14 Random Facts to Get One Step Closer to Knowing Everything
![14 Random Facts to Get One Step Closer to Knowing Everything](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/8/1/820581_320x180.jpg)
Did you know that Alexander the Great was inadvertently buried alive? Alexander is thought to have had Guillain-Barré Syndrome, a neurological condition. People believe he was only paralyzed and physically and psychologically aware when he died.
Similarly, ever heard Abraham Lincoln was a member of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame? By many of his roughly 300 contests, the 6'4" head of state had only one defeat. He established a reputation as an aristocracy fighter in New Salem for this.
When you study history lessons, it may appear that you are simply memorizing spontaneous facts and information about historical events. And while knowing the past is essential, uncovering a few odd history lessons makes learning even more enjoyable. The below amazingly weird history information and historical trivia are amongst the most interesting tidbits from the previous era, whether you're hoping to expand the history or become a whiz during your next random history facts trivia night.
Ben Schwartz the Cop
![Ben Schwartz was almost Dave the Cop in Parks and Recreation. Before becoming Jean-Ralphio, Schwartz auditioned for Dave Sanderson, Leslie Knope's cop boyfriend. The casting directors reportedly loved his energy, but ended up deciding he was too young to play Amy Poehler's paramour.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/7/820577.jpg)
More: 'Parks And Recreation': Tom Almost Dated Aunt May & 2 Other Wild Casting Near-Misses
Not A Game
![An Australian serial killer refused to eat to get a PlayStation. Ivan Milat, convicted for killing seven hitchhikers, went on a hunger strike in 2011 to protest a heinous injustice committed against him: Не wasn't given a PlayStation to exercise his mind. Не lasted nine days before deciding he liked food better than video games, and gave up.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/5/820575.jpg)
More: A Serial Killer Went On Hunger Strike, Demanding A PlayStation
Police Work
![Homicide detectives work way fewer cases than you think. Put on a cop show, and you'll see detectives solving a different murder every week. But in real life, the average homicide cop works maybe five cases in a year. Even in such a stab-happy place as Detroit, the number barely goes up to eight.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/3/820573.jpg)
Lance Armstrong's Ad
![Lance Armstrong made an ad mocking his critics (before they were proven right). Everybody wants to know what I'm on, Armstrong said in a 2001 ad for Nike. I'm on my bike, busting my ass six hours a day, he answered. Yeah, his bike and a shit-ton of human growth hormone, as it turned out - let's just say, the piece hasn't exactly aged gracefully.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/6/7/820567.jpg)
Business Expense
![A German tycoon tried to claim his own kidnapping as tax-deductible. As the founder of the discount supermarket Aldi, Theo Albrecht knew how to pinch a penny - and that included the time he was kidnapped in 1971. First he haggled with the kidnappers over his ransom - and after he was set free, he went to court to get a tax write-off for the money he paid.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/8/820578.jpg)
Privately-Owned Genes
![A company patented the breast cancer genes. For 15 years, Myriad Genetics had a patent over two genes that can increase your risk of cancer, and wouldn't let anyone else test for them. This monopoly ended in 2013, when the Supreme Court ruled, WTF, you can't own human genes.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/0/820570.jpg)
Dueling Divorce
![A guy challenged his ex- wife to trial by combat. As it wasn't explicitly outlawed, in 2020 Kansas resident David Ostrom challenged his ex-wife and her lawyer to decide the custody of the couple's child on the field of battle, wherein he would rend their souls from their corporal bodies. With a katana, because of freakin' course.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/2/820572.jpg)
More: Trial By Combat Is Worst Way To Win Custody Of Your Children
Cab-Driving Governor
![A random taxi driver turned out to be the former governor of West Virginia. William С. Marland's forward-thinking policies couldn't overcome his failings as a politician or his alcoholism, and by 1960 he disappeared from public view. A couple years later, a Chicago journalist thought of fact-checking this cabbie's joke about being a former governor - and it turned out, it was Marland.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/9/820579.jpg)
Libertarians and Cults
![American Libertarians funded a violent cult. In one of the countless harebrained Libertarian attempts at a micronation, a group called the Phoenix Foundation provided guns and funds to a cult leader named Jimmy Stevens, who wanted to secede from Vanuatu. The foundation faded away after Stevens' attempt failed in 1980. CRACKED.COM](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/4/820574.jpg)
More: 6 Grand Mastermind Coups (That Fell Apart Immediately)
Flying Spiders
![Spiders can go paragliding. The little critters can knit themselves a sort of kite, and go flying (or ballooning, as this is called). They can travel 2.5 miles up and 1,000 miles out. Not freaky enough? Then try this: Spider flight is driven by the Earth's electric field.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/8/0/820580.jpg)
Oscar Sales
![Oscar winners can't legally sell their awards. Since the Academy doesn't want their statuettes in the marketplace, there's a rule that if you want to sell your Oscar, you have to first offer to sell it back to the Academy itself, for just $10. Sounds like a weird rule, but a judge upheld it as legal in 2015.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/1/820571.jpg)
More: Oscar Winners Can't Sell Their Awards—Except For One Actor, Who Did
Flickr's Origins
![Flickr started as a video game. In 2002, husband and wife Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake founded a software company to create an MMO titled Game Neverending. The game failed, but a feature for sharing images stood out - so it was spun into its own product, called Flickr.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/6/9/820569.jpg)
First Science-Fiction Convention
![The first sci-fi convention happened in Victorian England. Edward Bulwer-Lytton's book Vril: The Power of The Coming Race garnered such a following that a five day long Vril-Ya Bazaar and Fête was held in London in 1891. This is considered the very first sci-fi convention, complete with merch booths and cosplayers.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/7/6/820576.jpg)
British Concentration Camps
![The Nazis had concentration camps in Great Britain. During World War II, Germany occupied the island of Alderney, in the English Channel, and built concentration camps there. For a long time, the British government was very sketchy about what went down in Alderney - we needed archaeologists to investigate the place and tell us it was very bad.](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/imageset/5/6/8/820568.jpg)
More: 5 Discoveries That Archaeologists Wish They Never Found