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“It Rained Fish In Denmark”: 45 Historical Facts That Sound Like Fiction But Are Real Life Events
If someone told you it rained fish once upon a time, would you believe them? You'd be forgiven if you said "no." But get this: not only has it rained fish, it's rained many different other animals, in several parts of the world... Frogs, rats, spiders, birds, jellyfish, and even snakes. It turns out that sometimes, fact is indeed stranger than fiction.
Someone recently asked, "What is a historical fact that sounds like fiction but is 100% true?" and some of the answers might surprise you. From a bear that served in the Polish army during WW2, to the fact that there are golf balls on the moon, it seems history is truly filled with the most bizarre and intriguing tidbits.
Bored Panda has put together our favorite answers from the thread for you to familiarize yourself with, so that you have something interesting to talk about at the Christmas table. Don't forget to upvote the ones you love best.
And if you're wondering how it could possibly rain fish, frogs or other creatures, you'll find that info between the images.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
_Cap Trafalgar_ was a German ocean liner.
In WWI, the Germans converted it into a warship, while also modifying it to look like the British ocean liner RMS _Carmania_. The idea was to cruise around in disguise, ambushing British shipping.
On its first such cruise, it ran into the real RMS _Carmania_ - which the British had secretly converted into a warship, with the idea of cruising around ambushing German shipping.
In the ensuing battle, the real _Carmania_ sank the fake one.
People have been claiming to see animals raining from the sky since the days of early civilization. There have been reports of showers of rats, fish, jellyfish, even snakes. While they aren't entirely incorrect, meteorologists and climatologists say it's a bit more complicated than the sky literally "raining" creatures.
It doesn’t “rain” frogs or fish in the sense that it rains water, explains the Library of Congress (LOC) site. What the experts mean is that frogs and fish don't vaporize into the air before a rainfall.
"However, strong winds, such as those in a tornado or hurricane, are powerful enough to lift animals, people, trees, and houses," the site adds. "It is possible that they could suck up a school of fish or frogs and 'rain' them elsewhere."
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#2
There were archaeologists in ancient Egypt digging up stuff from what they considered to be ancient Egypt.
#3
The whole story about Juan Pujol Garcia, aka Garbo, aka Alaric, aka the guy who ran the most valuable spy network for Germany in Britain during WW2. Except he was a double agent and the network with all its spies didn't even exist, he just made up the most plausible-sounding nonsense he could think of and sent it to the Germans who ate it all up.
The best thing? He was just a private citizen in Spain, who started the whole fraudulent spy business entirely on his own initiative.
David Paterson 1 hour ago
He had, all on his own without any help, German U-boats chasing non-existent allied convoys in the Atlantic. Later, the British found him and he worked for them to successfully obfuscate the D-Day landings.
“I’ve seen small ponds literally emptied of their water by a passing tornado. So, it wouldn’t be unreasonable for frogs (or other living things) to ‘rain’ from the skies,” says Professor Ernest Agee from Purdue University.
Instead of actual rain, many scientists believe that something called tornadic waterspouts may be responsible for frog and fish rainfalls. A tornadic waterspout is basically a tornado that forms over land and travels over the water. They aren't as strong as land-based tornadoes, which can reach up to 310 miles per hour.
But tornadic waterspouts can pack quite a punch, reaching up to 100 miles per hour.
#4
In 1927, the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology was awarded to Julius Wagner-Jauregg for using malaria to cure syphilis.
At the time, syphilis was incurable and horrific. Syphilis takes a long time to destroy the patient, and it ravages their body and mind along the way, while also making them a vector to infect others. It had been known for some time that a high fever could cure syphilis if it came at the right time. But how do you summon a high fever on demand? Wagner-Jauregg did it by intentionally infecting the patient with malaria.
Malaria was incurable, but could be treated with quinine for minimal side effects. Even if the malaria fever ended the patient, losing one's lifeI over a single night was far more humane than the years-long degradation of the Black Lion.
