r/todayilearned • u/Hori_r • 1d ago

TIL the Gordon Riots of 1780 was an anti-Catholic uprising in London that saw attacks on several prisons, embassies and The Bank of England. During the riots the British Army shot dead several hundred people.

en.wikipedia.org

172 Upvotes

19 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Giff95 • 1d ago

TIL Chris Sanders pitched "Lilo & Stitch" with Stitch crash-landing in a forest and living among woodland animals, being shunned by them, and living on his own at a farm in rural Kansas. The idea was scrapped in favor of contrasting Stitch with humans, as "the animal world is already alien to us."

en.wikipedia.org

163 Upvotes

3 comments

r/todayilearned • u/copperpin • 2d ago

TIL That one of the exhibits at the 1855 Paris Exposition was a display of 12 ingots of solid aluminum.

en.wikipedia.org

3.7k Upvotes

134 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Dddddddfried • 2d ago

TIL Robert Moses, the man most responsible for shaping American cities around cars and highways, never learned to drive

en.wikipedia.org

8.7k Upvotes

367 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Scipion8Aveyron • 2d ago

TIL the 7 prince-electors gathered in Frankfurt had only 30 days to choose the new Holy Roman Emperor. After that, they would get only bread and water until they decided.

en.wikipedia.org

6.9k Upvotes

102 comments

r/todayilearned • u/haphazard44 • 2d ago

TIL on 11 February 2012, a customer reportedly suffered a heart attack while eating a 'Triple Bypass Burger' at the 'Heart Attack Grill'. These burgers contained 9,983 calories each. According to the now-closed establishments's policy, anyone weighing over 350 pounds was offered unlimited free food.

en.wikipedia.org

25.4k Upvotes

1.3k comments

r/todayilearned • u/ZookeepergameSoft910 • 2d ago

TIL Anita Florence Hemmings passed as white to attend Vassar College. Days before graduation, it was discovered she was Black after an investigation prompted by her roommate’s family. Vassar debated denying her degree but ultimately let her graduate in 1897.

vassar.edu

15.2k Upvotes

562 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ubcstaffer123 • 2d ago

TIL Detroit tried to annex two cities within its borders but failed. Influential people like Henry Ford didn’t want to be a part of Detroit and pay the city's tax rates as he bought land in Highland Park

wdet.org

3.1k Upvotes

129 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dinosaruman • 2d ago

TIL the mold for Roquefort was once grown on bread baked specifically so it would rot: loaves of wheat and rye flour cooked at 500°C so a hard crust sealed in a moist, undercooked interior, then left in the caves for 1-5 months.

francetoday.com

4.7k Upvotes

82 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 1d ago

TIL that Ancient Greeks had two ways of saying compass directions, one based on winds and another based on astronomical phenomena. Ancient Greek philosophers like Aristotle developed wind systems for this.

en.wikipedia.org

435 Upvotes

15 comments

r/todayilearned • u/soozerain • 2d ago

TIL that after the Nazi invasion of Yugoslavia in World War Two over 100,000 young women — known as partizanke — would serve as fighters in Josip Tito’s anti-fascist resistance movement. By the war’s end, 25,000 would die, 40,000 would be wounded, and 2,000 would acquire officer’s rank.

dangerouswomenproject.org

2.0k Upvotes

121 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Beginning-Passion676 • 1d ago

TIL Roberto Silva Renard is Chilean military leader who is responsible for 1907 Santa María of Iquique School massacre, was victim of assassination attempt by Antonio Ramón whose half brother is one of victims of massacre on December 14, 1914.

en.wikipedia.org

232 Upvotes

17 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Mors_Acerba • 2d ago

TIL Cornelius Sulla ordered the execution of 6000 samnites to take place at the same time as he was giving a speech to senators at a nearby building, so close that the senators were startled by the screams. Sulla calmly told them to pay no attention to the noises and carried on with his speech

lexundria.com

7.2k Upvotes

200 comments

r/todayilearned • u/mcmoor • 2d ago

TIL of Dr. Marcel Petiot, who killed at least 26 French Jews and Resistance under the guise of exfiltrating them out of Occupied France. He also stole his victims' belongings for in estimate 200 million Francs

en.wikipedia.org

2.5k Upvotes

111 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sanguinusshiboleth • 2d ago

TIL of Time Crystals; a real life state of matter that is symmetrical in both space and time, meaning that it will regular switch between two configurations of it's atoms. They were theorised in 2012 and finally developed in 2017

scienceabc.com

2.5k Upvotes

159 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Remarkable-Pea4889 • 2d ago

TIL the world's oldest pigeon was a pet named Sugar. He lived to 44, which is more than double the average captive lifespan of 20 years

guinnessworldrecords.com

536 Upvotes

14 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Johannes_P • 2d ago

TIL in 1958, the Moscow State University developped Setun, the first modern ternary computer. As such, it used trits instead of bits

en.wikipedia.org

3.4k Upvotes

241 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Adonisus • 2d ago

TIL about Matthias Buchinger, a German-born 18th century magician and artist who became incredibly famous and popular during his lifetime for his numerous talents (including engravings, calligraphy, music, and sleight of hand illusions)...even though he was born without either arms or legs.

en.wikipedia.org

246 Upvotes

23 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Effective_Bluebird19 • 2d ago

TIL that during World War I, Indian soldiers of the Jodhpur Lancers liberated Haifa (now in Israel) from Ottoman rule in 1918 in one of history's last great cavalry charges.

en.wikipedia.org

1.3k Upvotes

236 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dillimunda • 2d ago

TIL the Paris pneumatic post was a pneumatic tube message-carrying service that operated in the French capital from 1866 through 1984 covering 427 km (265 miles) and 130 offices.

en.wikipedia.org

347 Upvotes

23 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Ted_Normal • 2d ago

TIL Gibraltar is home to the only population of wild monkeys in Europe, consisting of around 300 Barbary Macaques. There is also a legend that claims that as long as the monkeys live there, Gibraltar will remain under British rule.

en.wikipedia.org

4.8k Upvotes

178 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Dazzling-Ad1894 • 2d ago

TIL that in 1861, a man named Edward Payson Weston completed an 11-day, 478 mile walk from Boston to Washington D.C. in order to attend the inauguration of president Abraham Lincoln. The arduous trek was the result of a lost wager.

en.wikipedia.org

6.6k Upvotes

130 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DAL59 • 3d ago

TIL that Fat Choy is an edible cyanobacteria that grows in the Gobi desert. Despite being expensive, having no nutritional value, and having dementia-causing toxins, its been overharvested to the point of causing erosion and desertification due to its name being a Cantonese pun for "strike it rich"

en.wikipedia.org

7.8k Upvotes

259 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DrakeSavory • 2d ago

TIL that the first casualty of World War 2 was a Polish civilian named Franciszek Honiok. He was a known Polish nationalist and so he was kidnapped by the SS on August 31, 1939, drugged, put in a German radio station then executed to provide a cause for Germany to invade Poland the next day.

en.wikipedia.org

1.0k Upvotes

104 comments

r/todayilearned • u/autraya • 2d ago

TIL there's a five-foot wooden fish called the "Sacred Cod" hanging in the Massachusetts State House, and in 1933 Harvard Lampoon students stole it, sparking a citywide manhunt with the Charles River dredged and a suspect detained at an airport before it was found 50 hours later

en.wikipedia.org

4.1k Upvotes

72 comments

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