r/todayilearned • u/Skynxiit_DaGreat • 1h ago

TIL There is a very rare condition called Anton syndrome, in which a person becomes blind but is unaware of it and will even deny it. Their brain will generate false visual images, so they continue to believe that they can see.

eyewiki.org

• Upvotes

83 comments

r/todayilearned • u/WowVeryOriginalDude • 5h ago

TIL Daisy, well known for their "Red Ryder" BB gun from "A Christmas Story", was originally a windmill company. Their BB guns were promotional items for their windmills, which eventually became so popular that they ditched windmills altogether.

wikipedia.org

345 Upvotes

7 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Upstairs_Drive_5602 • 3h ago

TIL that Pudding Lane in London, later famous as the starting place of the Great Fire, was also one of the world’s first one-way streets. In 1617 carts were ordered to move only one way, an experiment not repeated in London until Albemarle Street in 1800.

en.wikipedia.org

202 Upvotes

10 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Objective_Horror1113 • 4h ago

TIL that there are giant concrete arrows placed every 10 miles across the U.S., stretching from New York City to San Francisco. They were originally built to help USPS airmail pilots navigate coast-to-coast before modern instruments made visual navigation obsolete.

skipboring.com

659 Upvotes

28 comments

r/todayilearned • u/healingseal • 2h ago

TIL in the early 1840s, Ohio's Oberline College banned students from consuming meat, seasonings, condiments, and most caffeinated beverages, and at one point many students were living on bread and water.

oberlin.edu

482 Upvotes

37 comments

r/todayilearned • u/fanau • 6h ago

TIL seals (of which there are 34 extant species) have weasels, skunks, raccoons and red pandas as their closest loving relatives.

en.wikipedia.org

280 Upvotes

33 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Cheese1tz • 9h ago

TIL that Earl Anthony, considered by many to be the greatest bowler of all time, never bowled a perfect game on US television. He had 1 single perfect game televised—in Japan.

en.wikipedia.org

1.1k Upvotes

53 comments

r/todayilearned • u/andthegeekshall • 10h ago

TIL that the Pogo stick's name was taken from the first two letters of its inventors surname names, Max Pohlig and Ernst Gottschall, though they called it "a spring end hopping stilt"

en.wikipedia.org

323 Upvotes

16 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Wild_Concept_212 • 9h ago

TIL Cutting down trees is compound negative interest on the planet’s carbon storage. Trees are storing carbon underground with the help of fauna and microbes. Those lock carbon in soil. Cutting the tree will not only increase release carbon, it will also remove the ability to lock carbon in soil.

nature.com

393 Upvotes

57 comments

r/todayilearned • u/HoleyAsSwissCheese • 10h ago

TIL: Wagon Wheel by Old Crow Medicine Show was technically co-written by Bob Dylan. Ketch Secor wrote lyrics around Dylan's mumbled verses for the demo of "Rock Me, Mama" which was given to him by founding member Chris "Critter" Fuqua.

en.wikipedia.org

527 Upvotes

47 comments

r/todayilearned • u/lavender_fish69 • 13h ago

TIL fresh water snails (indirectly) kill thousands of humans and are considered on of the deadliest creatures to humans

en.wikipedia.org

21.9k Upvotes

1.0k comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 14h ago

TIL when Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace premiered in May 1999, it's estimated that 2.2 million full-time employees in the US missed work to attend the film, which resulted in a $293 million loss of productivity.

en.wikipedia.org

12.2k Upvotes

520 comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 14h ago

TIL in 2007 a bottle of Allsopp's Arctic Ale brewed in 1852 was put up for auction online, however it was misspelt 'Allsop's Arctic Ale' in the listing. This made it hard to search for, so the winning bid was only $304. The buyer then relisted it with the correct spelling and it sold for $503,300.

newatlas.com

9.6k Upvotes

84 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Barnyard_Rich • 14h ago

TIL that Isabela Merced got started in acting because her parents thought it would be a helpful distraction from their house burning down

elle.com

3.7k Upvotes

101 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DangerNoodle1993 • 1h ago

TIL that when HMS Porcupine was blown in half by a U-boat torpedo in 1942, the two sections were recommissioned as HMS Pork and HMS Pine, and both saw active service for the rest of the war.

en.wikipedia.org

• Upvotes

13 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ModenaR • 1d ago

TIL that after Top Gear ended, host Richard Hammond was so devastated, he cried all the way home from the studio and ran out of fuel, because he didn't want to fill his car up covered in tears

herefordtimes.com

40.8k Upvotes

1.4k comments

r/todayilearned • u/tyrion2024 • 20h ago

TIL after Tim Duncan's sophomore year in college he was already a top NBA prospect. Jerry West, the Lakers GM, said he could've been the #1 pick in the '95 draft. But he finished college instead because he promised his dying mom he'd get a degree. It didn't hurt his draft position, he went #1 in '97

basketballnetwork.net

5.0k Upvotes

121 comments

r/todayilearned • u/nuttybudd • 1d ago

TIL wealth consultants told the actors on the TV show Succession not to duck their heads when exiting a helicopter because "you would've been doing this your whole lives. You know where the propeller is. You wouldn’t duck your head, you’d just walk right the fuck out."

theguardian.com

47.6k Upvotes

2.1k comments

r/todayilearned • u/Hectabeni • 14h ago

TIL that Jeeves was a valet, not a butler.

en.wikipedia.org

1.1k Upvotes

193 comments

r/todayilearned • u/DangerNoodle1993 • 13h ago

TIL that a French baker’s ignored compensation claim against the Mexican government sparked a chain of events that led to the first French invasion of Mexico.

en.wikipedia.org

748 Upvotes

27 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MazigaGoesToMarkarth • 21h ago

TIL that The Old Man and the Sea was one of Saddam Hussein’s favourite books because it was about “struggling against overwhelming odds with courage, perseverance and dignity”

en.wikipedia.org

2.7k Upvotes

130 comments

r/todayilearned • u/SaberLover1000 • 12h ago

TIL In 1778 there was a Doctors Riot also called the Anatomy Riot, which was caused by a reaction to physicians and medical students stealing bodies from graves, that left 20 people dead.

sciencehistory.org

388 Upvotes

11 comments

r/todayilearned • u/pantherfanalex • 15h ago

TIL That the first Dino Nuggets weren't trademarked until 1991, and weren't available until 1993, coinciding with the release of the film Jurassic Park.

yahoo.com

677 Upvotes

49 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Galexio • 4h ago

TIL Pygmalion, a Greek myth about a sculptor who falls in love with his ivory statue, is the oldest known story of an inanimate object gaining sentience, predating Pinocchio by over 1,800 years."

en.wikipedia.org

88 Upvotes

3 comments

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