Wagner-Jauregg's treatment became a historical oddity before long, when penicillin was discovered to be a much less invasive cure for syphilis.
UnclePanda 14 minutes ago
Salvarsan 606. I paid to learn that and have been waiting almost 50 years to use it.
#5
Everything about Staff Sgt. Reckless sounds like fiction. She was a mongolian race horse who was purchased from a Korean stable boy so that he could buy a prosthetic leg for his sister who had stepped on a land mine. The United States Marine Corps trained her to be a pack horse carrying Recoilless Rifles for the 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division. Recoilless Rifles were affectionately known as "Reckless Rifles" due to their backblast, hence her name. She was known to sleep with Marines in their tents on cold nights and would eat nearly anything that she was given, including scrambled eggs, beer, Coca Cola, and approximately $30 worth of poker chips once. She learned supply routes and carried supplies and wounded troops without a handler. During the battle for Outpost Vegas she made 51 supply trips and was critical in defending the area. It's not a stretch to say that she was instrumental in holding the front line and the modern Korean border might look very different if not for her efforts. She was wounded twice in combat which earned her 2 Purple Hearts in addition to a Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal, Presidential unit Citations from South Korea and the United States, and other minor honors. She was essentially smuggled back to Texas, partied at a USMC Birthday Ball, featured in LIFE Magazine and The Saturday Evening Post, and listed as one of the top 100 US war heroes of all time. She gave birth to 4 foals: Fearless, Dauntless, Chesty, and one that died nameless.
On July 26th 2013, one day before the 60th anniversary of the Korean War a statue of Sgt. Reckless was unveiled at the National Museum of the Marine Corps along with a lock of her tail hair at the base of the statue. The statue's plaque includes a quote from Sergeant Harold Wadley, who served in battle alongside Sergeant Reckless: "The spirit of her loneliness and her loyalty, in spite of the danger, was something else to behold. Hurting. Determined. And alone. That's the image I have imprinted in my head and heart forever." In addition, there are 5 other monuments to Sgt. Reckless around the US as well as another at Yeoncheon Gorangpogu History Park near the Outpost Vegas battlefield.
#6
Corporal Wojtek, of the 22nd Artillery Supply Company, 2nd Polish Corps... who was a Syrian Brown Bear. This was during WW2.
Adopted as a cub, he was trained to carry ammo crates, as he could carry much more than a man could. The men liked to wrestle with him, and he was even taught to salute. He like to drink beer, smoke... or eat cigarettes, and drink coffee.
Imagine being a new recruit and your superior officer is a bear.
The LOC site explains that like a tornado, a mature waterspout consists of a low-pressure central vortex surrounded by a rotating funnel of updrafts.
"The vortex at the center of these storms is strong enough to 'suck up' surrounding air, water, and small objects like a vacuum. These accumulated objects are deposited back to earth as 'rain' when the waterspout loses its energy," the site further states. "Most of the water seen in the funnel of a waterspout is actually condensate — moisture in the air resulting from the condensation of water vapor."
#7
In 1920, a cat officially ran for mayor in a small town in Minnesota.
#8
Before invading Spain, napoleon sent a formal letter to the crown along the lines of 'don't worry about my armies crossing the border, we are just on our way to Portugal!'. No one suspected anything until he was literally knocking on the gates of our capital.
#9
People used to be jailed for having a visible disability and being out in public. Just learned this today and could not believe what I was reading.
While animal rainfalls are largely attributed to waterspouts, at least one expert believes the sometimes a strong gust of updraft wind could also do the trick.
According to Doc Horsley from Southern Illinois University, any unusually powerful updraft could lift small organisms or organic material into the sky during a storm. And what goes up must come down...
"An updraft is a wind current caused by warm air from high pressure areas near the earth rising into cooler, low-pressure areas in the atmosphere. Because the cooling causes water in the air to condense, updrafts play an important role in cloud formation and storm development," explains the LOC site.
