1. Nebraska is where they invented Kool-Aid. Oh, yeah!
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2. Doughnut holes may not be sold in Lehigh—How did this law even happen? I blame “Big Doughnut Ring” lobbyists
3. True story: there's actually a National Liars Hall of Fame, and it's in Dannebrog. Or at least they say there is...
4. Runza is not just the name of Nebraska's best-loved fast-food chain, but also a type of stuffed dough sandwich, a precursor to the hot pocket.
5. The people of Fremont hold the record for making the world's largest open-faced sandwich. The topping? 1,652 lbs. of yummy Spam, fresh from the city's own Hormel meat-packing plant.
6. Another state law prohibits children from burping in church, and threatens the parents with jail time should such an unfortunate eructation occur. Oops, better skip the pre-service sodas, then.
7. The UNL Campus is home to an apple tree which came from the very one that Sir Issac Newton saw the apple fall from in England. This is a scientific fact.
8. Many famous entertainers were born in Nebraska, such as Johnny Carson, Fred Astaire, Marlon Brando, Hilary Swank and Mr. Get-R-Done himself, Larry the Cable Guy.
9. Go home, Captain Ahab. Whale hunting is against state law in Nebraska. Not that there are actually any whales in Nebraska, not even in any of its aquariums.
10. The Lied Jungle exhibit at Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo is the world's largest indoor rainforest.
11. This zoo also has several other “world's largests” to its credit: its Desert Dome is the world's largest indoor desert, while its Kingdoms of the Night exhibit features the world's largest indoor swamp.
12. On football game days, Nebraska’s Memorial Stadium becomes the third largest city in the state, holding over 90,000 people.
13. Good luck joining the Memorial Stadium population though, because it has been sold out for every game since 1962—more than 325 games and counting.
14. The University of Nebraska originally had a medical school as part of its Lincoln campus, but the school's professors soon earned a rather gruesome reputation for suspected body-snatching. So it closed in 1887 and wasn't re-established until the university opened its campus in Omaha. (Guess they just had better security on the graveyard shift.)
15. Nebraska is, yay! both the world's largest producer and user of center pivot irrigation! Whatever that is, it sounds absolutely riveting. Er, pivoting. Ok, I give up, I have absolutely no clue.
16. The world's largest mammoth fossil was found in Lincoln County, and is now on display in the University of Nebraska State Museum in Lincoln.
17. According to the Gallup and Healthways well-being index, Nebraska currently rates as the nation's third-happiest state, behind both North and South Dakota. Makes you wonder just what's going on in the Upper Midwest.
18. So that meme of the skateboarding professor, that was legit. His name was Tom Winter a religious studies professor at ULN who prior to retiring at 69 could be spotted skating around campus.
19. Shirtless gentlemen planning a trip to Omaha beware, keep it au naturel because men are not allowed to run around with a shaved chest in that city
20. The nation's first rodeo was held in North Platte in 1882 as part of a Fourth of July celebration.
21. The Ogallala Aquifer, one of the world's largest sources of underground water, lies beneath the states of South Dakota, Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Texas as well as Nebraska, but it takes its name from the city of Ogallala near where it was first discovered.
22. Omaha's first postmaster, who was also employed as a bricklayer, surveyor and city councilman, used to carry the letters in his hat. Anyone expecting mail needed to intercept him as he went about his daily business, at which point he'd remove his hat and try to locate the letter.
23. The capitol building has the dubious honor of not one but two naughty nicknames: The Phallus of the Plains and The Penis of the Prairie. We’ll let you figure out why.
24. Nebraska is the only state with a unicameral legislature, which means they just have one governing body called the Nebraska Legislature. I'm guessing that whatever that means, it amounts to only half as many campaign commercials and annoying solicitation phone calls, so I'm all for it.
25. Arbor Day was created by a Nebraskan, and first celebrated in Nebraska City, where the National Arbor Day Foundation is still headquartered.
26. UNL's Nebraska Tractor Test Laboratory is, evidently, the best-known such facility in the world, at least among agricultural implement cognoscenti.
27. While the internet rumor that the McRib was invented in Nebraska turns out to be untrue, it does owe its existence in part to UNL professor Roger Mandingo. Mandingo came up with a technique for taking little meat scraps and binding them together into a substance that can then be formed into the desired shape.
28. Another oddball Nebraska food item which somehow failed to catch on was the “Nebraskit,” a compressed wheat block developed by the Nebraska Department of Agriculture and meant to satisfy Nebraskans' nutritional needs in the event of some unspecified Cold War catastrophe.
