10 Historical Facts That They Don't Teach In School

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10 Historical Facts That They Don't Teach In School

Bear Essentials/National Geographic Kids

You could spend every moment of every day reading about the history of the world for your entire life, and never even make a dent in the full story. It is simply just too massive for any one person (or even group of people) to undertake, that is why we are selective with what we teach and learn in schools.

That being said, there are just some things that they just don't teach in schools because the facts are just so ridiculous that they don't seem real. Let's take a look at some of history's strangest facts that you won't learn in a classroom.

1. Einstein could have been president.

Though not for the United States, Einstein turned down the presidency of Israel because he said "he had no head for problems." There is no telling what would have happened if he had become a world leader.

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2. Lyndon B. Johnson had an interesting nickname.

Sticking with presidential facts, Lyndon B. Johnson nicknamed his own Johnson "Jumbo." There are numerous stories of him wandering around the White House waving his prodigious member in the air, and even bragging about his size during meetings.

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3. This Civil War rule is kind of outrageous.

Soldiers have their own code of honor and ethics, most of which are unwritten rules to which they are expected to follow. One such code of honor during the Civil War stated that: soldiers were forbidden to shoot the enemy if they were pooping.

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4. Would you like some poison for dinner?

Roman Emperors used to intentionally poison themselves every day. The practice was called mithridatism, and they hoped that by routinely ingesting small amounts of poison that they would eventually build up an immunity to it. It works for some poisons, but in a lot of cases they ended up killing themselves because of a long time build up of toxins in the body.

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5. Thank Teddy Roosevelt for the Teddy Bear.

When Teddy Roosevelt refused to shoot a tiny bear cub, the story spread like wild fire. A toy company decided to capitalize on the situation and produced the first plush bear, dubbing it as we now know today, the Teddy Bear.

Bear Essentials

It gets even stranger from here.

6. The Civil War age gap.

There was a 69-year difference between the youngest and oldest soldiers during the Civil War. The youngest was an 11-year-old boy from Mississippi, and the oldest was an 80-year-old man from Iowa.

Daily Mirror

7. Ben Frankly liked the ladies.

Ben Franklin, one of the founding fathers of the United States was quite the ladies man. It is said that he would visit brothels and other such establishments almost every night in order to curb his appetite.

Famous Biographies

8. Pirates knew how to torture you.

Though pirates as we fantasize about them are long gone to the past, their legacy has remained for centuries. If they wanted to torture an enemy they got down right sadistic. They would either tow you behind the ship on rope which would make breathing difficult, and also act as a beacon for sharks, or they would leave you on a deserted island where you would slowly die of dehydration or starvation.

The Cheat Sheet

9. The creation of the Milky Way..?

The Milky Way has its current name because the ancient Greeks believe that it was created when the Goddess Hera sprayed her breast milk into the sky...

ThingLink/National Geographic Kids

10. The U.S. once confiscated a lot of sex toys.

Anthony Comstock liked to refer to people's dildos and other sex toys as "immoral rubber goods." He was so angered by the existence of these products that in 1882, he went about confiscating almost 65,000 pounds of "illicit material."

Church and State

What is the strangest historical fact that you know? Let us know in the comments.