7 Secrets Only Two Living People Know (For Some Reason)
#3.
The Farmer's Almanac Weather Formula
What is it?
The Farmer's Almanac has interesting facts, stories, light humor, charming woodcuts and much, much more. Hell, we don't need to tell you. You probably own several copies already.
This is great and all, but other almanacs have that stuff, also. How can Farmer's keep its edge over classics like Poor Richard's? By being the best at what farmers care about: predicting the weather.
Just look at that farmer. He is fucking all about the weather.
This super-special formula was devised in 1792, by the Almanac's founder Robert B. Thomas. A "top secret mathematical and astronomical formula, which relies on sunspot activity, tidal action, planetary position and many other factors," to do what science believes impossible: predict long term patterns in weather. This in turn helps farmers, you know, farm.
Who Knows:
Farmer's Almanac editor Sandi Duncan and an anonymous meteorologist.
They call him The Mysteriologist!
How it is Kept Secret:
The formula is kept locked in a black box somewhere in the Almanac's headquarters in New Hampshire. In this video, Duncan shows how the box can withstand almost any attempt to open it.
As crazy as it seems, they keep it secret for good reason. The average seven to 14 day weather report, using up to the minute information and state of the art Doppler radar systems, is often no more accurate than what you, the Cracked reader, could predict.
This 200-year-old formula has an 80 percent accuracy rate even though predictions are made 2 YEARS IN ADVANCE. How do we know that? The Almanac told us. How do we know they're right? We just told you. They're accurate 80 percent of the time.
#2.
The Subject of "You're So Vain"
What is it:
As we pointed out previously, Carly Simon's "You're so Vain" is one hell of a revenge song.
The list of people it is rumored to be about is at least a dozen men long, including such luminaries as James Taylor, Mick Jagger, Kris Kristofferson and Warren Beatty. Whoever the guy is, he did Carly Simon bad, and worse for him it's now considered the 72nd best song of all time.
To put that in perspective, "Billie Jean" is #71.
All we know for sure is 1) Simon is never going to tell us who it's about and 2) we're real assholes if we think it's about us. Which it totally is. Bitch.
Who Knows:
Carly Simon and Dick Ebersol.
How it is Kept Secret:
Despite being asked in virtually every interview she has ever given, Simon has never admitted who the song is about. In 2003, an auction was held on Martha's Vineyard where one of the lots was the chance to know just who "You're so Vain" was referring to. Dick Ebersol, president of NBC won with a bid of $50,000. To be fair, he's loaded, it was for a good cause and he was also given a private performance by Simon.
The stipulation to Ebersol's winning bid was that he had to sign an agreement promising that he would never reveal the identity of the person to anyone, ensuring that no one who doesn't have $50,000 to spend on the answer to a trivia question will even know the truth.
He was, however, allowed to give the least useful clue of all time: The person's name had the letter E in it. Thanks, Dick.
#1.
How Do Sea Monkeys Work?
What is it?
If you ever saw the back pages of a comic book growing up, you know what Sea Monkeys are. For generations kids around the world have experienced the profound disappointment of ordering Sea Monkeys, dumping the dried powder into water and watching the tiny things squiggle around, doing nothing interesting.
They still sell what you, as a jaded adult, now know are nothing more than freeze dried brine shrimp.
Harlod von Braunhut developed the process in 1957. The solution the eggs are soaked allows the small, sperm-like animals to survive the shipping process, come to life within minutes and stay alive long enough to not entertain a child.
It may seem a bit ridiculous, but compared to some of his other inventions this was Nobel Prize winning science. Braunhut held 193 patents for such gems as X-Ray Spex (that didn't see through anything) and invisible goldfish (guaranteed to remain invisible, which is good, because we'd be pissed off if we found out we'd paid money for a temporarily invisible animal instead of, you know, NOTHING).
Oh fuck, please turn invisible again.
Braunhut continued to tinker with the formula for his entire life, trying to get sea monkeys that would grow larger and live longer. Even at the age of 75, Harold was still involved in the day to day running of his company.
Who Knows:
Until his death in 2003, only Harlod von Braunhut and his wife, Yolanda.
How They Keep it Secret:
No matter how many times he changed the formula to Sea Monkeys, or how huge the operation grew (to the tune of tens of millions of dollars a year) Braunhut never told anyone but his second wife about it.
Not even his most trusted associates at his company were told, no matter how many times they asked. Harold was very, very good at keeping secrets.
This might have something to do with the fact that he might have been a Nazi.
We don't mean that in a metaphorical sense. There is strong evidence that money from many of his inventions was funneled directly to the Aryan Nation. Braunhut, who was ethnically Jewish, wrote for their newsletter, was keynote speaker at their rallies and even lit a burning cross.
We're not saying the Sea Monkeys were a result of a failed experiment to breed aquatic Nazi super soldiers. But we're not saying they weren't, either.
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For more stuff people would like the answers to, check out 6 Insane Discoveries That Science Can't Explain. Or learn how to keep your lips sealed, in MI-6 to CIA: 5 Top Secret Agencies (Who Want to Hire You).