#10
Gladiators were a lot like professional athletes today. They’d have billboards and do product sponsorships in Ancient Rome.
Luke || Kira (he/she) 1 hour ago
Also - gladiators were fat! When the opponent cuts into a chubby belly, it heals better than those chiseled muscles. Also the gladiatrix - gladiator women - weren't that uncommon.
#12
I just saw this in a movie I watched today. It rained fish in Denmark about 50 years ago. There is more than one theory as to how that happened.
Zig Zag Wanderer 1 hour ago
If you research how hail is made, even baseball sized chunks, you will understand the atmospheric forces involved are way beyond what you probably imagine.
It once rained frogs in Kansas City in 1873. And it hailed frogs in Dubuque, Iowa on June 16, 1882. Scientists back then concluded the Kansas incident must have been caused by a tornado or other land-based storm. And the Iowa one by a powerful updraft, which made the frogs freeze before releasing them.
While there've been no confirmed reports of it ever raining cats and dogs anywhere, it does seem plausible that animals can indeed fall from the sky.
#13
The War of the Bucket (1325)
Basically, two Italian city-states, Modena and Bologna, were already bitter political rivals (Ghibellines vs. Guelphs). Their tensions were high, and then Modenese soldiers stole a wooden bucket from a well in Bologna’s public square.
Bologna demanded the bucket back. Modena said no.
A war broke out.
Zig Zag Wanderer 1 hour ago
That is as heinous as nicking someone's flip flop in Queensland, mate!
#14
One of my fav weird ones is that the australian army actually went to war with emus in 1932… and lost. like real soldiers, real machine guns, vs big dumb birds… and the birds just kinda outplayed everyone
sounds like a meme but it’s an actual chapter in history and somehow no one ever lets australia forget it.
#15
Until 1901 Western zoology did not recognize the okapi as a real animal and assumed the African tribes who lived in the Congo for thousands of years were just making it up.
Auntriarch 1 hour ago
I do like the idea of making up strange animals to wind up foreign zoologists though
#16
This fact always stuck with me: There was a Roman emperor - Gaius Caligula - who once declared war on the god of the sea, marched his army to the shore... and ordered them to attack the ocean.
Then he made the soldiers collect seashells as "war trophies" to bring back to Rome.
#17
The Titanic’s sister ship Olympic was known for hitting ships. She sank a U-Boat during WW1 by running it over and then did it again to the Nantucket Lightship though on accident that time. She also rammed the HMS Hawke which is where the unsinkable thing came from. She was also the only ship of the three to serve a full career and was noted to be in immaculate condition for her age. It’s sad the two others never finished a single civilian crossing. Titanic sank on her maiden voyage and Britannic never even made it to civilian service before being sunk my a sea mine.
#18
The original "War on Christmas" was waged by early Protestants (Puritans) in England and America during the 16th and 17th centuries. They succeeded in actually banning it for several decades.
Nils Skirnir 1 hour ago
Even until the late 19th and early 20th Centuries, Xmas in New England was a subdued affair. Source: my grandparents and great grandparents
#19
30% of Americans supported the British in the Revolution.
Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het 2 hours ago
I heard something like that, basically a third supported Britain, a third supported independence, and the other third did not care one way or the other.
#20
There are golf balls still on the moon.
#21
Russia once sent its Baltic fleet to attack Japan.
If you’re unsure why this is unusual, check where Baltics is.
The whole story is filled with hilarious details demonstrating how bad Russia’s army was.
#22
Africans have ~20% of their DNA belonging to a ‘ghost’ hominin.
I.e another species of early human that is extinct and we don’t know anything about. A bit like how Europeans and Asians have ~2% Neanderthal DNA.
David Paterson 1 hour ago
That can't be right. I think it's better to say that H.sapiens lost 20% of its DNA diversity when leaving Africa.
