Celebrity Trivia, Random Fun Facts

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• At last check, the governor of Arkansas makes $60,000 a year. His salary is the lowest of all 50 states. A dozen or so states pay their governors more than $100,000 year, generally the more populous states. California pays its governor $131,000. Illinois comes in second at $130,000 and change, with New York, a close third at $130,000 even.
• Lyndon B. Johnson was the first president of the United States to wear contact lenses.
• President Teddy Roosevelt died from an "infected tooth."
• Money man Cornelius Vanderbilt was an insomniac and a believer in the occult. He was not able to fall asleep unless each leg of his bed was planted in a dished filled with salt. He felt this kept out the evil spirits. It also kept out the snails, ants, and anyone with high blood pressure.
• Artist Andy Warhol became famous for his painting of Campbell's Soup cans. Before that - he made his living painting shoes for advertisements.
• Flamenco dancer Jose Greco took out an insurance policy through Lloyd's of London against his pants splitting during a performance.
• President Woodrow Wilson wrote all of his speeches in longhand.
• Television horse Mr. Ed was foaled in 1949 in El Monte, California. Mr. Ed's original name was Bamboo Harvester. Raised as a parade and show horse he was once owned by the president of the California Palomino Society. He died in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, on February 28, 1979, at 30 years old. Tahlequah was also the "home office" for "Late Night with David Letterman's Top Ten List" for several years.
• President Theodore Roosevelt was the first to announce to the world that Maxwell House coffee is "Good to the last drop."
• Lloyd Vernet Bridges III is the birth name of actor Beau Bridges. He was given the nickname "Beau" by his family, reportedly after Ashley Wilkes's son in the classic 1939 film "Gone With the Wind."
• On April 14th, 1910, President Howard Taft began a sports tradition by throwing out the first baseball of the season. That happened at an American League game between Washington and Philadelphia. Washington won, 3-0.
• Roosevelt was the most superstitious president—he traveled continually but never left on a Friday. He also would not sit at the same table that held thirteen other people.
• George Washington was deathly afraid of being buried alive. After he died, he wanted to be laid out for three days just to make sure he was dead.
• Richard Nixon's favorite drink was a dry martini.
• Julius Caesar was self-conscious about his receding hairline.
• James Buchanon is said to have had the neatest handwriting of all the Presidents.
• Richard Nixon left instructions for "California, here I come" to be the last piece of music played (slowly and softly) were he to die in office.
• The only president to be head of a labor union was Ronald Reagan.
• When the Hoovers did not want to be overheard by White House guests, they spoke to each other in Chinese.
• Robert Kennedy was killed in the Ambassador Hotel, the same hotel that housed Marilyn Monroe's first modeling agency.
• Benjamin Franklin lived at 141 Market Street, Philadelphia, PA.
• Theodore Roosevelt was the only U.S. president to deliver an inaugural address without using the word "I". Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower tied for second place, using "I" only once in their inaugural addresses.
• A short time before Lincoln's assassination, he dreamed he was going to die, and he related his dream to the Senate.
• When John Wilkes Booth leaped onto the stage after shooting the President, he tripped—on the American flag.
• Paul Cezanne had a parrot who he taught to say, "Cezanne is a great painter."
• George Washington had to borrow money so he could travel to his inauguration.
• Lyndon Johnson died one mile from the house he was born in.
• Grover Cleveland answered the White House phone, personally.
• Calvin Coolidge was sworn into office by his own father.
• Theodore Roosevelt was blind in his left eye.

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