... that in 1870 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels were planning to travel on a train that plunged into an inlet in Scotland when the bridge under it collapsed, taking 75 on board to their watery graves? Luckily for them, Marx and Engels had changed their plans, deciding instead to spend the night at a friend's place in Edinburgh.
... that in 1925 Sigmund Freud was offered $100,000 by Hollywood film producer Samuel Goldwyn to collaborate on a love film about Anthony and Cleopatra, but Freud declined?
... that at age 15 Albert Einstein decided to educate himself, but a year later he failed the history and language sections of the entrance exams for admittance to the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology? Of course, Einstein was always good at math and science. (Sources: notsosoft.com/blog; Sigmund Freud Museum, Vienna; American Museum of Natural History.)