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46 ‘Today I Learned’ Facts That May Come In Clutch When Conversation Runs Dry (New Facts)
September is the perfect time to learn something new. Why, you ask? Well, the start of a new academic year often motivates people to broaden their knowledge even if eons have passed since they set foot into an educational institution.
Taking advantage of this opportunity, our Bored Panda team has scoured the ‘Today I Learned’ community to bring you some of the most fascinating facts you can learn. Scroll down to find them below, and don’t forget to upvote those that you enjoyed learning the most.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
TIL that during WWII, the French carmaker Citroen was forced to make vehicles for German forces. The president of Citroen, Pierre-Jules Boulanger, first sabotaged this by slowing workers. He then redesigned the dipstick to show there was plenty of oil, leading to frequent breakdowns.
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#2
TIL a Canadian engineer once built a Mjölnir replica that only the "worthy" could lift: it sensed the iron ring commonly worn by Canadian engineers (presented in a ceremony called the Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer), triggering an electromagnetic release so ring-wearers could pick it up.
#3
TIL that people who experience "vicarioius embarassment" (feeling embarrased just observing someone else in an embarassing situation) have the same physical reactions in their nervous system as if they are the subject of the embarassing situation
#4
TIL 17-year-old female pitcher Jackie Mitchell struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in succession during an exhibition match. As a consequence, the baseball commisioner terminated her contract and Ruth later trash talked about women in baseball to a newspaper.
#5
TIL In 1945 the adult literacy rate in South Korea was estimated at 22%. In 1970, adult literacy was 87.6%. By the late 1980s, sources estimated it at around 93%.
#6
TIL Wes Anderson uses a flat-fee salary system in which the actors that appear in his films are all paid the same rate. He began this practice on Rushmore after Bill Murray offered to take the same pay as the then-unknown 18-year-old Jason Schwartzman as long as he could leave for a golf tournament.
#7
TIL Barefoot Doctors in China were farmers, folk healers, or young grads who received minimal medical training and brought healthcare, hygiene, and family planning to rural villages where urban-trained doctors wouldn’t go. They greatly reduced infectious disease and infant mortality in rural China.
#8
TIL the UK passport office declined to issue a 6-yr-old British girl a passport because the child's name Khaleesi was under WB trademark. After the story was reported on & it was determined that a birth name cannot be trademarked & that trademarks are for goods & services, the decision was reversed.
#9
TIL in 2008 Hugh Laurie made a single, off-hand comment claiming that a perk of being a celebrity was having a special lifetime, unlimited Burger King Crown Card (enabling him to eat there for free). He actually didn't have one, but after his comment caused a huge public response, BK gave him one.
#10
TIL that after a rural Ohio county reported nearly 70 cases of leukemia in the mid 90s, it was discovered that a local high school had been built on an Army depot used as a dump for chemical waste.
#11
TIL the last living veteran of the 1853 Crimean War died in 2004: Timothy, a Greek tortoise captured from a Portuguese ship, served as a mascot throughout the war
#12
TIL of Les Horribles Cernettes. A parody pop group made up of CERN employees, they performed primarily at events for physicists. In 1992 a colleague asked for a photo to upload to his invention "the World Wide Web". They scanned a photo for him, and it was the first photo uploaded to the internet.
#13
TIL in 2012, two elementary school students in the state of Washington were severely sunburned on field day and brought to the hospital by their mom after they were not allowed to apply sunscreen due to not having a doctor's note. The school district's sunscreen policy was based on statewide law.
#14
TIL there are dogs specifically trained to sniff out USB drives and other electric storage medium, most notably in the arrest of Jared Fogle (guy from Subway) for CP
#15
TIL the lost city of Petra was rediscovered by a Swiss explorer who took it upon himself to learn perfect Arabic, local customs, and gained the trust of the Bedouins to learn the location of the gorge leading to the city.
#16
TIL that UPS founder James E. Casey wanted yellow vehicles, but a partner said they’d be hard to keep clean. They chose Pullman Brown instead - a colour that hides dirt, mud, and grime, and is still used on UPS trucks today.
#17
TIL there is 14-thousand-year-old rock art in the middle of the Sahara desert. The paintings show crocodiles, giraffes, and hippos, from a time when the Sahara was lush grassland and forest, and was able to support these animals.
