Theoretically, television may be feasible, but I consider it an impossibility--a development which we should waste little time dreaming about.
- Lee de Forest, 1926, inventor of the cathode ray tube

I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.
- Thomas J. Watson, 1943, Chairman of the Board of IBM

It doesn't matter what he does, he will never amount to anything.
- Albert Einstein's teacher to his father, 1895

It will be years - not in my time - before a woman will become Prime Minister.
- Margaret Thatcher, 1974

This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.
- Western Union internal memo, 1876

We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.
- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962

Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?
- H. M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927

Louis Pasteur's theory of germs is ridiculous fiction.
- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology at Toulouse, 1872

Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons.
- Popular Mechanics, forecasting the relentless march of science, 1949

We don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.
- Hewlett-Packard's rejection of Steve Jobs, who went on to found Apple Computers

King George II said in 1773 that the American colonies had little stomach for revolution.

An official of the White Star Line, speaking of the firm's newly built flagship, the Titanic, launched in 1912, declared that the ship was unsinkable.

In 1939 The New York Times said the problem of TV was that people had to glue their eyes to a screen, and that the average American wouldn't have time for it.

An English astronomy professor said in the early 19th century that air travel at high speed would be impossible because passengers would suffocate.

Airplanes are interesting toys, but they have no military value.
- Marshal Ferdinand Foch in 1911

With over 50 foreign cars already on sale here, the Japanese auto industry isn't likely to carve out a big slice of the U.S. market.
- Business Week, 1958

Whatever happens, the U.S. Navy is not going to be caught napping.
- Frank Knox, U.S. Secretary of the Navy, on December 4, 1941

The world's largest palace has 1788 rooms. It was built for the Sultan of Brunei.

The world's largest recorded gathering of people was at a Hindu religious festival in India in 1989. It was attended by about 15 million people.

Abraham Lincoln went to school for less than a year. He taught himself to read and write.

The longest recorded swim was 2938 km down the Mississippi River in 1930. The swimmer spend 742 hours in the water.

Humans are no match for some animals. The rhinoceros beetle can carry 850 times its own weight on its back. The Emperor moth can detect smells 11 km away. The cheetah can run at 70 km/h. The Polyphemus moth eats 86,000 its own birth weight in 48 hours. The cries of South American howler monkeys can be heard 16 km away.

The longest jail sentence passed was in the United States - 10,000 years for a triple murder.

It is impossible to sneeze with your eyes open. Try it!

Levi Strauss made the first pair of blue jeans in 1850. They were intended as work trousers for American miners looking for gold.

In Ancient Rome only important people wore purple clothes. This is because the purple dye came from a particular kind of shellfish and was very expensive.

The sentence "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" uses every letter in the English language.

111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321

The average human eats 8 spiders in their lifetime at night.

"I am." is the shortest complete sentence in the English language.

A rhinoceros horn is made of compacted hair.

The shortest war in history was between Zanzibar and England in 1896. Zanzibar surrendered after 38 minutes.

A polar bear's skin is black. Its fur is not white, but actually clear.

Donald Duck comics were banned in Finland because he doesn't wear pants.

More people are killed by donkeys annually than are killed in plane crashes.

Shakespeare invented the word "assassination" and "bump."

If you keep a Goldfish in the dark room, it will eventually turn white.

Women blink nearly twice as much as men.

The name of all the continents end with the same letter that they start with.

The word "lethologica" describes the state of not being able to remember the word you want.

TYPEWRITER, is the longest word that can be made using the letters on only one row of the keyboard.

If the population of China walked past you in single file, the line would never end because of the rate of reproduction

The word racecar and kayak are the same whether they are read left to right or right to left.

A snail can sleep for 3 years.

China has more English speakers than the United States.

The electric chair was invented by a dentist.

Did you know you share your birthday with at least 9 other million people in the world.

The longest word in the English language is 1909 letters long and it refers to a distinct part of DNA.

Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds, dogs only have about ten.

Our eyes are always the same size from birth, but our nose and ears never stop growing.

Feb 1865 is the only month in recorded history not to have a full moon.

Cat's urine glows under a black light.

Leonardo Da Vinci invented the scissors.

Nutmeg is extremely poisonous if injected intravenously.

Only one person in two billion will live to be 116 or older.

If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee. If you fart consistently for 6 years and 9 months, enough gas is produced to create the energy of an atomic bomb.

The human heart creates enough pressure when it pumps out to the body to squirt blood 30 feet.

On average, people fear spiders more than they do death.

The strongest muscle in the body is the TONGUE.

It's impossible to sneeze with your eyes open.

A crocodile cannot stick its tongue out.

The ant always falls over on its right side when intoxicated.

Polar bears are left-handed.

The catfish has over 27,000 taste buds, that makes the catfish rank #1 for animal having the most taste buds.

A cockroach will live nine days without its head, before it starves to death.

Butterflies taste with their feet. Elephants are the only animals that can't jump.

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

Starfish haven't got brains.

Rubber bands last longer when refrigerated.

Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite.

The average secretary's left hand does 56% of the typing.

A shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes.

There are more chickens than people in the world.

Two-thirds of the world's eggplant is grown in New Jersey.

The longest one-syllable word in the English language is
"screeched."

No word in the English language rhymes with month, orange, silver or purple.

"Dreamt" is the only English word that ends in the letters "mt".

Almonds are members of the peach family.

There are only four words in the English language which end in "- dous": tremendous, horrendous, stupendous, and hazardous.

A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.

An ostrich's eye is bigger than it's brain.

Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur.

In most advertisements, including newspapers, the time
displayed on a watch is 10:10.

A dragonfly has a lifespan of 24 hours.

A goldfish has a memory span of three seconds.

The giant squid has the largest eyes in the world.

In England, the Speaker of the House is not allowed to speak.

The name for Oz in the "Wizard of Oz" was thought up when the creator, Frank Baum, looked at his filing cabinet and saw A-N and O-Z, hence "Oz."

The microwave was invented after a researcher walked by a radar tube and a chocolate bar melted in his pocket.

The average person falls asleep in seven minutes.

There are 336 dimples on a regulation golf ball.