r/todayilearned • u/Tall-Run-5511 • 6h ago

TIL Disneyland originally used real human skeletons provided by the UCLA Medical Center in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride because 1960s fake bones weren't convincing enough

sfgate.com

6.4k Upvotes

312 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sandstorm400 • 10h ago

TIL that in 2014, a recall was issued for about 2.2 million bean bag chairs that had zippers on them after two children were found dead inside two of the chairs, having suffocated from lack of air and from inhaling the chair's foam beads.

cpsc.gov

13.3k Upvotes

660 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Gnomeslikeprofit • 9h ago

TIL that the "pre-filled" tax return is a new innovation in the tax world used by 90% of OECD countries. Gov't. administrators pre-fill a tax return based on data collected. In China, 85% of VAT refund applications info is pre-filled. The IRS, the USA's tax agency, does not offer pre-filled returns.

oecd.org

8.0k Upvotes

822 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 13h ago

TIL that in 2016, a Chinese artist spent 3 days building a $15,000 LEGO statue or Nick Wilde from Zootopia. Shortly after it was put on display, a 4-year-old boy accidentally knocked it over, destroying it. The artist refused an offer of compensation from the parents.

abcnews.com

17.6k Upvotes

867 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ansyhrrian • 12h ago

TIL that in 2010, UCF professor Richard Quinn uncovered a massive cheating scandal by analyzing statistical anomalies in exam scores, prompting 205 students to come forward and forcing all 600 to retake the exam.

youtube.com

5.6k Upvotes

650 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 7h ago

TIL that Portugal’s crown prince, Pedro, was governing Brazil when he declared its independence in 1822, breaking with the kingdom ruled by his own father. A month later, he declared himself Brazil’s first emperor.

en.wikipedia.org

1.6k Upvotes

55 comments

r/todayilearned • u/CyberpunkSunrise • 11h ago

TIL that the 2011 dark/action comedy film “30 Minutes or Less” mirrors a real-life event where a pizza delivery driver was forced to wear a bomb collar and rob a bank, ultimately dying when the bomb detonated, though the filmmakers denied knowledge of the real-life story.

en.wikipedia.org

2.5k Upvotes

170 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Financial-Horror1844 • 4h ago

TIL during the Spanish-American War, approximately 1,100 men died in combat while 17,000 died from disease.

en.wikipedia.org

679 Upvotes

44 comments

r/todayilearned • u/AetheriaNox • 13h ago

TIL in 2016, a sweet shop owner in Pakistan confessed to mixing a highly toxic pesticide into the sweets after an argument with his brother and co-owner. From 20 April to 8 May 2016, at least 33 people, including five children, died from the purposely poisoned baked confection.

en.wikipedia.org

3.4k Upvotes

113 comments

r/todayilearned • u/HolyCowAnyOldAccName • 13h ago

TIL you could fit every planet in the Solar System between Earth and the Moon

skyatnightmagazine.com

3.2k Upvotes

321 comments

r/todayilearned • u/TooKreamy4U • 21h ago

TIL In 2012, an Irish mother delivered her first twin prematurely, and her contractions stopped. This allowed the second twin to stay safely inside the womb for another 87 days. This rare occurrence is known as a delayed-interval delivery. It broke the previous world record of 84 days.

irishamerica.com

11.7k Upvotes

267 comments

r/todayilearned • u/bastugubbar • 15h ago

TIL Albert Einstein, besides his work as a physicist and mathematician was also a Fridge engineer. Together with a former student Leo Szilard he helped invent several new technologies in refrigeration and jointly held 45 patents, including a design for a fridge with no moving parts.

en.wikipedia.org

2.5k Upvotes

36 comments

r/todayilearned • u/MembershipHuman4837 • 16h ago

Herbert Hoover TIL that Lou Hoover - Henry Hoover's wife - had a tradition of leaving one chair empty whenever she entertained company, as a reminder of ongoing child poverty.

en.wikipedia.org

2.9k Upvotes

126 comments

r/todayilearned • u/ComfortableGreySloth • 16h ago

TIL about heraldic hatching, a historical method of representing color without color.

en.wikipedia.org

2.9k Upvotes

85 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 5h ago

TIL golfer Tom Morris Jr. won four consecutive British Opens in 1868, 1869, 1870 and 1872. (There was no tournament in 1871.) He won his first at just 17 and all four before turning 22. In 1875 his wife and baby died during a difficult delivery. He died four months later. He was only 24.

en.wikipedia.org

326 Upvotes

19 comments

r/todayilearned • u/NetflixSux247 • 14h ago

TIL the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Movie pitch was to have starred comedians Sam Kinison, Gallagher, Bobcat Goldthwait and Billy Crystal in green make-up as the turtles.

en.wikipedia.org

1.4k Upvotes

204 comments

r/todayilearned • u/obalovatyk • 21h ago

TIL Up until 1981 Boeing used depleted uranium as counter weights in parts of their 747’s

simpleflying.com

5.9k Upvotes

305 comments

r/todayilearned • u/mvincen95 • 1d ago

TIL that despite their name, it is biologically impossible for a centipede to be born with exactly 100 legs because a genetic quirk dictates they always have an odd number of leg pairs.

en.wikipedia.org

16.2k Upvotes

404 comments

r/todayilearned • u/AetheriaNox • 16h ago

TIL the longest-standing record chronicled in The Guinness Book of Records belongs to the monk, St Simeon the Stylite (c. AD 386–459), who spent approximately 39 years on a stone pillar in Syria. His purpose was self-persecution for people's sins, and to be nearer God.

guinnessworldrecords.com

1.1k Upvotes

154 comments

r/todayilearned • u/NBrief • 9h ago

TIL that Finnish physicist Tuomo Suntola developed atomic layer deposition technology in the 1970s, a process now used to manufacture the ultra-thin material layers found in modern microprocessors and digital memory devices.

en.wikipedia.org

230 Upvotes

2 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Citrus2015 • 18h ago

TIL: Eumenes of Cardia who went from being Alexander the Great's secretary to defeating one of Alexander's greatest generals in his first major battle

en.wikipedia.org

1.2k Upvotes

73 comments

r/todayilearned • u/carboncopy95437 • 13h ago

TIL Russian Greco-Roman wrestler Aleksandr Karelin won three Olympic gold medals and nine world championships, retiring with 887 wins and just two losses. His final defeat came against American Rulon Gardner at the 2000 Olympics by one point in a controversial call.

en.wikipedia.org

380 Upvotes

72 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Recent_Flounder6011 • 7h ago

TIL that the Albanian language has the admirative mood to express feelings like surprise or irony.

en.wikipedia.org

102 Upvotes

8 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Sebastianlim • 1d ago

TIL about Cryptic Pregnancies, which is when a pregnancy shows little to no symptoms to the point that the woman can be unaware that she is pregnant until she is in labor in some cases.

my.clevelandclinic.org

7.5k Upvotes

839 comments

r/todayilearned • u/Finnish_Swede • 15h ago

TIL that King Charles III’s paternal grandfather, Prince Andrew of Greece, was a Major General in the Greco-Turkish War and got court-martialed and exiled after being blamed for losing the important Battle of the Sakarya which caused the Greek defeat in the war.

en.wikipedia.org

464 Upvotes

42 comments

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As of May 2026

This list was compiled from /r/todayilearned community suggestions by its members. If your TIL is found on this list, it will be removed. The titles have been abridged for the sake of brevity, however the context remains the same. This list is subject to change. The purpose is to keep content fresh on /r/todayilearned as requested by its members. If you are interested in reading about the TILs on this list use the search box feature and enter the keywords to pull up past TILs.

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