History
Discover facts about history. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
History
Putrajaya's roundabout is 3.5 kilometers around
The city of Putrajaya features a roundabout so ridiculously massive that navigating it feels like going on a brief road trip. If you miss your exit, you are…
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The kimono began as everyday clothing
While viewed today as an incredibly formal piece of clothing, the kimono essentially started as a generic, baseline robe for everyday folk. The name itself…
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Lesotho is entirely swallowed by the South African border
Lesotho is a completely independent nation that is geographically trapped entirely within the borders of South Africa. It is the ultimate enclave, completely…
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The cricket pitch built on a mountain
Built in the 1890s, the Chail Cricket Ground sits at an absurd altitude of 2,444 meters. They leveled an entire hilltop just to hit a ball around, creating a…
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Miniature souvenir buildings started as paper weights
Collecting heavy metal replicas of famous structures began entirely as a desk accessory. Before email, people had so many loose memos flying around that iron…
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The mountain farther from Earth's center than Everest
Because the Earth bulges at the equator, the peak of Mount Chimborazo is physically further from the center of the planet than Everest. It casually steals the…
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Abu Dhabi skyscraper intentionally leans at 18 degrees
While other famous towers get all the credit for an accidental tilt, the Capital Gate building leans four times further entirely on purpose. Architects…
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Buenos Aires has an avenue 140 meters wide
The 9 de Julio Avenue is so ridiculously wide that crossing it as a pedestrian is essentially a multi-stage athletic event. City planners demolished entire…
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Mitsubishi started with three steamships
Long before they were slapping their logo on cars and electronics, Mitsubishi started in 1870 as a ruthless shipping company. They essentially conquered the…
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Japanese carpenters built without nails or screws
In historical wood architecture, carpenters utilized insanely complex interlocking joints instead of metal fasteners. They essentially treated massive…
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Pressed pennies debuted at the 1893 exposition
Mutilating federal currency for fun is a surprisingly old tradition. The first mechanical coin squisher was unveiled at a Chicago fair, allowing visitors to…
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Mount Thor ends in Earth's biggest vertical drop
Boasting the greatest purely vertical drop on Earth, Mount Thor plunges straight down for over a kilometer. It is basically a sheer cliff face that laughs in…
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First indoor ice hockey game occurred in a tight rink
The first organized indoor game took place in Montreal in 1875, and they had to use a flat wooden block instead of a ball just to keep it from flying into the…
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The stadium built for 150,000 spectators
The Rungrado 1st of May Stadium is the largest capacity stadium in the world. It is built to hold a completely absurd number of spectators, ensuring that any…
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Japan's first pro baseball team formed for a challenge
The first professional baseball team in Japan wasn't formed for domestic entertainment, but purely to challenge a visiting foreign squad. They aggressively…
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Pressed pennies require immense mechanical pressure
Turning a common coin into a branded oval is a violently impressive feat of engineering. The crank machines you find at rest stops apply thousands of pounds…
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How Brasília was built in just 41 months
Instead of letting a city develop over centuries, Brasília was slapped together in a frenzied 41-month sprint. They carved an entire functional capital out of…
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Yonge street in Canada stretches to ridiculous lengths
Once considered the longest street in the world, Yonge Street runs endlessly from the shores of Lake Ontario deep into the wilderness. It is a pavement…
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Taekwondo was strictly standardized to unify martial arts
In the 1950s, South Korea decided they had too many competing martial arts styles and forced them all into one highly regulated system. Taekwondo was born out…
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Japan discovered thousands of islands it had missed
In a display of impressive administrative oversight, a recent mapping update revealed that Japan actually has double the amount of islands they originally…
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The CN Tower began as a railway rivalry
The CN Tower in Toronto wasn't born out of a desperate need for a broadcasting antenna, but rather a railway company wanting to prove the superiority of their…
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Kia began its massive empire by making steel tubing
Before pumping out millions of modern vehicles, Kia was established in 1944 to manufacture simple steel tubes and bicycle parts. They literally went from…
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Indonesian company produces 19 billion noodle packs yearly
Indomie doesn't just make instant noodles; they aggressively dominate the global supply. They churn out billions of packets annually, effectively sustaining a…
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The hockey game that lasted more than ten days
In an incredible display of stubborn endurance, a charity match in Alberta kept the puck moving for over ten consecutive days. Players basically lived on the…
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