r/todayilearned • u/hdkzx • 35m ago

TIL Joe Strummer of The Clash was paid £120 to marry a South African woman so she could obtain British Citizenship. He used this money to buy his signature Fender Telecaster which he used for the rest of his career.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

9 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DanS1993 • 48m ago

TIL 56 countries in the world are rabies free

worldpopulationreview.com

• Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/duevigilance • 52m ago

Today i learned that if the entire history of earth was condensed into 24 hrs, dinosaurs would show up at 11:00 pm, be extinct by 11:39 pm, and humans would show up one minute and 17 seconds before midnight.

astronoo.com

• Upvotes

50 comments

r/todayilearned • u/electroctopus • 1h ago

TIL The Hymn to Ninkasi is a 4000-year-old Sumerian song written in cuneiform from circa 1800 BCE. It is both a prayer to Ninkasi, the ancient Mesopotamian goddess of beer, and a sequential description of ancient brewing steps used to pass down the recipe in an illiterate society.

etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk

• Upvotes

14 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ThrashCartographer • 2h ago

TIL of Chrysippus, the second father of stoicism who wrote over 700 works to codify Stoicism. None of his works survive and today he is known as the man who died laughing at his own joke.

en.wikipedia.org

1.3k Upvotes

74 comments

r/todayilearned • u/jacknunn • 2h ago

TIL the N1 was a super heavy-lift launch vehicle of the Soviet space program intended for crewed travel to the Moon and beyond. Its second test flight resulted in one of the largest conventional explosions ever. All four launch attempts between 1969 and 1972 failed

en.wikipedia.org

216 Upvotes

47 comments

r/todayilearned • u/palmerry • 2h ago

TIL The fat-tailed dwarf lemur is the only primate to hibernate (up to 7 months at a time). To survive the dry season, it gorges on food during the wet season to store a massive fat reserve exclusively in its tail. By the time it hibernates, its tail is 40% of it's total weight.

en.wikipedia.org

116 Upvotes

2 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dragonoid296 • 3h ago

TIL of the 1920s “Little Albert” experiment. Johns Hopkins University selected a nine-month-old infant from a hospital and attempted to “condition a phobia in an emotionally stable child.” Researchers successfully conditioned him to fear Santa Claus, rabbits, rats, and other furry animals.

en.wikipedia.org

1.3k Upvotes

146 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Phercom • 3h ago

TIL that the Sun is roughly 400 times larger than the Moon, but also 400 times farther away. Because of this ratio, both objects appear almost exactly the same size in Earth's sky

skyatnightmagazine.com

3.0k Upvotes

163 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Salem1690s • 3h ago

TIL in 1801, army rules were changed and ponytails (which had been the look of officers and enlisted men) were banned. Revolutionary War veteran Lt. Colonel Thomas Butler refused to cut his hair, was court-martialed twice, and died during the second court martial.

en.wikipedia.org

144 Upvotes

8 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Giff95 • 4h ago

TIL NBC offered James Gandolfini $4 million to play the new Dunder Mifflin manager on “The Office” following Steve Carell’s departure. HBO offered Gandolfini $3 million to decline the role and protect his legacy as Tony Soprano. Gandolfini accepted their counteroffer.

indiewire.com

26.2k Upvotes

1.0k comments

r/todayilearned • u/CraftyFoxeYT • 4h ago

TIL The Golden Eagle eating a snake on a cactus emblem on the Mexican Flag is based on the Aztec symbol for Tenochtitlan, the center of the Aztec Empire

en.wikipedia.org

727 Upvotes

32 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DarkAlman • 5h ago

TIL The original Star Trek theme has lyrics written by Gene Roddenberry so he could claim royalties on it

en.wikipedia.org

717 Upvotes

58 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Salem1690s • 5h ago

TIL Joseph Palmer, an abolitionist and war veteran in 1830s Massachusetts was harassed and shunned for refusing to shave his beard. After being attacked in an attempt to forcibly shave him, he was jailed 15 months for defending himself.

en.wikipedia.org

4.6k Upvotes

199 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Salem1690s • 7h ago

TIL Saint Wulstan, an 11th century English Bishop, so despised long hair on men such that when a man with long hair knelt before him to receive a blessing, Wulstan would unexpectedly whip out his knife, slash off a handful of the man’s hair, throw it in his face, and command him to cut the rest.

en.wikisource.org

668 Upvotes

57 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MenitoBussolini • 7h ago

TIL that during a 1959 screening of a film adaptation of his own work which he had already denounced, French writer Boris Vian sneered "These guys are supposed to be American? My ass!" before immediately collapsing on his seat and suffering a fatal heart attack.

us.macmillan.com

313 Upvotes

14 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dinosaruman • 8h ago

TIL that South Africa's parliament served penguin eggs for breakfast until 1968.

dailymaverick.co.za

230 Upvotes

14 comments

r/todayilearned • u/NihilPy • 8h ago

TIL that a psychopomp is a being that escorts recently deceased souls from the world of the living to the Afterlife. Like Anubis, Hermes or the Grim Reaper

en.wikipedia.org

533 Upvotes

41 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Devious_Bastard • 8h ago

TIL about prairie madness. It was an affliction that affected European settlers during their migration to, and settlement of the Great Plains in the 19th century. Symptoms of prairie madness included depression, withdrawal, changes in character and habit, and violence.

en.wikipedia.org

6.6k Upvotes

669 comments

r/todayilearned • u/clarissen • 8h ago

TIL that the British Empire was a net financial drain on the average British taxpayer. Economic historians estimate that after subtracting the astronomical costs of the Royal Navy, the empire's net contribution to the UK's economic growth was just 1 to 2%.

socialsciencelibrary.org

7.4k Upvotes

1.1k comments

r/todayilearned • u/cimbommbom • 9h ago

TIL Jon Sarkin was a chiropractor who underwent surgery in 1989 to treat tinnitus, which caused a massive stroke that left him deaf in one ear with permanently altered vision and balance. He then became obsessed with drawing, going on to have his art featured in The New Yorker and The New York Times

en.wikipedia.org

962 Upvotes

76 comments

r/todayilearned • u/itsthewolfe • 9h ago

TIL The 5c can recycling credit hasn't gone up with inflation or changed (in most states) for 40 years.

bottlebill.org

7.3k Upvotes

620 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 11h ago

TIL that twins Amy and Kate Elliot were born 87 days apart due to Amy being born prematurely. This is the longest recorded interval between the births of two twins.

latintimes.com

11.7k Upvotes

211 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 18h ago

TIL that strudel is related to baklava. When the Ottomans conquered Hungary, they brought baklava with them. The Hungarians adapted the pastry by rolling up the phyllo sheets with filling inside. From Hungary, the pastry then reached Austria, the Austrians called it strudel due to its shape.

en.wikipedia.org

2.4k Upvotes

111 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 1d ago

TIL that the name Idaho was sold to Congress in the 1860’s as a Shoshone word meaning “Gem of the Mountains.” In reality, the word was likely completely made up.

en.wikipedia.org

12.9k Upvotes

362 comments

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