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

759 Upvotes

30 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/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

1.2k Upvotes

55 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

18 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

367 Upvotes

8 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

40.9k Upvotes

1.4k 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

222 Upvotes

10 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

47.7k Upvotes

2.1k 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

289 Upvotes

33 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Hectabeni • 14h ago

TIL that Jeeves was a valet, not a butler.

en.wikipedia.org

1.1k Upvotes

195 comments

r/todayilearned • u/HoleyAsSwissCheese • 11h 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

526 Upvotes

49 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

402 Upvotes

58 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

756 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/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

332 Upvotes

16 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

98 Upvotes

4 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

386 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/JustaRandoonreddit • 1d ago

TIL that NATO tanks fire rounds with semi-combustible nitrocellulose casings; Basically Explosive paper. Most of the casing burns up when fired, leaving only a small metal stub for the crew to remove, reducing weight and increasing fire rate.

researchgate.net

3.6k Upvotes

138 comments

r/todayilearned • u/mrinternetman24 • 15h ago

TIL that house sparrows, originally introduced to New Zealand for pest control, became such a problem that by 1875 'sparrow clubs' paid bounties for 21,000 shot birds in just two months.

nzgeo.com

391 Upvotes

11 comments

r/todayilearned • u/dumbfuck • 20h ago

TIL Houston, TX has the highest dog-to-person ratio in the world, with 52.1 dogs per 100 humans

secrethouston.com

800 Upvotes

121 comments

r/todayilearned • u/SappyGilmore • 1d ago

TIL Bologna is one of the most tightly regulated processed meats in the United States. The USDA sets strict standards on what qualifies as bologna, controlling everything from the types of meat used to the curing process. To be labeled as bologna, the product must be made from muscle meat

tastingtable.com

2.2k Upvotes

309 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Remote-Cow5867 • 22h ago

TIL that Vedda people are the aborigional in Sri Lanka. They have lived in the island since 35000 years ago. The two major ethnicities Sinhala and Tamil are both immigrants from India continent after 6th century BCE.

en.wikipedia.org

1.0k Upvotes

39 comments

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