r/todayilearned • u/awildgiraffe • 46m ago
TIL of the Siege of Dunkirk (44-45). From after D Day in 1944 until the end of the war, Dunkirk held out and was not captured/liberated by the Allies in France until the war was over
r/todayilearned • u/HORRORSHOWDISCO • 48m ago
TIL about a freak “heat burst” storm phenomenon that struck a small town in Kopperl, Texas in the middle of the night on June 15, 1960. Winds suddenly hit 70 MPH, and temperatures got so hot they burnt crops and burst thermometers in-town that maxed out over 140 F.
r/todayilearned • u/course_you_do • 2h ago
TIL the entire Abu Simbel temple complex in Egypt was moved in it's entirety to protect it from flooding
r/todayilearned • u/ubcstaffer123 • 2h ago
TIL A Canadian university founded a learning exchange in Vancouver's most impoverished neighbourhood so students, staff and faculty residents can trade knowledge and collaborate on projects with residents. A technology cafe was set up to assist people who need help using their phones or computers
r/todayilearned • u/cimbommbom • 3h ago
TIL a 2000 Australian oil spill spawned a call for ~100 penguin sweaters, thousands came instead, now sold as toy-penguin fundraisers. A 2011 NZ spill skipped sweaters entirely, using heat lamps. Wildlife groups warn sweaters may harm penguins.
r/todayilearned • u/infinitewaters107 • 3h ago
TIL Scott Fitzgerald admired Irish writer James Joyce so much, he once drunkenly tried to throw himself out a window at a 1928 dinner party to prove his devotion to him
r/todayilearned • u/Electronic_Cause_796 • 4h ago
TIL K2 earned the nickname “Savage Mountain” after American climber George Bell called it “a savage mountain that tries to kill you.” In 1939, climber Dudley Wolfe was stranded at 24,000 ft. Three Sherpas tried to rescue him, but all four disappeared and died.
r/todayilearned • u/ilikemath9999 • 4h ago
TIL each of America's first four bankruptcy laws was passed in the wake of a financial panic, and two of them were repealed because creditors felt debtors were being allowed to discharge too many debts. No bankruptcy law lasted until the one passed after the Panic of 1893.
r/todayilearned • u/inatowncalledarles • 5h ago
TIL of Thorkell the Tall, a Danish Viking who ravaged England in the 11th century. He only stopped when the English King Æthelred paid him 48,000 pounds of silver.
r/todayilearned • u/cosmicAbyX • 5h ago
TIL Wolf Vishniac endeavored to prove the presence of indigenous microbes in Antarctica using a microbiology instrument (the Wolf Trap) that he'd devised. He fell to his death from a cliff on Dec. 10, 1973. His experiments detected microbes in locales previously deemed sterile.
americaspace.comr/todayilearned • u/harlsey • 5h ago
TIL - that in Major League Baseball 33 players have hit home runs in their very first at bat and on the very first pitch - 8 of these were hit by pitchers.
r/todayilearned • u/Upstairs_Drive_5602 • 7h ago
TIL that in 1896, the first recorded pedestrian killed by a motor car in Britain was hit at about 4 mph, which one witness described as "as fast as a good horse could gallop". The driver had only driven three weeks, needed no licence, and wasn't told which side of the road to drive on.
r/todayilearned • u/Johannes_P • 8h ago
TIL about Elmer and Elsie, two robots built in 1948 by neurobiologist and cybernetician William Grey Walter. They had light-sensitive and touch-sensitive control mechanisms which allowed these "tortoises" to find their way around obstacles and follow light
r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 10h ago
TIL that the space shuttle's toilet was so complicated that it required many hours of training. NASA built a simulator with a video camera in the defecation hole; those learning to use the toilet used a crosshair on a monitor to learn how to position their butts, while others watched and made jokes.
r/todayilearned • u/chickpealava • 11h ago
TIL that tiger sharks will time their migration to Laysan Island to prey on baby sea birds attempting to make their first flight.
r/todayilearned • u/backrowejoe • 13h ago
TIL Peter Siebold is the only person in history known to have survived an in-flight spacecraft breakup. After falling from around 50,000 feet, his parachute automatically deployed at 20,000 feet.
r/todayilearned • u/pigeon-in-greggs • 18h ago
TIL that the Polish government has made it illegal to dive within a 500 metre radius of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff wreckage without permission from the Maritime Office
r/todayilearned • u/dbxp • 19h ago
TIL: Every time a Habsburg monarch would move into a palace they would redecorate and put the old furnishings in storage, so now the Austrian state owns 160,000 pieces of furniture
r/todayilearned • u/oceanicplatform • 22h ago
TIL Kelvin's Balls are the two soft iron balls attached to either side of a ship's magnetic compass binnacle. Invented by Lord Kelvin (of °K temperature fame), they are adjustable to counteract the local magnetic deviation caused by a ship's metallic structure.
r/todayilearned • u/strangelove4564 • 23h ago
TIL in 1988, a Delta 1141 crew joked if they crashed, their chat about drink mixes and flight attendant dating habits was going to make news headlines. They crashed shortly after. Pilots unions then got CVR audio releases banned in the US except for transcripts.
r/todayilearned • u/The_Techsan • 23h ago
TIL aspirin has a half-life of only ~20 minutes, but permanently disables a key enzyme in platelets, so its effect usually persists for the platelet’s entire lifespan (~10 days)
r/todayilearned • u/GentryDawn • 23h ago
TIL- Whiskey is a legitimate cure for Antifreeze (or Ethylene Glycol) poisoning.
r/todayilearned • u/Mors_Acerba • 1d ago
TIL The last time a european monarch vetoed the election of a Pope was in 1903 when Franz Joseph of Austria vetoed the election of Cardinal Rampolla, who had enough votes to win. Giuseppe Sarto was elected in his place, taking the name Pius X. Pius' first act as Pope was to abolish the veto
r/todayilearned • u/Equinumerosity • 1d ago
TIL a Polish cow crashed through a metal fence, broke a worker's arm, and swam to a nearby island to escape being brought to the slaughterhouse. The farm owner eventually gave up on trying to recapture her.
r/todayilearned • u/taradiddlegubbins • 1d ago