Today I Learned 🎓

14 October 2026 03:49

TIL Stephen King initally threw away the first few written pages of manuscript for "Carrie" in his wastepaper basket, giving up on the project. It was his wife, Tabitha King, who fished them out of the trash, and gave it back to him, telling him that the idea was good, and he ought to go on. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

14 October 2026 00:49

TIL Parkinson's Law is an observation written in 1955 where "work expands to fill the available time", which inspired the facetious Stock-Sanford corollary: "If you wait until the last minute, it only takes a minute to do." [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 23:49

TIL chewing gum is not biodegradable because it is made from synthetic polymers and plastics [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 21:49

TIL that ancient hunter-gatherer populations consumed between 100g-150g of fiber per day, contrasting with the 15g of fiber the average American adult consumes daily. Between 90-95% of Americans fail to meet daily fiber recommendations. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 20:49

TIL that in 1994, Disney offered a 13-year-old Jason Weaver $2 million to sing in ‘The Lion King.’ Jason declined. Instead, his mom negotiated and took $100K plus royalties instead. He’s still getting paid 34 years later. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 18:49

TIL a-96-year old WWII veteran received a love letter from his wife 72 years after she wrote it. The letter had been hidden beneath the stairs of their old home since 1945. His wife died six years earlier so their son read the letter to him. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 16:49

TIL that Emperor Wenxuan of Northern Qi was an alcoholic who, when drunk, had a habit of taking off all his clothes and running around the capital naked, even in the coldest winters. He would also sometimes sleep on the streets and personally behead passersby. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 14:49

TIL there has been at least one hazing-related death on a U.S. college campus every year since 1969. Over 200 university hazing deaths have occurred since 1838. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 12:49

TIL the longest running voice actor for Mickey Mouse, Wayne Allwine, was married to the longest running voice actress for Minnie Mouse, Russi Taylor. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 07:49

TIL that the Apollo 11 Source Code is available on GitHub and even back then they were cracking jokes in the comments of their code [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 06:49

TIL In 2021, a man in Beaverton, Oregon, stole a woman's SUV only to discover that her 4-year-old son was in the back seat. He reportedly drove back, returned the child to his mother, and scolded her for leaving him unattended. He drove away again but the SUV was recovered hours later without him [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 04:49

TIL Mork & Mindy was a spinoff of Happy Days. Robin Williams first played Mork in February 1978, when the alien tried to take Richie Cunningham to planet Ork as a specimen, only to be stopped by Fonzie. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 03:49

TIL that after German bombers sank the SS John Harvey at Bari in 1943, releasing its secret cargo of American mustard gas and killing dozens, the US military initially covered up the chemical leak by attributing the victims' deaths to “burns due to enemy action”. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 00:49

TIL in 2005 two African Flamingos escaped from a Zoo in Wichita, Kansas. And 13 years later one of them was spotted and identified as living in Texas. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

12 October 2026 21:49

Today I learned that Wisconsin is the only U.S. state that requires a license to make cheese. Becoming a master Cheesemaker takes 13 additional years. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

14 October 2026 02:49

TIL that the actor Hervé Villechaize, most famous for staring as Tattoo on the TV series Fantasy Island was an accomplished painter. At age 16, he entered he entered the École des Beaux-Art and by 1961, at age 18, he became the youngest artist ever to have his work displayed in the Museum of Paris. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

14 October 2026 00:49

TIL that there is no record of the death of 12 Years a Slave (1853) author, Solomon Northup. There is only one account of him alive after 1857, leading to speculation he was enslaved again. Historians believe he most likely died in 1863 or 1864. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 23:49

TIL about the Ash Street Shootout. An intense gunfight between US Army Rangers and the Crips. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 21:49

TIL biomass of large predatory fish has declined worldwide by at least 90% over the past 50–100 years, according to a study published in 2005. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 19:49

TIL that Taylor Swift used 34 different album variants in a single week to break Adele's record for the biggest sales week in modern music history. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 17:49

TIL for six years Ann Moore, "the Fasting Woman of Tutbury," drew crowds and gifts by claiming she could live without food. In 1813 a committee put her on a bed fitted with a weighing machine to watch her for a month; she gave up after nine days and made a written confession. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 15:49

TIL that Australia has an exceptionally low adoption rate, with only 155 adoptions finalised in 2024-2025, with 119 of these being known child adoptions. This represents a 98% fall from 1971-1972. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 13:49

TIL Before the introduction of chess clocks, competitive chess games would often take 8 hours or more, with one famous match between Howard Staunton and Pierre St. Amant in 1843 reportedly taking over 14 hours [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 10:49

TIL that a man was held prisoner in him room by his father and stepmother for 20 years. When he escaped by setting the house on fire, he weighed only 68 pounds. Though his father had since died, the stepmother was charged and is awaiting trial. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 07:49

TIL about Dawit Isaak, an Eritrean-Swedish playwright, journalist and writer who has been incarcerated in Eritrea since 2001. He is considered to be one of the world's longest continuously detained journalists, assuming he is still alive. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 05:49

TIL that during WWI, German troops stopped to drink captured wine in Champagne's cellars, delaying their advance. Historians have found that the wine contributed to delays during the 1918 German spring offensive [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 03:49

TIL of the Fuggerei, the world's oldest social housing still in use (first opened in 1516), whose door bells are all unique to allow people to find their way home in the dark before street lights existed. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 01:49

TIL a phone company planted hundreds of telephone poles in a field and spent half a century measuring their resilience [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

13 October 2026 00:49

TIL that the passenger pigeon, once a common American food staple, went extinct in 1914. Two years later, scientists began work to develop a "broiler" chicken, bred specifically for meat production. By 1960, per-capita consumption of chicken was 28 pounds. By 2018, it was estimated at 92.5 pounds. [Source]

Today I Learned 🎓

12 October 2026 20:49

TIL that in 1963 several cows were carried into the air by a tornado in Illinois. They survived but "acted strangely for several days" [Source]