#23
It took about 30 million years after the evolution of trees for a fungus to evolve with the ability to break down lignin. Before that, trees just kind of lay there where they fell, weathering but not decomposing.
Nathaniel He/Him Cis-Het 2 hours ago (edited)
Dead plant life nearly choked the ground, almost causing life to d*****f. Mushrooms saved the planet.
#24
Before Columbus arrived, indigenous people along Haida Gwaii used marine engineering to make sustainable aquaculture farms. To this day, you can still find "Clam gardens" along that coast.
#25
Minnesota still holds a captured flag taken from Virginia during the Civil War.
Virginia has asked for it back many times.
#26
The dancing plague of 1518, or dance epidemic of 1518 (French: Épidémie dansante de 1518; German: Straßburger Tanzwut), was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, Alsace (modern-day France), in the Holy Roman Empire from July 1518 to September 1518. Somewhere between 50 and 400 people took to dancing for weeks. There are many theories behind the phenomenon, the most popular being stress-induced mass hysteria, suggested by John Waller.[1][2] Other theories include ergot poisoning. There is controversy concerning the number of deaths.[3]
Tbh I just can’t believe such an insane party went down, stress induced doesn’t sound correct to me (I’m not the smartest though so eh). This sounds like burning man to the max. Maybe some crazy fermented wine or something.
#27
The ancient Greeks forgot how to read their own writings.
They slipped into the dark ages with the collapse of civilization around the Mediterranean in the 10th century bce and forgot how to read their own script. They were illiterates for a few centuries before recovering sometime after Homer and then learned to read and write again. Plato and Aristotle and basically the time from the 5th to the 3rd century in Ancient Greece are really the equivalent of the Italian Renaissance as far as culture and thought for the Greeks.
#28
"On December 24, 1971, 17-year-old Juliane Koepcke became the sole survivor of LANSA Flight 508, which broke apart mid-air after being struck by lightning over the Peruvian Amazon. Still strapped to her seat, she fell nearly **10,000 feet** and miraculously survived the impact with a broken collarbone and other injuries. Koepcke then **survived for 11 days in the jungle**, following a creek and using survival skills taught by her zoologist parents, before being rescued by loggers.".
Anonymouse 11 minutes ago
The cool thing about falling from great heights, is once you hit terminal velocity, there really is not much difference between 450 meters (1,500 feet) and anything greater than that. The real difficulty lies with the cold and low air pressure/oxygen at those heights. It is not the fall that is the issue - it is the sudden stop at the end, lol
#29
I don't know when exactly it was "discovered", but VERY recently (like past few devades), it was discovered that infants feel pain. So yeah, they used.to perform surgery on infants without anesthesia. In RECENT times. Like in the 80s and maybe 90s even.
.
On a side note, most people think animals don't feel pain or are incapable of any kind of sentience and sapience. I believe all life outside of fungi and plants can feel pain. It'd genuinely shock me of mushrooms and grass could feel pain. But yeah, why people dont realize mice or lizards or bats or turtles can feel pain is beyond me. And... no way to prove this (my handwashing moment), but I believe mammals and maybe "lesser" animals can feel dread and despair and such. Develope depression, get traumatized and developed PTSD, etc. I think mammals are much more human than other humans give them recognition for. I also believe that if an animal looks at his or her food bowl and looks away and walks away, that's it considering whether it should eat for pleasure or for hunger. And thus shows decision making.
Besides, we've proven that crows and ravens (birds) are pretty intelligent.
Stardust she/her 43 minutes ago
The part about not knowing infants felt pain is a myth, one of the main reasons they didn’t anaesthetise infants was because they were not sure how to do it without accidentally k*****g them by giving the wrong dose
#30
The 100-year war. That lasted for 116 years, actually.
When you hear about 100-year war that happened in human history, you imagine it was probably exaggeration, and it lasted at most like 55 years or something... But no, it actually lasted LONGER!
