“Infantry” sounds like “infant,” as typically, in ancient times, an army’s infantry consisted of soldiers too young or too inexperienced to ride a horse and be part of the cavalry.
100 Mind-Blowing Ride Facts
The first roller coaster was used to transport coal down a hill. After people found that it could reach speeds up to 50 miles per hour, tourists asked to ride on it for a few cents.
The first commercial passenger flight lasted only 23 minutes. In 1914, Abram Pheil paid $400 (which would be $8,500 today) for a 23-minute plane ride. The Florida flight flew between Saint Petersburg and Tampa, where only 21 miles of water separated the cities. Pheil, a former mayor of Saint Petersburg, and the pilot, Tony Jannus, were the only passengers. This momentous flight paved the way for air travel as we know it.
In 2014, there was a Tinder match in Antarctica. Two research scientists matched on the global dating app in the most remote part of the world – a man working at the United States Antarctic McMurdo Station and a woman camping a 45-minute helicopter ride away. What are the chances?!
The first commercial aeroplane flight lasted 23 minutes. In 1914, Abram Pheil paid $400 (the current equivalent of $8,500) for a 23-minute plane ride. Pheil flew between St. Petersburg and Tampa, Florida, which was only 21 miles away from each other.
Black taxis in London are tall for a reason. This is so that gentlemen can ride in them without having to remove their top hats. For many, this is considered to be very convenient.
A Lord of the Rings actor would rather hike up a whole mountain than ride a helicopter. One of the things that makes Lord of the Rings lore so rich is the immersive environment of the story’s settings. While shooting the films, the cast had to fly to remote locations via helicopter. Sean Bean, who plays Boromir (and Ned Stark in Game of Thrones) was afraid of flight, and would only do it if he had no choice. During the shootings for the Fellowship crossing snowy mountains, he’d climb for two hours every morning to get to the set. He would make the climb already dressed as Boromir.
There’s an apartment inside the Eiffel Tower. When Gustave Eiffel designed the tower, he added a hidden apartment on the third level—but he never lived there, nor did anybody. Instead, Eiffel used this space to entertain guests such as Thomas Edison. Though it wasn’t big, the apartment was decorated with wallpaper, furnished with wooden cabinets, and even had a grand piano. Nowadays, you can get a peek at the unique space through a window if you ride up the tower.
A rollercoaster can make you pass kidney stones. After many reports of passing a kidney stone on Disney World’s Big Thunder Mountain Railroad ride, a team from Michigan State University decided to investigate whether it was coincidental or not. They found that there was a 64% kidney stone pass rate for passengers in the rear of the Thunder Mountain ride. However, it was just 16% for passengers in the front.
The Pirates of the Caribbean ride in Disneyland used to have real skeletons. In the 1960s, the skeletons on the Pirates ride at Disneyland were real. Why? They thought the fake skeletons didn’t look spooky enough. How? They contacted the UCLA medical department and bought skeletons usually found in anatomy classrooms. However, they stopped when they realized that the fake skeletons were cooler (and probably cheaper.)
In Welsh folklore, corgis carried fairies. According to a Welsh legend, a pair of corgis tow the carts and carriages of fairies and help them ride into battle. Epic corgis = WTF facts.
Sally Ride was the first American woman to fly in space, on June 18, 1983.
Amelia Earhart first saw a plane at the age of 10 but didn’t take an aeroplane ride until 1920 when she was 23 years old.
Linux is a Kernel: Linux is essentially a kernel and not an operating system. The term “Linux” is commonly used to refer to operating systems based on the Linux kernel such as Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Mint, and so much more. These are correctly referred to as Linux distributions or flavours since they ride on the Linux Kernel, which is the core of any operating system and interfaces the underlying hardware with the operating system and installed applications.