Last year, “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver’s”, posted a video about the information you need for school starting up. With school is starting up soon, here are some facts you need to know for school. This will cover your history, math, science, theatre, and English. Be prepared to go "wow" or "I knew that."
First, we will do history:
1. America was founded on Thursday, July 4, 1776. Yes, those “Thursday Night Football” games are correct, our nation was founded on a Thursday.
2. George Washington was the first president. His Vice President was John Adams.
3. Aaron Burr shot Alexander Hamilton in a duel on July 11, 1804. Spoiler alert for “Hamilton”.
4. The South seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860. With the war starting on April 12, 1861 and ended May 9, 1865 with the North winning.
5. Abraham Lincoln was assassinated by John Wilkes Booth on April 14, 1865. Lincoln was the first US president to be assassinated.
6. World War 2 started on September 1, 1939. This started with the invasion of Poland by the Nazi.
7. John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963. He was shot in Dallas, Texas by Lee Harvey Oswald.
8. Richard Nixon is the only presidential candidate to campaign in all 50 states. Take that Clinton and Trump!
9. Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. This because of the Watergate scandal. Nixon was the only president to resign from office.
10. Osama Bin Laden was killed on May 1st, 2011.
Seal Team Six is to thank for this.
Now onto math:
11. Anything divided by zero equals zero. The same rule applies to multiplication.
12. 1+1=2. You knew that, just thought I would remind you.
13. Always bring your calculator. That’s not just a statement, but it’s a fact. Bring it.
Let’s journey into the science field:
14. Don’t ask your teacher how to make meth. You will probably fail if you ask how to do that, due to you binge watching “Breaking Bad”.
Let's go reads some books in English:
15. Almost every Shakespeare drama has the lead character dying. Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Richard III, and Macbeth all die in their respective plays
16. Gatsby dies at the end of “The Great Gatsby”. So does Myrtle and George Wilson.
17. C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien were friends. This will get your teacher extra brownie points you mention this
18. Lenny dies at the end of “Of Mice and Men”. Lenny gets shot by George
19. Frankenstein is not the monster. Dr. Frankenstein made Frankenstein’s Monster.
20. Oedipus marries his mom. Yes. This is true.
21. Johnny dies in “The Outsiders”. “Stay golden Ponyboy”
Let's go to the Theatre:
22. Shakespeare is to be performed, not read. This isn’t a fact, but it should be.
23. Never say “Macbeth” in the theatre. Unless you want to have a light fall on you, refer to it as “The Scottish Play”
24. Almost everyone dies in “Les Miserable”. You will probably learn about this in your musical theatre history classes, if you haven’t seen this already.
25. Willie Loman commits suicide in “Death of a Salesman”. You will read this in your theatre history or intro to theatre class.
26. “The Crucible” is a metaphor for the red scare during the cold war. That was Arthur Miller’s intent. A middle finger to McCarthyism.
27. Johnathan Larson did not die from AIDS. The creator of “RENT” did not die from AIDS, as the musical is set during the AIDS crisis.
28. Almost everyone dies in a Shakespeare play. Well, only the dramas.
29. “Chicago” is the longest revival of a musical. Twenty years strong. “The Phantom of the Opera” is the longest running musical.
30. “Hamilton” is still talked about a year later after the release of the cast album. It’s still really good.
