The Promotional Idea Showcase - Spring 2003 - Updated Quarterly

UNQUESTIONABLY STRANGE FACTS!

• Even if you’re Mark Spitz and Johnny Weismuller combined, it’s impossible to outswim a shark. They can go as fast as 44 mph. 
• More films have been made about boxing than any other sport.
• Recycling a single glass jar saves enough energy to watch three hours of TV.
• If a female ferret in heat cannot find a mate, she dies. 
• Among many other things, Leonardo Da Vinci invented scissors.
• Rats can last longer without water than camels.
• When a piece of glass cracks, the crack travels in excess of 3,000 mph.
• Henry Ford believed he was a reincarnated Civil War soldier who died at Gettysburg.
• A teaspoon holds 120 drops of water.
• Everyone knows the Enola Gay. But the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki was the Bockscar. 
• Only one person in 2 billion will live to be 116 or older.
• Walt Disney was afraid of mice.
• Talk about preparedness: Every Swiss citizen is required by law to have a bomb shelter or access to one. 
• “Deeded” is the only English word consisting of two letters used three times each.
• The horse Paul Revere used on his famous ride was borrowed from Deacon Larkin. 
• “Het Wilhelmus,” the Netherlands national anthem, is the world’s oldest, dating back to 1590.
• On an average day, 217 sets of twins and five sets of triplets are born.
• Jade, the semiprecious stone, occurs naturally – not only in light and dark green, but lavender and red. 
• There’s a product on the market called “Sinkems,” consisting of paper cut-outs of boats, ducks and other shapes, used to toilet-train little boys. 
• Contrary to popular belief, Coca-Cola was never green in color. The company’s logo, however, was green and white for awhile. 
• Four famous buildings are reportedly haunted by five equally famous people: Saltzburg Castle by scientist Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim; Windsor Castle by Queen Victoria, Versailles by Marie Antoinette and the Kremlin by Ivan the Terrible and, occasionally, Vladimir Lenin (It’d be interesting to see those two cross paths…).
• A life sentence in Australia is 25 years.
• Got milk? In a recent survey, 47% of respondents said they drink it right from the carton (but only when nobody else is around). 
• Until 1796, the state of Tennessee was called Franklin. 
• Leave It To Beaver, that paragon of wholesomeness, was the first TV show to show a toilet.
• The average person sees approximately 3,000 advertisements each day.
• Cleopatra sometimes wore a false beard. (No info on what Marc Antony occasionally wore). 
• Women need a permit to wear cosmetics in Morrisville, PA. 
• Truly ghastly: In the 14th century, the Tartars, attempting to seize control of Caffa, Crimea, from Crusaders, catapulted the bodies of plague victims over the city walls. 
• Dolphins sleep with one eye open. 
• The United States uses about 85 million tons of paper each year. 
• African locusts can cover 300 miles overnight. 
• So as not to panic the public in a troubled economy, President Grover Cleveland had a cancerous growth secretly removed from his mouth on July 1, 1893. The weird part? It’s preserved for all to see in a museum in Philadelphia. 
• Globally, the person most represented by statues is Joan of Arc. France alone has over 40,000 of her. 
• When he wrote the Wizard Of Oz, L. Frank Baum’s inspiration for Emerald City wasn’t New York, Paris or London. It was San Diego.
• Several dogs survived the sinking of the Titanic. One, a French bulldog, eventually succumbed to the cold water. Two others – one of which was a Pekinese named Sun Yat Sen – were on the lifeboats with the rich folks. 
• Over 75% of the population of Milwaukee is of German descent.
• Big surprise: The official prepared food of Georgia is grits.
• In Rehobeth Beach, DE, it’s illegal to pretend to sleep on a boardwalk bench.