Jeane asks: A friend told me Chickenpox is a form of Herpes. Is this true? Yes Jeane, Chickenpox is one form of a Herpes Virus. Most of us are familiar with the 2 sexually transmitted types of Herpes: Type 1 (oral herpes) and type 2 (genital herpes). But actually, there are over 25 known viruses that fall into the Herpes’ […]
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Ken J. asks: How is the calorie content in food determined? First, let’s make sure everybody here understands what a calorie is. A calorie is just a measurement of energy- the amount of energy needed to raise 1 gram of water 1 degree Celsius at standard atmospheric pressure. This makes sense when talking about calories in food. Food provides energy […]
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Contrary to popular belief, “Rock Around the Clock” was not the first Rock ‘n’ Roll record to be recorded. In fact, it wasn’t even Bill Haley’s first Rock record. “Rock Around the Clock” was, however, the first-ever Rock ‘n’ Roll song to hit the #1 spot on the pop charts. It transformed rock from a novelty and a curiosity to […]
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Today I found out was started three years ago on January 1, 2010. In that span about 20 million people have visited the site with around 7.2 million of those people visiting at least once in 2012. There are now over 1400 posts between “regular” articles, “This Day In History” posts, Quick Facts, Infographics, and Answers. 2013 should be an […]
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As someone who’s been lucky enough to work in movies and is a gigantically huge movie fan on top of that, I was saddened this last July by the death of the great Ernest Borgnine. One of Hollywood’s last genuine legends, Ernest passed on at the ripe old age of 95, looking not a day older than 70, on July […]
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The condition is known as “prosopagnosia” / “facial agnosia”, or in less medical terms: “face blindness”. (“Prosopagnosia” actually literally means: “face ignorance”. “prosopon” = “face”, “agnosia” = “not knowing” or “ignorance”). Once thought to be incredibly rare, with only 100 or so documented cases up until the last decade or so, it’s now thought that around 1 in every 50 […]
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This Day In History: December 29, 1890 On this day in history, 1890, the Seventh Cavalry opened fire on a Lakota Native American encampment with four rapid fire Hotchkiss guns, killing 150-300 of the group, including women and children. Along with the dead Lakota, around 25 of the cavalry troops themselves were killed with another 39 wounded, largely due to […]
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Embed This Infographic [Source: Today I Found Out] For Part 1 of this series go here: 10 Bizarre Facts For Part 2 of this series go here: 10 Bizarre Facts (Part-2)
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Today I found out the Johnny Cash song “A Boy Named Sue” was written by Shel Silverstein. The song was originally inspired by a friend of Silverstein’s, Jean Shepherd (noted writer, actor, radio personality, and humorist, who, among other things, co-wrote and narrated the holiday classic The Christmas Story film, partially based on his childhood). Jean had often been teased […]
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It was voted in 2000 by VH1 as the #3 song on its list of “Greatest Rock Songs” and landed the #31 spot on Rolling Stone magazine’s “Greatest Songs of All-Time” list. Written by Robert Plant (lyrics) and guitarist Jimmy Page (melody) Stairway to Heaven is not only Led Zeppelin’s signature song, it may well be the most beloved rock […]
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The (Carcharodon) Megalodon is thought to have looked something like a Great White Shark, only a bit more stocky and overall bigger… much bigger, with an average adult Megalodon estimated to have weighed around 70-100 tons (about 30 times that of a Great White Shark which full grown tend to be about 2.5-3 tons). The Megalodon is estimated to have […]
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Tristan asks: Why are some people right handed and some left handed? Tristan it appears that there is no single mechanism that will definitively determine which hand you will prefer. Technology and further studies will continue to help shed light on the subject. What is known is that it essentially comes down to genes and biological asymmetry in the human […]
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Merry Christmas from everyone here at Today I Found Out! While you’re sipping eggnog and trying your best to continue smiling and nodding while your cousin and cousin-in-law once again tell you how their little Stacey has a photographic memory and already sings and plays the piano as well as Norah Jones, despite being just 4 years old and publicly […]
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Maya asks: Why does Chemotherapy cause hair loss? Maya I love the question. It seems like once or twice a year I’m shaving my head to help raise money for cancer research and at every fundraiser, the question seems to come up- Why does the common treatment for cancer make body hair fall out? The answer is really pretty simple. […]
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On the whole, people don’t generally like to kill one another. Most wars throughout history are often more about the agendas of the state’s leaders than the soldiers on the field actually inherently feeling any real malice towards those they are asked to try to kill or otherwise defeat. Few events in history illustrate this as well as a remarkable […]
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Embed This Infographic [Source: Today I Found Out] For Part 1 of this series go here: 10 Interesting Christmas Facts You might also like: 12 Fascinating Christmas Traditions from Around the World
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This Day In History: December 21, 1898 On this day in history, 1898, Marie and Pierre Curie discovered the radioactive element radium (in the form of radium chloride), extracting it from uraninite. They first removed the uranium from the uraninite sample and then found that the remaining matter was still radioactive, so investigated further. Along with the barium in the […]
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The man was Eric Moussambani Malonga, later nicknamed “Eric the Eel”. Moussambani is from Equatorial Guinea in Africa and only managed to get into the Olympics at all because of a wildcard drawing system put in place by the International Olympic Committee, designed to try to encourage developing countries to participate in various Olympic events. Thanks to this drawing, Equatorial Guinea […]
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