#18
TIL in 2017 Japan arrested a 74 year old man who had committed over 250 burglaries dressed as a ninja. He avoided most surveillance, but was seen "navigating tight spaces and running on walls"
#19
TIL Beethoven’s late quartets, now widely considered to be among the greatest musical compositions of all time, were so ahead of their time that initial reviews deem them indecipherable, uncorrected horrors, with one musician saying “we know there is something there, but we do not know what it is.”
#20
TIL a man who developed 'popcorn lung' after years of inhaling the smell of artificial butter flavoring from daily consumption of microwave popcorn sued Gilster-Mary Lee Corp. and King Soopers for failing to warn on labels that the flavoring diacetyl was dangerous. In 2012, he was awarded $7,217,961
#21
TIL in 2014 a 27-year-old man fell asleep in a hammock while camping in Kentucky. In the morning, his friends saw him get up & sleepwalk off a 60-foot cliff. However, a rhododendron bush actually broke his fall, therefore he had no life-threatening injuries. He didn't even know he was a sleepwalker.
#22
TIL that, as President of the New York City Police Commission, Theodore Roosevelt would regularly walk the city streets at night or in the early morning to make sure officers were on duty.
#23
TIL that George Carlin was a court-martialed Air Force Vet, Grammy-winning comedian, children's TV actor, and the 1st host of SNL. His arrest for performing the routine "Seven Words You Can Never Say on Television" placed him at the center of a landmark Supreme Court case, FCC v. Pacifica Foundation
#24
TIL that in 2022, 90% of complaints about Dublin Airport were from one person, who made over 23,000 complaints in one year
#25
TIL there was no film copyright law in Turkey until 1986, leading to films like "3 Giant Men" which featured Captain America and Mexican wrestler El Santo fighting against a chain-smoking Spider-Man villain, all to the ripped soundtracks of the James Bond movies.
#26
TIL that many American churches once had bowling alleys in their basements, originally built as community spaces and loopholes to serve beer on Sundays. Fewer than 200 still exist today.
#27
TIL the bubble style glass on pub windows not only offers privacy by distorting what's inside, but was sold cheaper as it was the last part in the process of blowing glass, perfect for establishments
#28
TIL that Rabies can make wild animals behave in a way that seems tame, friendly or even affectionate towards humans. Animals with Rabies don't always seem rabid.
#29
TIL they dropped millions of purpose-bred sterile flies from planes every week in Panama from the 1960s until 2022 to keep a flesh eating parasite from getting into the U.S. cattle supply.
#30
TIL 29% of male gamers prefer playing female characters, whereas only 9% of female gamers prefer playing male characters. In a typical core PC/console game, about 60% of the female avatars you meet are played by a male player.
#31
TIL During the 1900 Galveston hurricane, at the Saint Mary’s orphanage, the 10 nuns tried to save 90 of the children by tying clothes lines around their own waists and each attaching themselves to several children. Only 3 older boys were left untied, and they would be the orphanage’s only survivors.
#32
TIL at the 2025 Kentucky Derby, all 19 participants can be traced back through their lineage to 1973 Kentucky Derby winner and Triple Crown champion Secretariat, who sired more than 660 foals.
#33
TIL personal or private helicopter flights in the US account for just 3% of helicopter flight hours, but more than 25% of fatal helicopter accidents.
#34
TIL the world's longest regularly scheduled nonstop flight (Singapore-NYC; 17,250 km) covers so much of the Earth that pilots can opt to fly the return flight westward over the Pacific, or eastward over the Atlantic and Europe depending on winds aloft, saving time and fuel
#35
TIL, during a set at the 1995 US Open, tennis player Shuzo Matsuoka collapsed from severe cramping for several minutes and was defaulted for delaying the match. The incident led to a rule change in professional tennis to allow players to receive medical treatment during matches without forfeiting.
#36
TIL that Lewis and Clark Expedition participant and War of 1812 veteran, Patrick Gass, had to be removed from a recruiting station after attempting to enlist in the Union Army to fight in the American Civil War at the age of 91.
#37
TIL about the concept of 'digital dementia', a theory that excessive use of digital devices, such as smartphones, computers, and tablets, may lead to cognitive decline.
