.

• Joseph Williams — Official biography

39

Antarctica is a desert, despite all that ice.

• Norwegian Polar Institute — Climate in Antarctica

40

Creed from The Office really did have a rock-band past.

• Creed Bratton — Official biography
• Rockerzine — Creed Bratton’s Long Strange Trip

41

Google used to be called BackRub.

• Google — From the garage to the Googleplex

42

Scientists have partially “unboiled” egg white.

• University of California, Irvine — Chemists find a way to unboil eggs
• Flinders University — Scientists figure out way to uncook an egg

43

Sabrina Carpenter’s step-aunt is Bart Simpson.

• Parade — Nancy Cartwright profile

44

Firefighters can make water wetter.

• National Wildfire Coordinating Group — Foam vs Fire: Aerial Applications (1995), surface tension section and glossary

45

Gil Scott-Heron’s father was Celtic’s first Black player.

• Sacramento Republic FC — Black Trailblazers in Football: Gil Heron
• The Celtic Star — Gil Heron’s grandchildren at Celtic Park

46

Watching someone’s lips can change what you hear.

• McGurk and MacDonald — Hearing lips and seeing voices, Nature 264, 746–748 (1976)
• NTIA Institute for Telecommunication Sciences — McGurk Effect

47

A Monkee’s mother invented Liquid Paper.

• Lemelson MIT — Bette Graham

48

Oxford was already teaching before the Aztec Empire existed.

• University of Oxford — Our history
• Yale Human Relations Area Files — Featured Culture: Aztecs

49

A kilogram used to be defined by a lump of metal.

• BIPM — How the kilogram is realized
• NIST — Kilogram: Introduction

50

Pigeon dads make “milk” too.

• Smithsonian Q?rius — Pigeons and doves: Parental care

51

Babies have more bones than grown-ups.

• NIH NIAMS — Health Lesson: Learning About Bones

52

WD-40’s name celebrates getting it right on the 40th try.

• WD-40 official history

53

Missing Doctor Who episodes turned up at a Nigerian TV station.

• BBC Prospero December2013, page9
• DoctorWho official missing episodes history

54

Bananas are berries. Strawberries aren’t.

• Purdue Arboretum — Berry
• UC Agriculture and Natural Resources — berry development

55

A louder crunch can make the same crisps seem fresher.

• Charles Spence — Eating with our ears

56

Abraham Lincoln is the only US president granted a patent.

• USPTO — A guide through troubled waters

57

Harry Potter’s doomed teaching post was inspired by Spinal Tap.

• MusicFeeds — Rowling confirms the Spinal Tap connection, 15 March 2018
• Rowling original public post, 14 March 2018

58

Nature had nuclear reactors running two billion years ago.

• IAEA Bulletin — Meet Oklo

59

“Love Will Keep Us Together” and “Love Will Tear Us Apart” came from the same studio.

• Harvey Lisberg — Eric Stewart and Strawberry Studios
• Sveriges Radio — Love Will Tear Us Apart

60

Bubble Wrap was meant to go on the walls.

• Sealed Air — Our History

61

Play-Doh’s first job was cleaning wallpaper.

• Smithsonian — The Accidental Invention of Play-Doh

62

The Pacific Ocean is bigger than all Earth’s land.

• NOAA — Largest ocean basin

63

Lasers can make things colder.

• NIST — Bringing Atoms to a Standstill: NIST Miniaturizes Laser Cooling
• NIST — Context of the Discovery: Bill Phillips

64

Neil Young was sued for not sounding like Neil Young.

• Billboard — Geffen Takes Young To Court, 21 April 1984, page 64
• Greil Marcus — 1993 Artist of the Year: Interview with Neil Young, January 1994

65

John Fogerty was sued for allegedly copying John Fogerty.

• US Supreme Court — Fogerty v Fantasy

66

Repeating a familiar word can make it seem suddenly unfamiliar.

• Moulin et al. 2020 — The the the the induction of jamais vu, Memory
• St Andrews Research Repository — originalpaperrecord
• St Andrews — study co-author explanation

67

Jon Bon Jovi sang on a Star Wars Christmas album.

• Lucasfilm — Christmas in the Stars

68

Ketchup had a life before tomatoes.

• Ken Albala — Global History of Ketchup

69

Picasso was suspected of stealing the Mona Lisa.

• Louvre — The Theft of the Mona Lisa transcript

70

A whale’s flipper has the same basic bones as your arm.

• California Academy of Sciences — Specimen path
• Pacific Science Center/Washington Sea Grant — Project ORCA

71

Angelina Jolie’s uncle wrote “Wild Thing”.

• Songwriters Hall of Fame — ChipTaylor

72

Soviet music fans turned X-rays into records.

