The World's Greatest Book of Useless Information by Noel Botham

Author:Noel Botham [Botham, Noel]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Curiosities & Wonders, Reference, Curiosities and wonders, General, Humor, Trivia, etc, Handbooks, Vade-Mecums
ISBN: 9780399535024
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2009-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

The Book of Useless Information

The three cardinal virtues are faith, hope, and charity.

It was only after 440 C.E. that December 25 was celebrated as the birth date of Jesus Christ.

Two-?thirds of Portugal was owned by the Church in the early eighteenth century.

Kerimaki Church in Finland is the world’s largest church made of wood.

Las Vegas has the most chapels per capita than any other U.S. city.

Sister Boom-?Boom was a transvestite nun who ran for mayor of San Francisco in 1982. He/she received more than twenty thousand votes.

St. Stephen is the patron saint of bricklayers.

IS THE POPE CATHOLIC?

Pope Adrian VI died after a fly got stuck in his throat as he was drinking from a water fountain.

The youngest pope was eleven years old.

The election of a new pope is announced to the world with white smoke.

Pope Paul IV, who was elected on May 23, 1555, was so outraged when he saw the naked bodies on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel that he ordered Michelangelo to paint clothes on them.

OY VEY!

According to ceremonial customs of Orthodox Judaism, it is officially sundown when you cannot tell the difference between a black thread and a red thread.

A young shepherd boy discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran, Jordan, in 1947.

Snow angels originated from medieval Jewish mystics who practiced rolling in the snow to purge themselves of evil urges.

BUDDHA-?OLOGY

Contrary to popular belief, there are almost no Buddhists in India, nor have there been for about a thousand years. Although Buddhism was founded in India around 470 B.C.E. and developed there at an early date, it was uprooted from India between the seventh and twelfth centuries C.E. and today exists almost exclusively outside the country, primarily in Sri Lanka, Japan, and Indochina.

A temple in Sri Lanka is dedicated to one of the Buddha’s teeth.

HINDU WHO?

Hindu men once believed it to be unlucky to marry a third time. They could avoid misfortune by marrying a tree first. The tree (the third wife) was then burned, freeing the man to marry again.

Husbands and wives in India who desire children whisper their wish in the ear of a sacred cow.

On the stone temples of Madura in southern India, there are more than thirty million carved images of gods and goddesses.

IT’S A PARTY

A third of Taiwanese funeral processions include a stripper.

BUSINESS RELATIONS

BRANDING THE COW

A single share of Coca-?Cola stock purchased in 1919, when the company went public, would have been worth $92,500 in 1997.

IBM’s motto is “Think.”

NERF, the popular foam children’s toy company, doesn’t actually stand for anything.

Nestlé is the largest company in Switzerland, yet more than 98 percent of its revenue comes from outside the country.

The three most valuable brand names on Earth are Marlboro, Coca-?Cola, and Budweiser, in that order.

THEY’RE IN THE MONEY

Japan’s currency is the most difficult to counterfeit.

John D. Rockefeller was the first billionaire in the United States.

Howard Hughes once made half a billion dollars in one day. In 1966, he received a bank draft for $546,549,171 in return for his 75 percent holdings in TWA.

Ted Turner owns 5 percent of New Mexico.

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