#31
Alfred Dreyfus, a French Jewish Army Officer was accused of spying for Germany at the end of the 19th century. This lead to a very famous polemics between his supporters and his detractors that lasted a few years, even after the army learnt that he wasn't actually guilty and knew the name of the real spy. Despite this, he remained faithful to the Army and was rehabilitated.
A few years after, at the start of WW1, he was the very officer that learnt from a scouting plane crew that the Germans were deviating from their route, realized the importance of this information and transmitted it with the highest priority, allowing the French High Command and the British Expeditionnary Force to launch a successful offensive on the Marne.
The man that was wrongly accused and recognized guilty of one of the worst crimes by his country's army was the one that saved it from its worst military defeat 20 years after.
#32
There are churches in Europe still in use that were built before those Easter island heads were carved, and before both Hawaii and New Zealand were populated. .
#33
Mexico once had a president who ruled for a whopping 45 minutes.
#34
More people have been to space then to the bottom of the ocean.
Zig Zag Wanderer 1 hour ago (edited)
I've been to the bottom of the ocean every time I've been to the beach, mate!
#35
Czech Republic/ former Czechoslovakia as a landlocked country without ever having a navy still has a naval Victory, that didn’t even happen in Europe .
#36
For centuries in western culture, reading silently was considered everything from strange to immoral and potentially dangerous into the 18th century. The danger comes from when people started reading in bed by candle light and there was a chance of the fire spreading by someone who had fallen asleep reading.
Don't listen to me 2 hours ago
Where are you getting this from. I'd like to see some sources for this too.
#38
John Tyler was born in 1790, and was President from 1841 -1845. His last surviving grandchild, Harrison Ruffin Tyler, was alive earlier this year.
#39
The US occupied the Philippines after the Spanish American war to sell more pants.
The McKinley administration in the 1890s was very concerned about the fact that supply growth was outstripping demand growth domestically, and causing financial panics and a potential recession.
Garments were a key US industry but we were making ever more pants etc but not seeing a corresponding increase in Americans who needed to buy pants. Seizing colonies, and monopolizing their markets, was seen as a solution to this. So one thing leads to another and the US ends up occupying the Philippines to, in fact, sell pants
#40
The first powered flight (1903) and the moon landing (1968) were 66 years apart. A not insignificant number of people were alive and remember both events.
Tucker Cahooter 1 hour ago
Very few, if any, people aged over 120 any more, so maybe it is time to retire the second sentence
#41
Julius Caesar was kidnapped and ransomed by pirates. He told them to ask for a higher ransom and that he would find them and crucify them if they let him go. They took the ransom and let him go. He hunted them down and crucified them.
Chuck the Cat 49 minutes ago
What? So they let him go and then he kílled them for not kílling him, and if they didn't let him go he would have been kílled by the people who were actually kílled for not kílling him? That's kinda confusing.
#42
Pope Leo the first begged its life from the Turkic commander Attila the Hun, in 452 AD. It was because Attila caused great harm to whole Europe and Western Rome, and was on way to attack and end the Western Rome. Surprisingly he accepted and did not attack.
#43
Ketchup was sold as medicine in the 1800s.
#44
Most writing systems in the world descend from Egyptian Hieroglyphics (Chinese doesn't, but Mongolian, Manchurian and Tibetan do).
Stardust she/her 39 minutes ago
Not my native languages, they all derive from the script used by the Harappans and maybe some semitic languages had influence on some scripts
#45
During the greek-italian war greek soldiers captured so many vehicles to form the 1st tank unit and almost caused the 2nd line of defences to surrender because they believed a breakthrough happened.
highwaycrossingfrog 2 hours ago
This makes little sense, and I can't find anything online resembling it
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Chuck the Cat 44 minutes ago
It was really interesting learning about these historical facts. More of this BP, less of non-stop political/celeb articles.
Chuck the Cat 44 minutes ago
It was really interesting learning about these historical facts. More of this BP, less of non-stop political/celeb articles.
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