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78 Bizarre And Fascinating History Facts That Might Change Your Perspective Of The Past (New Pics)
History is often presented as a very serious collection of dates, places, people, wars and other events that shaped the world as we know it today. But the halls of the past are adorned with so much more...
Beneath the extravagant historical, important narratives lies a parallel universe of weird moments, bizarre traditions, crazy coincidences, questionable medical practices and wacky individuals that also played a part in shaping life for us and future generations. There's an X account called Weird History that's anything but your average history textbook. Its aim is to share the more absurd happenings of the past.
Bored Panda has put together a list of the page's best posts. Some might make you cry with laughter, while others could leave your jaw on the floor. Don't forget to upvote your favorites.
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#1
Tamra 3 hours ago
It was such a horrible time. Very few people in positions of power, those who could have helped, didn't want to talk about it or address it in any meaningful way. The ignorance, fear, and even indifference caused a lot of deaths, many of which were lonely deaths. My uncle came out in the 80's after a lifetime in the closet. He died from AIDS in the late 80's, and only two of his 14 siblings visited him in the hospital before he passed. Still makes me sad.
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A lot happened in 1977: South African anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko passed away in police custody on September 12, drawing international condemnation; two Boeing 747 passenger jets collided on a runway in Tenerife, Canary Islands on March 27, resulting in the loss of 583 people; Jimmy Carter was sworn in as the 39th U.S. President on January 20, and granted unconditional pardons to Vietnam War draft evaders the very next day.
And a random woman hosted Saturday Night Live, becoming the show's most unlikely presenter and the only non-public figure to ever take on the task... Proof that not all moments make it into the history textbooks.
#5
LakotaWolf (she/her) 7 hours ago
He also played Barf the Mog in my lifelong favorite movie, Spaceballs. Rest in peace, John, we still miss you.
#6
Janissary35680 7 hours ago
It was not only great, it was also unexpected given that he'd mostly done comedy up till then except for an X-FIles episode that Vince Gilligan wrote. Studio executives were initially sceptical about the choice of Cranston and pushed back but Gilligan insisted and eventually prevailed when others proposed for the WW role turned it down.
The 80-year-old grandmother from New Orleans had entered - and won - the show's the show's first only Anyone Can Host contest. Miskel Spillman found herself on stage, next to host, actor and screenwriter Buck Henry.
According to Australia's Nine.com, Spillman's contest entry was a "punchy pitch that abided by the 25-word count limit." It simply stated, "I'm 80 years old. I need one more cheap thrill since my doctor told me I only have another 25 years left."
"She told the Associated Press at the time that her message was inspired by her frequent declaration that she would live until 105," the site reports. She sadly passed away roughly 10 years shy of her goal.
#11
Chaos Pandas Unite 3 hours ago
What a cool lady, I’d be terrified and she looks like she’s having a ball. I see Gilda Radner up there with her, and Garrett Morris in the back left; not sure who’s on her right.
#12
Ace 6 hours ago
One might take issue with that period being termed "Ancient Egypt"; by that time it was very much part of the Greek world, so this was more a Greek thing than it was Egptian. Worth remembering that the ancient Egyptian civilisation had already been in existence for a longer period than the time between Ptolemy II and the present day.
#13
Janissary35680 6 hours ago
“Uh hello, yeah hi, my name is Buk Lau. This is Imperial Garden Chinese Restaurant. Your food ready. You order three Chow Mein, two Wonton soup, four egg rolls..."
#14
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
He was granted political asylum, but he left his wife and son behind in the Soviet Union. In 1978, while Korchnoi was playing in a World Championship match in the Philippines, "Korchnoi's son, who along with Korchnoi's wife had applied to leave the Soviet Union, was drafted into the Soviet army and subsequently went into hiding. In 1979, the son was sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison for draft evasion. His son was released from prison in 1982 and was promptly drafted again. But later that year, Korchnoi's wife, son and step mother were allowed to leave the USSR. Korchnoi divorced his wife soon after. At the time he was living with Petra Leeuwerik, a German woman who had been imprisoned in the Soviet Union and who had led Korchnoi's delegation during the candidate matches in 1977; the two would later marry."
