History
Discover facts about history. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
History
Johnny Carson's shortage joke helped fuel a run on toilet paper in 1973.
Johnny Carson's shortage joke helped fuel a run on toilet paper in 1973. It amplified existing reports of supply concerns, and shoppers responded by buying…
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Greenland's inviting name was part of Erik the Red's pitch.
Greenland's inviting name was part of Erik the Red's pitch. According to the sagas, Erik chose a favorable name to encourage settlement. Norse settlers did…
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Roosevelt gave his speech after being shot on the way to it.
Roosevelt gave his speech after being shot on the way to it. In Milwaukee in 1912, a bullet passed through his folded speech and spectacle case before…
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A medieval village legend tells of two green children.
A medieval village legend tells of two green children. Chroniclers recorded a boy and girl appearing near Woolpit with unfamiliar speech, greenish skin and a…
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A liquid can look brittle while taking years to form a drop.
A liquid can look brittle while taking years to form a drop. The University of Queensland's pitch experiment began in 1927 to show that a material hard enough…
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A chronicler gave Basil II a terrifying victory story.
A chronicler gave Basil II a terrifying victory story. John Skylitzes described the Byzantine emperor having thousands of Bulgarian prisoners blinded after…
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A spy made twenty-seven imaginary agents useful to the Allies.
A spy made twenty-seven imaginary agents useful to the Allies. Juan Pujol, codenamed GARBO, built a fictional intelligence network that German handlers…
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Shin-kicking has rules about how to kick a shin.
Shin-kicking has rules about how to kick a shin. At England's Cotswold Olimpick Games, opponents grip each other's upper clothing and try to knock each other…
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Edgar Allan Poe deliberately broke West Point’s rules to get himself expelled.
Edgar Allan Poe deliberately broke West Point’s rules to get himself expelled. After serving in the Army under the name Edgar A. Perry, he entered the academy…
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A Toronto lawyer’s 1926 will turned an inheritance into a ten-year childbirth contest.
A Toronto lawyer’s 1926 will turned an inheritance into a ten-year childbirth contest. Charles Vance Millar left the residue of his estate to the local woman…
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Tsutomu Yamaguchi holds the incredibly dark historical distinction of officially surviving both atomic bombings in Japan during World War II, basically making him the unluckiest lucky man alive.
Tsutomu Yamaguchi holds the incredibly dark historical distinction of officially surviving both atomic bombings in Japan during World War II, basically making…
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Polish spy Krystyna Skarbek managed to casually escape execution by the German Gestapo during World War II by deliberately biting her own tongue until it bled profusely and…
Polish spy Krystyna Skarbek managed to casually escape execution by the German Gestapo during World War II by deliberately biting her own tongue until it bled…
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Inventor Thomas Edison is widely credited with making the word 'hello' the standard telephone greeting, winning a weird linguistic turf war against Alexander Graham Bell.
Inventor Thomas Edison is widely credited with making the word 'hello' the standard telephone greeting, winning a weird linguistic turf war against Alexander…
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Berlin Zoo became a casualty of the bombing war.
Berlin Zoo became a casualty of the bombing war. Air raids in 1943 devastated the zoo, killing animals and wrecking enclosures. A place built to display…
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New York tried to make businesses stop women from smoking in 1908.
New York tried to make businesses stop women from smoking in 1908. The Sullivan ordinance targeted proprietors who allowed women to smoke in public…
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British and German soldiers temporarily paused the horrifying carnage of World War I to celebrate Christmas together in 1914, singing carols and exchanging small gifts in the frozen mud of no man's land.
British and German soldiers temporarily paused the horrifying carnage of World War I to celebrate Christmas together in 1914, singing carols and exchanging…
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China's palace servants could become political gatekeepers.
China's palace servants could become political gatekeepers. Eunuchs worked close to emperors and the imperial household, putting some in a position to control…
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Belladonna's beauty history is also a history of pupil-dilating drugs.
Belladonna's beauty history is also a history of pupil-dilating drugs. Historical accounts connect the plant with attempts to make eyes look larger by…
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Britain gave a dead spy a fake love life to fool the Nazis.
Britain gave a dead spy a fake love life to fool the Nazis. For Operation Mincemeat in 1943, British intelligence gave a corpse the identity of Major William…
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Zheng Yi Sao negotiated her way out of a pirate empire.
Zheng Yi Sao negotiated her way out of a pirate empire. After her husband's death, she became a central leader of the Guangdong pirate confederation, which…
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Tutankhamun's curse grew around a real death and a much larger story.
Tutankhamun's curse grew around a real death and a much larger story. After Lord Carnarvon died in 1923, newspapers connected the expedition financier's death…
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Edison's talking dolls put a fragile recording machine in a child's hands.
Edison's talking dolls put a fragile recording machine in a child's hands. The 1890 dolls contained miniature phonographs operated by a crank. Records and…
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Oxford had students centuries before the Aztec Empire formed.
Oxford had students centuries before the Aztec Empire formed. There is evidence of teaching at Oxford in 1096; the Aztec Triple Alliance was established in…
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A swimming center carries Harold Holt's name.
A swimming center carries Harold Holt's name. The Australian prime minister disappeared while swimming in 1967 and was later officially found to have drowned.…
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