Note: This is a guest article contributed by frequent TIFO visitor and owner of DumpADay, Jon. Today I found the Slinky was originally intended to be used as a tension spring in a battleship engine horsepower meter. In 1943, Richard James, a marine engineer in a Philadelphia shipyard, was working at his desk, developing a special meter designed to monitor […]
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Today I found out that the Popsicle was invented by an eleven-year-old boy. In 1905, eleven-year-old Frank Epperson from San Francisco, California invented the popular hot weather treat, the Popsicle as we know it today. However, the invention supposedly came about as a pure accident! According to the Popsicle company, one cold evening Frank left a mixture of powder flavored […]
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Today I found out the microwave oven was invented by accident by a man who was orphaned and never finished grammar school. The man was Percy Spencer. At the age of just 18 months old, Spencer’s father died and his mother soon left him to his aunt and uncle. His uncle then died when Spencer was just seven years old. […]
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Today I found out Super Glue was invented by accident, twice. Super Glue, also known as cyanoacrylate, was originally discovered in 1942 by Dr. Harry Coover, who by the way died last month on March 26th, 2011. Coover was attempting to make clear plastic gun sights to be put on guns used by Allied soldiers in WWII. One particular formulation […]
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This week’s Today I Found Out articles will all be themed towards accidental inventions that are now common products. If you happen to know of any popular products that were invented by accident, feel free to email me here and let me know. If it’s interesting enough, I’ll do an article on it.
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Embed This Infographic Source: Today I found out How to Make Maple Syrup Ever find yourself sitting there enjoying a stack of pancakes dripping with melted butter and maple syrup (getting hungry aren’t you?) and find yourself wondering, “I wonder how maple syrup is made?” …. Ya me neither. However, on the off chance you’re out of maple syrup and […]
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Note: This is a guest article contributed by frequent TIFO visitor, paramedic, and amateur physicist, Scott. Today I found out why we divide the day in to seconds, minutes, and hours. The concept of needing to divide up the day seems second nature to even the smallest kid who asks, “is it snack time”. The reality is, even though we’ve […]
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Today I found out that Elvis didn’t naturally have black hair. He was born a blond and, when he got older, his hair was more of a sandy blond color. He started occasionally dying it black all the way back when he was in high school and eventually just always kept it as black. Other fun Elvis Related Facts: There […]
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Today I found out why short movie advertisement clips are called “trailers”, even though they are typically shown before the movie. It turns out, the first movie trailers occurred not at the beginning of the films, as they do today, but rather at the end of the films. They were called “trailers” because the advertisements would be spliced directly on the end of […]
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Today I found out bread goes stale about six times faster in the refrigerator then when kept at room temperature. On the surface, this might seem counter intuitive; after all, everyone knows if you want to keep food fresher longer, you put it in the fridge. The problem stems from what bread is made out of, specifically starch molecules, and […]
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Today I found out that toilet paper was first used by the Chinese about 1300 years before it caught on with the rest of the world. The first references of people using toilet paper dates back to the 6th century AD in the Chinese Imperial courts and amongst the other wealthy citizens of China. This eventually spread throughout China and […]
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Note: This is a guest article contributed by frequent TIFO visitor and owner of DumpADay, Jon. Today I Found Out that Dolph Lundgren (A.K.A. Ivan Drago) is a real life genius. I guess the phrase “you can’t judge a book by its cover” is true. Just looking at Mr. Lundgren, I’d think he was a fun guy to hang out […]
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Today I found out the world’s most fearless creature is the Honey Badger, according to the Guinness Book of World Records. Honey Badgers have many reasons to be fearless. They have very thick (about 1/4 inches), rubbery skin, which is so tough that it’s been shown to be nearly impervious to traditionally made arrows and spears. Further, their skin can […]
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Today I found out how the “I’m going to Disneyland/Disney World” saying got started. In January of 1987, CEO of Disney, Michael Eisner, and his wife were having dinner with Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager. Rutan and Yeager had just recently become the first to fly an aircraft around the world without re-fueling or stopping. At a certain point in […]
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Today I found out Robert Downey Jr. modeled his portrayal of Tony Stark after Elon Musk, one of the founds of Zip2, Paypal, Tesla Motors, Solar City, and SpaceX. During the planning stages of Iron Man, after Downey Jr. had been cast, director Jon Favreau and Downey Jr. sat down to discuss how to make a really believable Tony Stark […]
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Note: This is a guest article contributed by frequent TIFO visitor and owner of DumpADay, Jon. Today I found out that in the 1960s, the CIA spent 5 years and over $20 million training spy cats. I guess it’s not as strange as it might first seem. Cats are stealthy, smart, fast, can jump tall objects, and most people when […]
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