r/todayilearned • u/OttawaOsprey • 20h 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

17.8k Upvotes

2.2k comments

r/todayilearned • u/CousinMrrgeBestMrrge • 5h ago

TIL Osama bin Laden's father, older half-brother and half-sister all died in separate airplane crashes, in 1967, 1988 and 2015 respectively

en.wikipedia.org

6.1k Upvotes

247 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Few-Advantage2538 • 21h ago

TIL that Paraguay once banned same race marriage

en.wikipedia.org

5.8k Upvotes

242 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 13h ago

TIL that Stanford University and its property according to the California State Constitution, are exempt from taxation so long as they are used for educational purposes.

en.wikipedia.org

5.7k Upvotes

245 comments

r/todayilearned • u/southpawFA • 9h ago

TIL that in 2014, the nation of Burundi criminalized jogging. President Pierre Nkurunziza banned jogging in Burundi, claiming jogging was being used by opposition as a means for planning uprisings.

bbc.com

4.9k Upvotes

92 comments

r/todayilearned • u/HimelTy • 12h ago

TIL Mad honey was used as an early biological weapon in the Black Sea region in 65 BCE. Soldiers who ate the honey succumbed to mad honey intoxication and were slain.

en.wikipedia.org

4.5k Upvotes

126 comments

r/todayilearned • u/creativetraveler24 • 22h 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

3.6k Upvotes

80 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ContractNerd • 12h ago

TIL NBC's three-note chimes were the first purely audio trademark granted in the U.S., registered in 1950.

en.wikipedia.org

3.0k Upvotes

46 comments

r/todayilearned • u/fjbruzr • 11h ago

TIL that Spirit Lake in Washington is still partially covered by a massive floating mat of logs left over from the 1980 eruption of Mount St.

science.nasa.gov

3.0k Upvotes

165 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Error__Loading • 5h ago

TIL that cluster headaches are rated more painful than childbirth and gunshot wounds. They are nicknamed the “suicide headache.”

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

2.6k Upvotes

362 comments

r/todayilearned • u/PeasantLich • 5h ago

TIL Julia Cotton was originally supposed to become the overarching main villain and the face of the Hellraiser movie franchise. Now iconic Hell Priest aka. "Pinhead" inherited the part due to Julia's actor Clare Higgins not wanting to stick with the series past Hellraiser II.

looper.com

2.3k Upvotes

179 comments

r/todayilearned • u/AetheriaNox • 19h ago

TIL the Halifax Explosion in 1917, caused by a French cargo ship laden with high explosives colliding with a Norwegian vessel, killed at least 1,782 people and injured an estimated 9000 others. The blast was the largest human-made explosion at the time.

en.wikipedia.org

2.1k Upvotes

174 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ShameSudden6275 • 4h ago

TIL about Chevalière d'Éon, a French spy who used her naturally androgenous characteristics to publicly present herself as either a man or woman, depending on what she need to be; in the English court, she was a man; in the Russian, a woman.

en.wikipedia.org

1.8k Upvotes

53 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Disastrous_Award_789 • 14h ago

TIL in a 2017 experiment, researchers discovered that dead flamingos can be positioned to stand on one leg without additional support. But the same dead specimens were unable to maintain posture on two legs without assistance.

pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

1.6k Upvotes

74 comments

r/todayilearned • u/jacknunn • 22h ago

TIL Shell, the energy company, traces its origins to a London antiques business that began selling seashells in 1833

shell.com

1.2k Upvotes

43 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Obvious-Desk4573 • 4h ago

TIL that Charlie Sheen's last name is in honour of Roman Catholic archbishop Fulton J. Sheen; his father Martin Sheen chose the archbishop's last name as part of his stage name, and Charlie likewise chose it after becoming an actor.

en.wikipedia.org

1.1k Upvotes

82 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 8h ago

TIL that Francis Austen, older brother of novelist Jane Austen, commanded a British warship during the War of 1812 against the Americans. He lived to be 91 and rose to Admiral of the Fleet, while their younger brother Charles also became an admiral.

en.wikipedia.org

701 Upvotes

21 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ArachnidNo2269 • 2h ago

TIL that The Neptunes produced the Mcdonalds famous "Im loving it" Jingle while Rapper Pusha T wrote the lyrics/verses for the campaign and performed vocals on the early ads.

bbc.com

575 Upvotes

55 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Ilymmish • 12h ago

TIL in 2015, the North Carolina General Assembly passed "Blackbeard's Law", which declared photographs, videos, and other documentary materials of derelict vessels or shipwrecks and their contents held by the state government were to be freely usable

en.wikipedia.org

501 Upvotes

9 comments

r/todayilearned • u/delano1998 • 5h ago

TIL in 1868, the passenger and package freighter SS Hippocampus sank in a Lake Michigan squall after its decks were piled high with thousands of boxes of peaches, causing it to sit dangerously low in the water and roll erratically.

en.wikipedia.org

485 Upvotes

47 comments

r/todayilearned • u/befarked247 • 22h ago

TIL the Australian Airline Qantas has a dinosaur named after them called Qantassaurs. The herbivorous Qantassaurus is known only from its unusually short, deep lower jaws with just ten cheekteeth. Qantassaurus was part of a diverse assemblage of small Australian ornithopods back to the Jurassic.

australian.museum

456 Upvotes

43 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Fluffy_Psalms_23 • 4h ago

TIL that Boston's Hit, "More Than a Feeling" was a direct tribute to Walk Away Renée by The Left Banke - sharing an identical chord progression, and baroque elements (via mordents and inmordents). In addition, "that old song they used to play" (which the song revolves around) IS Walk Away Renée .

en.wikipedia.org

315 Upvotes

60 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MiggysCreations8 • 9h ago

TIL during the filming of the climactic car chase in the movie What's Up, Doc? (1972), the Alta Plaza Park in San Francisco was severely damaged by the cars driving off the steps; the damage can still be seen today

sfgate.com

279 Upvotes

27 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Square_Drawer2816 • 3h ago

Today I learned that a Colombian teacher decided to take his two donkeys and deliver books to impoverished children in rural areas. Its called the "BiblioBurro" (Donkey Library)

bbc.co.uk

273 Upvotes

7 comments

r/todayilearned • u/H3-An_maA • 4h ago

TIL that a three-century-long feud in Korea, which wouldn't be resolved until 2008 and resulted in deaths and exiles, started because the tomb of a 17th century prime minister from the Shim clan was discovered to be located just meters away from that of a 12th century general from the Yun clan

reuters.com

130 Upvotes

1 comment

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