#16
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
In between songs, while he was leading out the employees, he was able to call his wife and speak to her. But Rick himself did not survive 9/11. After leading the 2,700 employees to safety, he went back into the building to make sure everyone was evacuated. The South Tower collapsed shortly afterwards.
#18
Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het 13 hours ago (edited)
The popularity of Queen in the USA dropped dramatically after the release of I Want To Break Free. Conservative Americans were shocked to see the band dress up as women. They thought there might be something slightly "gay" about the band. Radio stations stopped playing their music.
#19
A widow of a WWII veteran never learned the exact fate of her husband. After 68 years she found that he was not only buried in France, but that a town in France has been honoring him for the last 68 years.
Chaos Pandas Unite 3 hours ago
I’d love names here, to be able to read a bit more about them and the French town.
#20
Robert Frost couldn't read the poem he wrote for John F. Kennedy's inauguration due to the glare on the snow being too strong. So he instead recited one he knew from memory.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
One of my favorite poets. Frost recited his older poem "The Gift Outright" instead of the one he'd written for the occasion, which was titled "Dedication".
#25
#27
#28
#29
During the peak of the Cold War, one of the tasks given to niel armstrong was to place two soviet medals on the moon to honour their fallen soviet competitors.
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
The medals were to honor cosmonauts Yuri Gagarin and Vladimir Komarov. Just because your respective governments are at war with each other doesn't mean that you "must" hate every single citizen of the "enemy" country.
#36
#37
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
Pompe disease generally does not affect cognitive function, and Megan (lower right) graduated from Notre Dame in 2019!
#40
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
There'd be 8 members of my household if I could count my pets on the census XD (Hey, they're my family too!)
#41
#42
#50
LakotaWolf (she/her) 7 hours ago
The date of the plane crash is known as "The Day the Music Died". Buddy Holly was only 22 at the time. Fellow musicians Ritchie Valens (aged 17) and The Big Bopper (aged 28) also díed in the same plane crash. Honestly an absolute tragedy all around.
#51
#52
#57
Salttypepper 6 hours ago
Now that a cold burn lmao....att least use your own material,not the guys you're writing about...then use so much you have to pay him ..
#58
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
He looked a bit too old to be Nick Andros (Nick is 22 in the book) but he otherwise did a fantastic job. It's one of Stephen King's longer books (800+ or 1,000+ pages, depending on which version you're reading), so it's difficult to translate it to the screen. Absolutely wonderful novel, though; I highly recommend it. Hits even harder now post-COVID (it was originally published in the late 70s.)
#61
LakotaWolf (she/her) 6 hours ago
He was a law school graduate (he entered the police academy after graduating law school) and had been planning to practice law with his younger brother Joel after retiring, specializing in medical malpractice cases. While he was still on the force, he volunteered as a small claims court arbitrator in NYC and took pro bono civil liberties cases. John was 38 years old when he díed.
#65
Major D Winters led perhaps the most storied U.S. army unit in all of World War II. On D-day, he and his "Band of brothers" in easy company defeated a far larger German force and allowed the allied advance to continue
LakotaWolf (she/her) 10 hours ago
I hate that we humans fight so many wars, but the series "Band of Brothers" does an excellent job of depicting the humanity of the soldiers who are forced to fight and suffer. It's a good watch if you haven't seen it already (but be prepared to cry!) Above - the real Major Winters is on the left, and on the right is the actor who depicted him in "Band of Brothers", Damian Lewis, who is a very talented actor.
#67
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
From the original on Instagram: "In 1963, the famous photographer Richard Avedon took a picture of a man named William Casby. William Casby, born in 1857, was 106 years old at the time. In his hands, he was holding his great-great-granddaughter, Cherri Stamps-McCray. The image amazes me because the elderly gentleman holding his descendant so tenderly, was born into slavery more than a century prior. Casby would eventually live until 1970, dying at the age of 113."
#69
Phantom Phoenix 12 hours ago
Her alien abductors got mixed up and dropped her off somewhere chilly...
#70
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
I live in Southern California (about 15 miles away from where the restaurant was) and this was THE biggest local scandal for a while XD The restaurant tried to really embrace the scandal and roll with it, and Popeyes even partnered with them briefly, but the owner of the restaurant transferred ownership of the building/location in 2019 and the restaurant closed down permanently.
#72
Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het 13 hours ago
That was a shame, all those businesses and their owners not making so much money. If only we had war mongering Presidents to help keep the money rolling in.