And discover the secret (that editors Jack and David only know the answer to) about who crapped in the office urinal, in our Top Picks.
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William Poundstone had a lab test Original Recipe KFC back in the 1980's for his book Big Secrets. There was only one spice (black pepper) and no herbs found in the sample. The other flavorings were salt and MSG. The alleged syrup formula for Coke - which was apparently revealed in a court case in the early twentieth century - is in the same book.
ReplyWe should fire everyone who is in charge of our nations top secret 'whatevers' and replace them with these people-especially those running the Coke/KFC operations.
ReplyI'm not joking.
Pff brine shrimp reproduce naturally if they have enough space and the stress conditions for the eggs, what secret?
ReplyCarly Simon, Dick Ebersol, and Howard Stern!
ReplyThis reminds me of that show where that guy tries to recreate secret famous recipes.
ReplyI've got an E in my name. I've got a few in fact. Is it about me? I'm not very vain though. And I don't walk into parties like I'm walking onto a yacht.
ReplyOliver Cromwell was a religious tyrant. He banned Christmas for fuck's sake! His reign was more tyrannical then the Monarchy he replaced. Ask the Irish what they think about Cromwell. The Irish probably have nicer things to say about Hitler than they do about Cromwell. He was pretty much the closest England came to a despot.
Replyyeh he was a despicable weasel
The kfc around here is horrible. The dryest blandest s**t ive ever tasted and there are NO condom things to put on the chicken.
Reply... Condom?
Maybe he means Condiments?
Also one of the secrets to KFCs spices are not to eat it, I mean throw in $10 and you'll be full for a couple of hours but after that your bowels take control of your day after that unless you are an obese American n***o which I am none of the following.
ReplyIf you really wanted to find out about baseball mud, you now have the guys son in laws name.
ReplyFind where this guy lives, give up your job and follow him where ever he goes once he has left his house for 365 days and you'll find exactly where this mud is from.
I hope you like getting welfare, food stamps and getting what you own reposed due to now being a full time stalker.
I am one of the two people in the world that have seen my penis.
ReplyMy mother being the second, of course.
I wish I could be like you when I grow up.
I like how coke, the monkeys, mud, and KFC can be broken down with chemistry if you had enough determination and a lab.
ReplyIt's no secret what the main ingredient in the mud is---the dirt in that part of the New Jersey pine barrens is almost pure quartz. It's just a helluva lot cheaper to dig the stuff up than it is to try and synthesize it, which is how the guys who run that company are able to keep costs down.
I bet that when Simon's 90 years old and on her death bed, she'll finally reveal who "You're So Vain"'s subject is, and it'll just be some guy from before she was famous.
ReplyThere really shouldn't be any secret to sea monkeys. They are after all just brine shrimp, the very same as is sold as fish food in aquarium stores. They live in ephemeral (temporary) desert pools that only exist when it rains, and their life cycle involves living just long enough to breed before the pools dry up; their eggs are naturally capable of surviving prolonged dessication. So really a replication of such conditions is all you need, the rest (living longer, getting bigger) would, I imagine, just be selective breeding.
ReplyThe secret is a mix of which of more than 70+ species they are, the exact formula of the food -and- the exact elements and ration of said elements in the powder they go in with. Brine shrimp are surprisingly picky in some cases, and some grow much bigger than others. Getting the ideal conditions for desert ephemera to thrive is surprisingly hard.
"no one eats at KFC because they have the best chicken in the world. People eat it because it's a pain in the ass to make at home and the line was too long at Popeye's."
ReplyDaaaammmmmnnnnnnnn......
Another (local/regional) where the recipe is known only to 1 or 2. Dirty John's (New Way lunch) meatsauce, in Glens Falls, NY. I think it's the owner of the main restaurant who knows it (and maybe one other person in the event that something happens, but idk). Not even the managers of the stores know it.
Reply*facepalm*
ReplyWhen are people going to realize that predicting the general weather trends for next year is FAR LESS impressive than predicting exactly what's going to happen in three days.
Flip a coin 10 times. You get 8 heads and 2 tails. Nothing special. take the same coin, flip it 1000 times, you get 800 heads and 200 tails, then something's wrong with the coin. The probability of error grows as the data set shrinks
Your example contradicts what your first (full) sentence says.
Seriously. Yes, the probability of error grows as the data set shrinks. So when something IS successful 80% of the time over the very long range, it actually IS pretty damn impressive.
Fuck.
ReplyHey just testing the profanity filter
"the american league has been using blackburn mud exclusively on all their BALLS." rofl.. Cracked me up
ReplyShouldn't you be getting ready for school? I mean, for that to "crack you up" you must be in the 10-14 year old age set.
Your joke should have been "CRACKED me up!"
See what I did there?
So.....the guy just walks into some unknown place and scoops some random glop into a few buckets?
ReplyDo we have any reason to believe that professional baseball teams aren't using balls coated with old, watered-down leech s**t stew?
Well then... damn does that old, watered-down leech s**t stew work wonders on my balls.