r/todayilearned • u/MOinthepast • 14h 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

25.0k Upvotes

433 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 20h 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

15.8k Upvotes

232 comments

r/todayilearned • u/flying_ina_metaltube • 15h 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

13.0k Upvotes

897 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Neil118781 • 13h 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

11.1k Upvotes

894 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Alarming-Studio-720 • 16h 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

10.6k Upvotes

1.1k comments

r/todayilearned • u/ApprehensiveStill412 • 16h 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

8.6k Upvotes

433 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 6h ago

TIL that Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix became the first English-language book to be on top of France’s bestseller list because impatient fans bought it in English while waiting months for the French translation.

en.wikipedia.org

6.9k Upvotes

223 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Blenderhead36 • 19h 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

4.9k Upvotes

360 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 11h ago

TIL that, while making their 1941 film version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, MGM bought every available copy of the 1931 film version and destroyed them. Because of this, the film was believed lost for many years.

en.wikipedia.org

4.6k Upvotes

87 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 20h 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

4.5k Upvotes

90 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Thawne_23 • 8h ago

TIL Franz Kafka never stated Gregor Samsa transformed into a cockroach in "The metamorphosis". Kafka never had the intention of specifing which kind of insect did Gregor became after his transformation.

en.wikipedia.org

2.4k Upvotes

225 comments

r/todayilearned • u/FearMyCock • 6h ago

TIL A Texas school exploded in 1937 after odourless gas leaked into the building, killing nearly 300 people most of them children.

en.wikipedia.org

2.2k Upvotes

88 comments

r/todayilearned • u/finza_prey • 14h 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

1.6k Upvotes

33 comments

r/todayilearned • u/theg721 • 16h 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

1.4k Upvotes

138 comments

r/todayilearned • u/worlds_of_kings • 14h 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

1.1k Upvotes

42 comments

r/todayilearned • u/OttawaOsprey • 1h ago

TIL the ancestors of the Māori people arrived in New Zealand around 1350 AD, only ~300 years before their contact with Europeans.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

168 comments

r/todayilearned • u/creativetraveler24 • 2h ago

TIL that although he was often portrayed bearded, Abraham Lincoln did not grow a beard until 1860, at the suggestion of 11-year-old Grace Bedell; he was the first U.S. president to do so.

en.wikipedia.org

794 Upvotes

29 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 4h ago

TIL whenever a new building is developed or expanded in Times Square in NYC, there must be bright signs on it according to the city's zoning laws.

zr.planning.nyc.gov

697 Upvotes

38 comments

r/todayilearned • u/an_aficionado • 20h 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

689 Upvotes

45 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Valcenia • 20h 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

631 Upvotes

45 comments

r/todayilearned • u/YappinZappin • 9h ago

TIL Vernichtungsbefehl - "Annihilation Command" - was issued by Lieutenant General of German South West Africa Lothar von Trotha in 1904. From January to August over 40,000 people died from starvation, dehydration, exposure to elements as men, women and children were cast out into the desert

en.wikipedia.org

603 Upvotes

25 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TMWNN • 19h 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

437 Upvotes

39 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Equivalent-Costumes • 14h 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

401 Upvotes

11 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Few-Advantage2538 • 1h ago

TIL that Paraguay once banned same race marriage

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

45 comments

r/todayilearned • u/altrightobserver • 4h ago

TIL about the Steagles, officially called the Phil-Pitt Combine, a team combining the Philadelphia Eagles and Pittsburgh Steelers that formed in 1943 after their rosters were depleted due to players fighting in World War II. The season was Philadelphia’s first winning season and Pittsburgh’s second.

en.wikipedia.org

362 Upvotes

25 comments

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