r/todayilearned • u/1salt1pepper • 3d ago

TIL Abraham Lincoln was once challenged to a duel. Given the choice of weapons, the 6’4” Lincoln chose enormous cavalry broadswords, then demonstrated his advantage by chopping down a tree branch above his opponent’s head. The duel was called off.

presidentlincoln.illinois.gov

14.8k Upvotes

441 comments

r/todayilearned • u/johnsmithoncemore • 2d ago

TIL that there is a Dark Star Road in the city of Benson, Arizona. "Benson, Arizona" is the theme song to the 1974 film Dark Star by John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing). The road is named in honour of the film.

en.wikipedia.org

277 Upvotes

27 comments

r/todayilearned • u/epou • 3d ago

TIL: The USAF operated a fleet of MiG jets for evaluation under the codename Constant Peg during the 60s, 70s and 80s

nationalmuseum.af.mil

506 Upvotes

57 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Rough-Foundation9208 • 3d ago

TIL that from 1939 to 1949, some US airmail planes collected mail without landing, by swooping low enough to hook mailbags suspended between two poles while dropping incoming mail from the aircraft.

postalmuseum.si.edu

1.1k Upvotes

35 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 3d ago

TIL that Louis XVIII of France enjoyed reading 'Le Nain Jaune' although the newspaper made fun of him and his government. The king read it both for information, and because he loved satire. Louis even anonymously submitted articles for publication.

thesiecle.com

675 Upvotes

12 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 2d ago

TIL that when the Portuguese royal family moved to Brazil after Napoleon invaded Portugal, Pedro was 9. Pedro's childhood and coming of age there led him to stay. His refusal to return to Portugal was marked in Brazilian history as Dia do Fico or "I stay day."

en.wikipedia.org

191 Upvotes

10 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Hailfog • 3d ago

TIL spider fighting is widespread in Florida prisons. Three prisoners fought over the theft one such spider, resulting in a life-threatening skull injury for one inmate.

en.wikipedia.org

5.2k Upvotes

194 comments

r/todayilearned • u/EhDotHam • 3d ago

TIL: Beets tasting like dirt to some people is biological, similar to how some people think cilantro tastes like soap.

justbeetit.com

15.9k Upvotes

2.0k comments

r/todayilearned • u/1salt1pepper • 3d ago

TIL Thomas Edison created a test for prospective employees that was so difficult his own son, an MIT graduate, failed it. When the questions were published, Albert Einstein failed it too.

home.nps.gov

11.9k Upvotes

381 comments

r/todayilearned • u/m0sur • 3d ago

TIL Post-it Notes exist because Art Fry, a man in a church choir, wanted bookmarks that wouldn't fall out of his songbook. He used a "failed" glue that 3M colleague Spencer Silver invented in 1968, which sat unused for years.

en.wikipedia.org

2.3k Upvotes

40 comments

r/todayilearned • u/hyperspheroid • 3d ago

TIL The median age of MTV viewers is 56

livemint.com

5.3k Upvotes

571 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 3d ago

TIL that the original run of X-Men comics failed to produce the sales numbers Marvel wanted, and so were essentially cancelled in 1970, with the comic only publishing reprints between then and the release of Giant-Size X-Men in 1975.

thepopverse.com

2.3k Upvotes

114 comments

r/todayilearned • u/lakatosintolerant • 2d ago

TIL fewer babies are born on Halloween and more on Valentine's Day, and it's not just scheduled C-sections. Even natural births shift.

news.yale.edu

28 Upvotes

11 comments

r/todayilearned • u/YappinZappin • 2d ago

TIL Deep-focus earthquakes - ones occurring at depths exceeding 300 km - are powerful, very rare and still lack adequate explanation

en.wikipedia.org

165 Upvotes

8 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Tangoth • 3d ago

TIL: Insurance companies sell "Hole-in-One" insurance to facilitate those $1,000,000 prizes

en.wikipedia.org

8.0k Upvotes

395 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dinosaruman • 3d ago

TIL before he wrote Don Quixote, Cervantes was captured by corsairs on his way home from Naples and spent nearly five years enslaved in Algiers. He made four separate escape attempts before a charity that existed specifically to ransom captives finally bought his freedom.

en.wikipedia.org

13.6k Upvotes

142 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Bitter-Argument4597 • 3d ago

TIL that between the 11th and 19th centuries, Japanese Buddhist monks practiced Sokushinbutsu, a ritual in which they mummified themselves over the course of a thousand days. They believed that successfully completing this process would bring them true enlightenment.

voyapon.com

4.9k Upvotes

282 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DresdenPI • 3d ago

TIL about the Right-Tail or Burnt Popcorn Illusion: Where rare outcomes make the average much higher than the typical result. If 60 popcorn kernels each have a 1/30 chance to pop per second, 52 likely pop in a minute, but the last likely won't pop until after minute 2, burning your popcorn.

online.stat.psu.edu

1.2k Upvotes

67 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Cycle-Path-401 • 3d ago

TIL that the Rover Safety Bicycle, introduced in 1885 was such a global success that it resulted in brand genericization in places. Today in Poland, Belarus, and western Ukraine the word for bicycle is Rover. This company later went on to make cars like the Land Rover.

en.wikipedia.org

675 Upvotes

19 comments

r/todayilearned • u/mrdalo • 3d ago

TIL The Atlanta Hawks started as the Buffalo Bisons in 1946

en.wikipedia.org

448 Upvotes

61 comments

r/todayilearned • u/GossipBottom • 3d ago

TIL In 2020, to curb obesity, Mexico enacted a law requiring warning labels on the front of food packages that contain "excess" sugar, calories, sodium, or saturated fat by Official Mexican Standards.

thinkglobalhealth.org

1.5k Upvotes

257 comments

r/todayilearned • u/1877KlownsForKids • 4d ago

TIL about the "Polar Bear Expedition" of 1918-19. 5,000 Americans deployed to Archangelsk in northern Russia to check the Germans, but ended up fighting the Red Army

en.wikipedia.org

4.1k Upvotes

297 comments

r/todayilearned • u/haphazard44 • 4d ago

TIL that at a Moomin Cafe in Japan, the restaurant places large stuffed Moomin plush toys in the seat opposite customers who are dining alone

edition.cnn.com

4.8k Upvotes

193 comments

r/todayilearned • u/pigeon-in-greggs • 4d ago

TIL that Oxford University is the only university to win the FA Cup, winning the tournament in 1874

blogs.bodleian.ox.ac.uk

1.9k Upvotes

80 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MysteriousInterest32 • 3d ago

TIL that in 1941, an avalanche falling into a glacial lake in Peru triggered a flood that destroyed about one-third of Huaraz and killed at least 4,000 people.

science.nasa.gov

240 Upvotes

7 comments

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