#38
TIL about an Iranian translator named Zabihollah Mansouri, who on one hand became Iran's most famous translator, but on the other hand became known for liberally adding his own content into translations to the point of making up entire books
#39
TIL that in languages such as Icelandic, they require the person to breathe in air while speaking. In Icelandic, it's used to signal agreement.
#40
TIL a woman with prosopometamorphopsia had a history of seeing people's faces morph into dragon-like faces. After a few minutes, she'd see faces turn black, grow long, pointy ears & a protruding snout, & display a reptiloid skin & huge eyes in a bright color. Treatment eventually helped control it.
#41
TIL coffee was all the rage in London in the 17th and 18th century until a fungus destroyed coffee plantations and forced the switch to tea in Sri Lanka
#42
TIL that in Sweden, almost anyone’s address, age, floor number and move-in date can easily be found online, because the Freedom of the Press Act contains provisions on the right to access official documents such as the national registration data.
#43
TIL that “Shakespeare’s Curse” on his grave warns anyone who moves his bones that they will be cursed — yet in 2016, a ground-penetrating radar revealed his skull is actually missing.
#44
TIL 85% of all gaming revenue comes from free-to-play games. These games are free upfront and generate revenue through ads, in-game transactions, and optional purchases.
#45
TIL that the character Kirby was named after a lawyer who successfully defended Nintendo against Universal Studios in a copyright dispute over the game Donkey Kong
#46
TIL One of the most prominent methods of combatting the Great Fire of London was to blow up any buildings in its path in order to isolate the blaze
#48
TIL In the UK, the Home Secretary was required to attend Royal Births, to verify an heir to the throne was legitimately born.
#49
TIL: Early iPhone users in the US who did not specify a billing preference were mailed incredibly detailed bills of around 50-100 pages long from AT&T, itemizing every data transfer including background traffic for email, web browsing, and text messaging. One woman even got a 300 page bill.
#50
TIL that Miyazaki Hidetaka, the creator of Dark Souls, Sekiro, and Elden Ring, was banned from playing video games by his parents until he entered university.
#51
TIL before Julius Caesar's reforms, the 355 day Roman year required a special month every few years to line the calendar back up with the seasons. The month was often enacted or cancelled for political reasons, so every year people outside Rome had to wait weeks to learn what the actual date was.
#52
TIL that the term 'Sneakers' originally referred to how the rubber soles of the shoe made them much quieter when walking than hard leather soles of dress shoes.
#53
TIL that the world did not agree on how long a nautical mile was until 1929 when the nautical mile was fixed at just 1851.8 meters. It is the result of dividing the earth´s longitude in 360 degrees and each degree in 60 minutes. 1 nautical mile = 1 mitute
#54
TIL the second ever DC superhero was Zatara the Magician, introduced in Action Comics 1 in 1938 alongside Superman. Zatara’s daughter Zatanna would not be introduced for another 30 years.
#55
TIL of Jevons Paradox, an economic theory stating that as the efficiency of a resource improves, the overall consumption of that resource increases rather than decreases
#56
TIL in 1994, a paper was published in a medical journal presenting a method to calculate the area under a curve, using rectangles and triangles, called "Tai's model". The researcher was unaware this method has been known for 2400 years and exact methods using calculus for 400 years
#57
TIL that actor Chaz Palminteri was fired from his job as a bouncer at a nightclub when he refused entry to a top talent agent who was having a party thrown for him there. This led to him writing the play A Bronx Tale, based on his own life, for himself to star in as he was not being offered work.
#58
TIL the US Dept of Transportation values a human life at 13.7 million dollars in a statistical sense, when evaluating potential safety standards.
#59
TIL Isoroku Yamamoto, who planned the attack on Pearl Harbour, once studied at Harvard University in the United States and was appointed naval attaché to the Japanese embassy in Washington.
#60
TIL that in 2014, David Hester filed a lawsuit against A&E Television due to expensive items being planted in storage closets in the show before auctions in the show Storage Wars. He was let go in response.
#61
TIL in 2009, Ken Basin became the first contestant on the U.S. version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire to miss the million-dollar question. He debated what he would regret more: walking away with $500K and being right or answering it and being wrong. He risked it, lost $475K, and left with $25K.
