Hawaii became the 50th U.S. state on August 21,1959 .

Roald Amundsen and Umberto Nobile became the first men to cross the North Pole in an airship on May 12, 1926.

In December of 1657, the Massachusetts General Court ordered a fine to be payed by anyone celebrating Christmas.

Harvard University was founded in 1636.

The Hundred Years War actually lasted for 116 years.

Mexico declared its independence from Spain on August 23, 1821.

In April 1919, England enacted a 48 hour work week with minimum wages.

The first successful oil well was drilled in Pennsylvania in 1859.

The George Washington Bridge, linking New York to New Jersey, opened on October 24, 1931.

The
Khone waterfall on the Cambodia-Laos border has the greatest volume of
water of any waterfall in the world. About 410,000 cubic feet of water
falls over it's drop of 45 feet

every second! Niagara Falls has a volume of half of that.

It takes 100 years for a cave stalactite to grow 1 inch!

Every year in the United States there are around 700 tornadoes!

The San Andreas fault in California moves about .4 inch each year!

The world's smallest independent nation is Vatican City with an area of .2 square miles (.4 square kilometers).

The Sahara desert in Africa is as large as all of the United States. It covers an area of over 3 million square miles!

A Giant Sequoia named the General Sherman is the largest tree in the world.

There are about 9,500 different kinds of grass in the world.

The highest point in Pennsylvania is lower than the lowest point in Colorado

It takes about two years for a pineapple to grow to its full size

Bengal tigers are the most water loving of the big cats. They will even chase prey into the water.

A male Angler fish
attaches itself to a female and never lets go. Their vascular systems
unite and the male becomes entirely dependent on the female's blood for
nutrition.

A purple finch is really crimson in color.

Roadrunners are large
(about two feet long) crested birds that prefer to run rather than fly.
They eat rattlesnakes whole, and they can sprint 15 miles per hour.

The longest recorded life span of a tapeworm was 35 years!

Hummingbirds are the only birds that can fly backwards.

Toucans are found
only in tropical areas of Central and South America. Some Toucan
species have bills more than half as long as their bodies.

A beaver can hold it's breath for 45 minutes.

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.

Flying squirrels
don’t really fly, they glide from branch to branch. A blanket-like
furry skin stretches their front and hind legs, and acts as a
parachute, enabling the squirrel to soar like a kite.

Camels have three eye lids.