In the 1830s, ketchup was sold as medicine — for baldness, jaundice and all 🍅
Patent-medicine makers bottled tomato ketchup as a cure-all, because tomatoes were then thought to hold real healing power.
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64 discoveries
The 1908 Olympic tug-of-war was decided by boots, not biceps 🥾
Liverpool's police team wore hefty hobnailed boots that dug in, while their rivals slid in ordinary shoes. The Americans complained, but the boots stayed on — and so did the gold.
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That scream you've heard in a hundred films? A 1951 extra, one take.
The same brief yelp was recorded for Distant Drums and kept getting pulled from the studio library, so it now echoes through Star Wars, Indiana Jones and countless others. 🎬
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Octopuses taste with their arms, one sucker at a time
Their suckers are packed with chemoreceptors, so every touch gives them a literal taste of what they're handling.
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The first car to break 100 km/h was electric, in 1899
Camille Jenatzy's torpedo-shaped La Jamais Contente hit 105.88 km/h outside Paris. Petrol cars soon caught up, and electrics vanished for decades. ⚡
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Victorian pubs installed frosted screens so you could drink without being spotted
They were called snob screens because they let a respectable customer sip in his own little booth, invisible to the bar. The barman, of course, could see everyone. 🍺
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Lightning strikes when the sky above you is still blue ☀️
The bolt comes from a storm too far away to see, and the thunder is just air exploding outward from its heat. So much for waiting for the rain 🌧️
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Mona Lisa ditched her eyebrows to keep up with Florentine fashion
Florentine women of the era often removed their eyebrows entirely, considering a high forehead more beautiful. Leonardo simply painted his sitter in line with the trend. 🖌️
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Guard: 'It's 3 AM, do you know where your crown is?' 👑
The Yeoman Warders at the Tower of London are drilled to be ready to assist with a coronation at a moment's notice, so the crown jewels are always kept in a state of readiness. 👑
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Norway built a thunder generator to catch lightning in a supercapacitor
When the strike hit, a coil converted the enormous current into a safer, lower voltage so the supercapacitor could store a tiny charge — enough to show it's possible, not to power your house. ⚡
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One NHL goalie refused a mask until 1974, trusting only his face to stop pucks
While most goalies strapped on fibreglass masks after a 1959 injury, Andy Brown didn't wear one until his last season in the league. 😬
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Green sky before a tornado is the cloud showing off, not the tornado
A tornado is colourless air. The green comes from sunlight filtered through an exceptionally water- and ice-heavy thundercloud, so the storm gets the credit while the funnel just passes through.
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