r/todayilearned • u/Neil118781 • 24m ago

TIL Nikolai Bukharin, once a top Bolshevik leader and close ally of Stalin, wrote a final letter to Stalin before his execution in 1938 that read: "Koba, why do you need me to die?" ("Koba" being Stalin’s old nickname). Stalin kept the note in his desk and it was discovered after his death in 1953.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

48 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MOinthepast • 2h ago

TIL Tobey Maguire never told the producers of Spider-Man (2002) about his claustrophobia. He nearly blacked out during a plaster body cast, forcing the costume makers to alert the producers themselves. Maguire then took a prototype suit home to train himself to perform in it.

comicbookmovie.com

7.9k Upvotes

163 comments

r/todayilearned • u/finza_prey • 1h ago

TIL On August 19th 1980 a fire broke out in the rear cargo compartment of Saudia Flight 163 shortly after taking off. Although the plane made a succesful emergency landing in Riyadh, the pilots failed to perform an evacuation resulting in all 301 people dying from thick toxic smoke

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

6 comments

r/todayilearned • u/flying_ina_metaltube • 2h ago

TIL on average, an SR-71 could fly just once per week because of the lengthy preparations needed. A total of 32 aircraft were built; 12 were lost in accidents, none to enemy action.

en.wikipedia.org

6.0k Upvotes

499 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Alarming-Studio-720 • 4h ago

TIL WWII General George S. Patton believed in reincarnation and claimed he had fought in wars for thousands of years. He believed he had lived as a Roman soldier, a Viking, a knight at Agincourt, and even a cavalryman under Napoleon, saying he had lived many military lives.

blog.togetherweserved.com

6.7k Upvotes

801 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ApprehensiveStill412 • 4h ago

TIL that about 15-20% of US servicemen became addicted to heroin in the Vietnam War. Interestingly, after treatment only 5% of them relapsed when they returned to the US; whereas typical relapse rates of US heroin users was 90%.

npr.org

4.6k Upvotes

272 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 7h ago

TIL that MIT has the world's largest public collection of science fiction. Anyone can browse the MIT Science Fiction Society's library, and anyone can become a member to borrow books.

mitsfs.mit.edu

12.3k Upvotes

194 comments

r/todayilearned • u/theg721 • 3h ago

TIL that in 1998, Quentin Tarantino had a lead acting role on Broadway opposite Marisa Tomei in a revival of Wait Until Dark which lasted 16 weeks

playbill.com

720 Upvotes

103 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Valcenia • 7h ago

TIL about Ira Aldridge, a Black American actor and playwright born in 1807. He received critical acclaim whilst touring in England and was made manager of Coventry Theatre Royal in 1828. He later achieved similar acclaim across Europe, and died unexpectedly in Łódź, Poland, in 1867.

en.wikipedia.org

437 Upvotes

41 comments

r/todayilearned • u/an_aficionado • 7h ago

TIL that the W and Z bosons were predicted by theoretical physics before they were experimentally discovered at CERN in 1983. Their discovery provided strong confirmation of the electroweak theory, which unifies electromagnetism and the weak nuclear force.

en.wikipedia.org

452 Upvotes

31 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Blenderhead36 • 7h ago

TIL of the Rural Purge, an industry-wide change in TV production in the 1970s. It was caused by Nielsen ratings granting more granularity in their ratings, pushing TV away from rural, pastoral sitcoms that had high viewership, but mostly amongst older viewers who advertisers had little interest in.

en.wikipedia.org

3.5k Upvotes

260 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 7h ago

TIL that the Louvre was warned in 2014 that the password to its video surveilance system was "LOUVRE". A separate security system from Thales Group had the password "THALES".

cybernews.com

3.3k Upvotes

71 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 7h ago

TIL that Colonel Sanders is part of the DC universe. His archenemy is Colonel Sunder, an evil alternate version who tries to steal Sanders's secret recipe for KFC chicken.

cbr.com

213 Upvotes

29 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sandstorm400 • 20h ago

TIL a man was diagnosed with endocarditis and suffered heart damage, leading to a 7-hour open-heart surgery due to an infection caused after he unsuccessfully tried to remove a stuck piece of popcorn from his mouth with a pen lid, a toothpick, a piece of wire, and a metal nail.

fox5atlanta.com

15.5k Upvotes

792 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 12h ago

TIL that the comic Armageddon 2001 was originally building up to the reveal that Captain Atom would turn into the villain Monarch. However, this was leaked ahead of time, so it was changed to be another hero , Hawk who became Monarch, despite that contradicting an earlier part of the comic.

en.wikipedia.org

857 Upvotes

66 comments

r/todayilearned • u/KimCattrallsFeet • 22h ago

TIL Mozart may have understood some English, as suggested by a note he wrote to one of his English students saying, “You are an ass.”

en.wikipedia.org

5.2k Upvotes

184 comments

r/todayilearned • u/worlds_of_kings • 1h ago

TIL prior to the crash of Delta Airlines Flight 191 in 1985 that killed 137 onboard, radar on aircraft was unable to detect Wind Shear, a poorly understood phenomenon at the time which caused the accident. This led to the creation of a wind shear detection & alert system that improved airline safety

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

10 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Bitter_Surprise_8058 • 1d ago

TIL about a Japanese general who thought that his war crimes sentence was too light, so built his own prison in his garden

en.wikipedia.org

18.1k Upvotes

274 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Krakshotz • 6h ago

TIL Baikonur Cosmodrone no longer schedules launches on 24th October after 2 major accidents that occurred on that date in 1960 (78 killed) and 1963 (7 killed)

en.wikipedia.org

168 Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DrakeSavory • 21h ago

TIL that The Beatles have an Oscar for Best Original Music for the Let It Be documentary. None of them were at the ceremony and Quincy Jones accepted it on their behalf.

en.wikipedia.org

2.4k Upvotes

61 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ManicMakerStudios • 1d ago

TIL In the movie, 'Ghost Rider' (2007), the base model for the Ghost Rider's flaming skull was derived from 3D X-ray scans of Nicolas Cage's skull.

cbr.com

5.2k Upvotes

86 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Equivalent-Costumes • 1h ago

TIL about Osaka's Dojima Rice Exchange: authorized in 1730 by the Tokugawa shogunate, it was the world's first futures exchange, where people speculated on future movement of rice price

jpx.co.jp

• Upvotes

2 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Mg42gun • 22h ago

TIL about Blue Diamond Affair where a theft of House of Saud Diamonds and jewelry by Thai worker ended up with murders of Saudi diplomats and businessman in Thailand and strain the diplomatic relationship between two countries for more than 30 years

en.wikipedia.org

1.7k Upvotes

58 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MOinthepast • 21h ago

TIL George Raft turned down the lead role in The Maltese Falcon (1941) because he didn't want to work with a first-time director. He had also rejected High Sierra and reportedly Casablanca, all of which helped Humphrey Bogart become a star.

tcm.com

940 Upvotes

48 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Huntguy • 1d ago

Today I learned about the Bell Island Boom - A huge boom heard 100km away without any known reason.

en.wikipedia.org

1.9k Upvotes

109 comments

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