#62
TIL that Baldur's Gate 3 has sold 2 copies in Vatican City, meaning 0.39% of the country's population has played the game
#63
TIL that the U.S. Coast Guard was originally operated by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. It was originally created in 1790 at the request of Alexander Hamilton to collect customs duties at U.S. seaports and was the United States’ only armed maritime service until the U.S. Navy started in 1798.
#65
TIL in 2010 the principal of West Sylvan Middle School in Oregon banned hugging after observing that girls were hugging 6 or 7 times between classes, students were arriving late due to excessive hugging, it was being used as a game to provoke arousal in boys, and, at least once, as a form of mockery
#66
TIL the movie Boyhood (2014) was filmed from 2002 to 2013 and began filming without a completed script, with only basic plot points and the ending written initially. Director Richard Linklater developed the script throughout production and incorporated changes he saw in the actors into the script.
#67
TIL in 1992-93, four children died and hundreds of people were sickened by an E.Coli outbreak linked to undercooked beef at the Jack In the Box fast food chain.
#68
TIL As part of a live-fire test of a nuclear air-to-air rocket, 5 U.S. air crewmen agreed to stand directly beneath the nuclear explosion to prove it would not affect ground populations
#69
TIL In 2012, golfer Jose Manuel Lara was disqualified from the BMW International Open due to a "serious breach of etiquette" after his caddie realized on the second hole that they were carrying 15 golf clubs (one more than allowed) and attempted to hide the extra club in a bush to avoid a penalty.
#70
TIL in 1979 an armed group seized Grand Mosque of Mecca, taking hostages. They were conservative islamists led by a self-proclaimed prophet.
#71
TIL that Carlo Gambino, namesake of the Gambino crime family and one of the most powerful Mafia bosses in US history, only spent 22 months in prison during a 50-year criminal career.
#72
TIL that after leaving the White House, Harry Truman was pulled over on the Pennsylvania Turnpike for driving too slowly in the passing lane
#73
TIL that George Washington never actually served in the British Army. Though he sought a commission in the Army, which would have afforded him prestigious privileges and status, he only served in the Virginia Militia prior to the Revolutionary War.
#74
TIL that Janet Hubert, the original Aunt Viv from "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air", wasn't fired from the show. Instead, she declined a new contract that would have prevented her from taking other acting jobs, believing it was an attempt to "put her in her place" due to existing friction on the set.
#75
TIL Australians have a diet trend called “Kangatarianism” that focuses on eating only kangaroo meat for environmental reasons
#77
TIL in the late 1990s, McDonald's began implementing its "Made For You" system into its restaurants, which did away with a decades-old process of making sandwiches by the batch ahead of time and putting them in warming bins.
#78
TIL that the primary nuclear reactor design in Canada (CANDU) is unable to be licensed in America or the EU as they forbid reactors with Positive Void Coefficients
#79
TIL the Charlotte Hornets apologized after giving a child a PS5, only to take it away off camera and exchange it for a jersey. In a statement, the team said the incident was an "on-court skit that missed the mark" and that they would give the child the PS5 and a VIP experience to a future game.
#80
TIL that two skinny tires on one wheel are better in the rain and no worse in dry conditions than a standard tire
#81
TIL that throughout human history the average age of having a baby has been 23.2 for women and 30.7 for men
#82
TIL poker players used to call an off-suit Ace-King an "Anna Kournikova". This is for two reasons: first is that it's her initials, and much like Anna herself, an off-suit AK looks really good but rarely ever wins.
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BookFanatic 6 months ago
TIL The "gin and tonic" drink came about as a way to combat malaria in the 19th century. British sailors and soldiers were given a daily ration of "tonic water" (containing quinine--an anti-malarial) and would mix it into gin to improve the taste.
Julia H 6 months ago
With tonic containing quinine, id wondered what the link was.
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BookFanatic 6 months ago
TIL The "gin and tonic" drink came about as a way to combat malaria in the 19th century. British sailors and soldiers were given a daily ration of "tonic water" (containing quinine--an anti-malarial) and would mix it into gin to improve the taste.
Julia H 6 months ago
With tonic containing quinine, id wondered what the link was.
Load More Replies... 
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