#73
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
"Immediately following the initial attacks on the World Trade Center, tunnels were closed, and traffic fleeing Manhattan via bridges reached a standstill. Many civilians, especially in those neighborhoods closest to the attacks, were desperate to escape the island but had no way to do so. A coast guard transmission went out. “All available boats,” it said. “This is the United States Coast Guard… Anyone wanting to help with the evacuation of Lower Manhattan report to Governors Island.” Within minutes, around 150 private ships of all shapes, sizes, and purposes reported for duty and got to work. All told, these heroic captains transported around 500,000 people away from the disaster zone."
#74
Ace 4 hours ago
Not a "quirk of statistics" but an artefact of the survey, given that a much higher proportion of the non-drinkers were very young and old drivers who are generally much more likely to be involved in accidents. "Elvik's 2026 paper (Accident Analysis & Prevention) shows the mechanism precisely: the group that drinks daily drives with a low BAC 21% of the time, while the group that drinks once a year does so only 3% of the time. The daily drinkers are also far safer overall (accident rate 0.348 vs. 0.898). Remove them from the low-BAC group and the dip disappears."
#75
Phantom Phoenix 12 hours ago
Once upon a time, a girl was photographed as she stood in front of a cabin. It's unclear as to why this is considered, in any way, to be a "Very Strange Tidbit About The Past" or a "Weird Thing About History"
#76
#77
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
"Isabelle Romée (1377–1458), also known as Isabelle de Vouthon and Isabelle d’Arc, was the mother of Joan of Arc. She grew up in Vouthon-Bas and later married Jacques d’Arc. The couple settled in Domrémy, where they managed a farm of roughly 50 acres. After Joan’s rise to prominence in 1429, Charles VII granted the entire family noble status that same year. Following Jacques d’Arc’s passing, Isabelle moved to Orléans in 1440 and received a pension from the city. Determined to clear her daughter’s name, she appealed to Pope Nicholas V to reopen the original heresy case. In her seventies, she personally spoke at the opening session of the new trial held at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. The appeals court formally overturned Joan’s conviction on 7 July 1456. Isabelle spent her final years near Orléans, most likely in Sandillon, where her life came to a close in 1458."
#78
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
"A bridge in a small town in West Virginia had fallen into serious disrepair by the early 1970s, with missing planks making crossings increasingly dangerous. By 1974–75, the structure collapsed entirely due to wood rot. The town’s mayor repeatedly appealed to state and federal officials for a replacement, but no action followed. In 1977, the self-appointed mayor, John Robinette, took an extraordinary step by requesting foreign aid from the Soviet Union and East Germany to rebuild Vulcan’s bridge. That same year, Soviet journalist Iona Andronov visited Vulcan to assess the situation and meet with Robinette. Within an hour of the visit, reporters were informed that the state had agreed to act. The West Virginia Legislature approved $1.3 million to fund a replacement bridge, which opened in 1980."
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Gingersnap In Iowa 11 hours ago
Hmm...is it really difficult to perhaps cut and paste the descriptions of the pictures?
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
I try to take up the slack when the BP article authors drop it like this XD
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Chich the witch 11 hours ago
"We have some more photos". "Yeah? Well I'm tired S***w the headings. Nobody is going to scroll that far"
Janissary35680 6 hours ago
I think your explanation is the correct one, Chich.😄
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Pamina 1 hour ago (edited)
Interesting article BUT shame in the author for the photos without descriptions. And thanks to the readers that took upon them the job of filling it up so we could know what's going on
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Load More Replies... Gingersnap In Iowa 11 hours ago
Hmm...is it really difficult to perhaps cut and paste the descriptions of the pictures?
LakotaWolf (she/her) 9 hours ago
I try to take up the slack when the BP article authors drop it like this XD
Load More Replies... Chich the witch 11 hours ago
"We have some more photos". "Yeah? Well I'm tired S***w the headings. Nobody is going to scroll that far"
Janissary35680 6 hours ago
I think your explanation is the correct one, Chich.😄
Load More Replies... Pamina 1 hour ago (edited)
Interesting article BUT shame in the author for the photos without descriptions. And thanks to the readers that took upon them the job of filling it up so we could know what's going on
davidthomas 52 minutes ago
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