29. Languishing away in a bank somewhere is $10,000 in reward money for a still-unsolved murder...that of a deformed bird. Not just any bird, however – Andy the Footless Goose, whose owner fashioned little sneakers for him to wear on his stumps, became quite the celebrity. He was profiled in a 1989 issue of “People” magazine, and later appeared on “The Tonight Show” before meeting with fowl play in 1991.
30. While snake-handling never really caught on in Nebraska, the congregants of Bethany Presbyterian Church in Lemoyne did have the opportunity to test their faith when their church was invaded by rattlers in 1941. Like the sensible Midwesterners they were, they decided to forego the opportunity to “take up serpents,” and instead just got rid of the darn things.
31. USA Roller Sports, the governing body for such competitive sports as speed skating, roller hockey and even roller derby, makes its headquarters in Lincoln.
32. The Reuben sandwich was created by a Lithuanian grocer in Omaha, and first featured on the menu of the Blackstone Hotel.
33. Actor Thurl Ravenscroft, best known as the voice of Tony the Tiger, was a native of Norfolk, Neb.
34. In 1986, Nebraska became the first state to have a gubernatorial election where both major party candidates were women.
35. The small town of Prague (population: several) celebrated its centennial in 1987 by constructing the world's largest kolache. This cherry-filled dough monster weighed 2,605 pounds and measured nearly 15 feet in diameter.
36. Each spring over half a million sandhill cranes gather for their annual meetup along a 40-mile stretch of Nebraska's Platte River before dispersing to fly to their separate northern destinations.
37. Nebraska has approximately three and half times the number of cows as people.
38. Reuben the chimp, who became famous for his ability to use sign language, used to live at the Zoo Nebraska in Royal, in a building constructed with money donated by Johnny Carson. Sadly, he was shot and killed during a 2005 escape attempt, and the zoo itself closed down a few years later.
39. Another state law prohibits children from burping in church, and threatens the parents with jail time should such an unfortunate eructation occur. Oops, better skip the pre-service sodas, then.
40. While the city of Scottsbluff is just one word, it's located in Scotts Bluff County.
41. Sioux Sundries of Harrison used to be the home of what they claimed to be the world's largest burger, but the restaurant closed down about 10 years ago. The famous two pound Coffee Burger is soon to make a comeback, however, and will be featured on the menu of the Drifter Cookshack at the High Plains Homestead in Crawford.
42. Carhenge, located 10 miles north of Alliance, is a replica of Stonehenge created from junked cars covered with gray paint. Carhenge went on the market in 2011 with a price tag of $300,000, but the only interested buyer wanted to dismantle it and ship it elsewhere, so its owners instead decided to donate it to the city of Alliance.
43. Marlon Brando's mom taught acting lessons at the Omaha Community Playhouse. Wait, it gets better—one of her students was none other than Henry Fonda.
44. The city of Cozad lies right on the 100th Meridian, where east meets west.
45. The Les Vilda Presidential Museum and Library, a monument to an eternally hopeful, if incredibly obscure, perpetual presidential candidate, is located in an outhouse in Wilber.
46. Nebraska was the first state to complete a toll-free interstate system, which it did in the early 1970s. Unlike certain other states (such as the ones that rhyme with shmensylvania and poklahoma), that are probably still trying to think up ways to erect toll booths on their sidewalks.
47. A stretch of fence that runs along the side of Highway 26 between Northport and Ogallala is decorated with upside-down shoes.
48. The small town of Cairo (which the locals call Cay-ro) may not pronounce its name in quite the same way as its Egyptian namesake, but it does have a pyramid-shaped sign, a statue of a camel, and streets named Egypt, Nile, Mecca, Syria, Medina, Nubia, Alexandria and Suez.
49. The city of Friend must live up to its name, at least as far as the crime rate's concerned – its police station, which may be the nation's (or even world's) smallest, is about the size of a garden shed.
50. Nebraska's Sandhills were home to some of the nation's first straw-bale buildings. The first one documented was a schoolhouse built around 1896, but it didn't last too long as it was eaten by cows in 1902.
51. The Pilgrim Holiness Church in Arthur, built in 1928, is the oldest known straw bale church in North America, and one of only three in existence. Its straw is covered by both stucco and plaster, proof that the settlers had, by that point, learned to take precautions against marauding bovines.
Feature Image Source: Flickr user Sarah Korf