• X-Ray Audio Project — A Short History of Bone
• X-Ray Audio — A History of Bone
• X-Ray Audio Project — The Project
• Tel Aviv Museum of Art — Forbidden Music: X-Ray Audio in the USSR, 1946–1964
• Great American Songbook Foundation — Archives Hidden Gems

73

Africa lies in all four hemispheres.

• National Geographic Society — Africa: Physical Geography
• National Geographic Society — Prime Meridian
• NOAA — What are latitude and longitude?

74

Shark ancestors predate the oldest known forests.

• SmithsonianOcean — Sharks evolution
• NaturalHistoryMuseum — Howtreeschangedtheworld

75

Martin Luther King Jr. got a C in public speaking.

• The King Center — MLK transcript from Crozer Theological Seminary, original artifact

76

Your talking Woody toy may be voiced by Tom Hanks’s brother.

• Entertainment Weekly — Jim Hanks interview report, syndicated by AOL

77

Some Toy Story 2 DVDs accidentally contained a scene from High Fidelity.

• Toy Story 2 DVD Has High Fidelity Cursing — Animation World Network, 24 October 2000

78

The longest recorded bout of hiccups lasted 68 years.

• Longest attack of hiccups — Guinness World Records

79

Chevy Chase drummed with the future founders of Steely Dan.

• FMQB Album Report — Walter Becker interview, 10 March 2000, page 12

80

Earth’s core could coat every continent in gold.

• Macquarie University GEMOC — Research Highlights 2006: How did the Earth form?
• ABC Science — Researcher calculates gold within Earth’s core, interview with Bernard Wood, 15 June 2006

81

A French Scrabble world champion couldn’t speak French.

• French Scrabble Federation — Nigel Richards Champion du Monde, 23 July 2015

82

An early webcam was there to watch the coffee.

• The Trojan Room Coffee Pot Timeline — Quentin Stafford-Fraser, University of Cambridge

83

Dr. Dre sampled a David McCallum record.

• Universal Music Italia — The Edge: David Axelrod at Capitol Records 1966–1970
• Television Academy Interviews — David McCallum
• Red Bull Music Academy — Heavy Axe: A Guide to David Axelrod

84

France was still using the guillotine after Star Wars came out.

• Éphéméride: Septembre — ÉNAP, French Ministry of Justice
• Star Wars: A New Hope (Episode IV) — StarWars.com

85

Häagen-Dazs is a made-up name from the Bronx.

• Häagen-Dazs — official US brand history

86

ABBA asked a fish company if they could borrow its name.

• Om Abba — Abba seafood company

87

Mark Twain’s life was bookended by Halley’s Comet.

• National Park Service — Mark Twain in Hawaiʻi
• NASA — Halley’s Comet and the Battle of Hastings
• Albert Bigelow Paine — Mark Twain: A Biography, Volume III, Part 2

88

The Pringles can designer was partly buried in a Pringles can.

• ABC7 — Ashes of Pringles designer buried in his work

89

Tetris is named after four squares and tennis.

• The Tetris Company — About Tetris

90

A Frisbee pioneer had his ashes made into flying discs.

• DGA Factory Store — Steady Ed Headrick Memorial Disc Set

91

Snoop Dogg and Picasso shared the planet.

• Snoop Dogg — Biography.com
• Mort de Picasso 8 avril 1973 — Musée national Picasso-Paris

92

Starbucks got its name from Moby-Dick’s first mate.

• Starbucks — Our Name

93

Michael Caine legally changed his name to Michael Caine.

• Sky News — Sir Michael Caine Changes Name By Deed Poll
• The Guardian — Michael Caine interview, 18 October 2021

94

Nike’s waffle sole began with an actual waffle iron.

• Nike — The true history of the Nike Moon Shoe

95

Venus takes longer to turn once than to orbit the Sun.

• NASA Science — Venus facts

96

Pet Shop Boys named their debut album Please to make record shopping more polite.

• Please — Pet Shop Boys official album archive

97

“Fizzle” used to mean a quiet fart.

• Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary — Fizzle, Word Origin

98

NASA emailed a spanner into space.

• NASA — Space Station 3-D Printer Builds Ratchet Wrench To Complete First Phase Of Operations, 22 December 2014
• NASA Science — Wrench

99

“Jumping the shark” began with an actual shark jump.

• The Fonz Jumps the Shark! — Television Academy Interviews

100

The Postal Service played a gig for the actual Postal Service.

• Sub Pop — The Postal Service biography
• Pitchfork — Jimmy Tamborello interview,5September2006

101

Goodbye began as “God be with you”.

• Goodbye: word origin — Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary