19 Mind-Blowing Facts They Didn't Teach in 90s Schools

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Laurent Shinar • Writer and Editor
May 28, 2025 11:30 AM EDT

Ah, school in the 90s. Fresh off the back of the end of capital punishment and straight into the throes of the technological revolution. In all likelihood, our teachers had no idea what they needed to teach us to prepare us for the brave new world that was unfolding in front of them, nor did they know how to keep us in line without the aid of a ruler.

The odds were stacked against them and against us, and there is little denying that in the end we were the ones who lost out. But there is a saving grace, in that we were the first to grow up with the internet, and we were quick to discover that there is a whole world of weird but wildly interesting facts out there that we did not know. And so to complete your education, we figured we would help out with this mind-blowingly informative list of weird facts that they did not teach in our 90s schools.

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  • 01
    Weird REPRESENTATIVE Valentina Vassilyev was a Russian peasant woman in the 18th century who is reported to have given birth to 69 children between 1725 and 1765. Her births included 16 pairs of twins, 7 sets of triplets, and 4 sets of quadruplets.
    via factsweird
  • 02
    Weird REPRESENTATIVE In the United States, several people have chosen to marry themselves as part of a self-empowerment movement that began in 2000. Some even hold wedding receptions and take themselves on honeymoons.
    via factsweird
  • 03
    838 The person who invented the stop sign, the pedestrian crosswalk, the traffic circle, the one-way street, the taxi stand, and the pedestrian safety islands never learned how to drive a car. Weird
    via factsweird

  • Which explains why these pieces of infrastructure are so good and sage for pedestrians. The chances that a person who had a license and drove would ever consider the needs of pedestrians is little to none. And stands as a shining beacon to the principle that in order to truly revolutionize something, you need to know it intimately inside and out.

  • 04
    Weird 20th Century Fox In Home Alone, the vintage gangster movie that Kevin watches (called Angels with Filthy Souls) isn't a real movie. It was created solely for the film and is a one-minute sequence designed to look like a vintage movie.
    via factsweird
  • 05
    園 Weird REPRESENTATIVE An 18th-century Italian-made violin, valued at $100,000, was accidentally left at a bar. The bar used it for a fiddle contest, allowing the winner to keep the violin as a prize. That winner pawned it for just $600. The violin was later found abandoned in an alley near the Manhattan bar where its owner had left it.
    via factsweird
  • 06
    Weird Only three people in the nation were qualified to hand-pack the parachutes for Apollo 15. Their expertise was so vital they were not allowed to ride in the same car together for fear that a single auto accident could cripple the space program.
    via factsweird
  • 07
    Weird REPRESENTATIVE A cat in New Zealand tricked two women into adopting him without either knowing about the other. After he went to the vet for stitches, they discovered the truth and agreed to a shared custody arrangement, allowing the cat to keep both names and owners.
    via factsweird
  • 08
    牛 **** Weird REPRESENTATIVE A couple in Japan divorces and remarries every three years to take turns using their family names, as they cannot agree on which last name to use.
    via factsweird
  • 09
    Weird William Wrigley, Jr. sold soaps in 1891, offering buyers baking powder as an incentive. The baking powder became more popular, so he started selling it, offering gum as an incentive. But the gum was even more popular, so he started selling them. In 1893, he launched Juicy Fruit.
    via factsweird

  • Further proof that we were taught to work as part of the masses, rather than think for ourselves. Could you imagine what kind of creative ideas and inspiration we would have had, growing up with stories like this one? Pure examples of the never ending will power of the human spirit. 

  • 10
    AYA OAU BAYA LAKSANA S816 1000000 SURO OYO US Weird Mujionomaruf / CC BY-SA 4.0 Residents in Surabaya, Indonesia, can pay for bus fares using plastic waste instead of money. By paying with plastic waste, passengers will receive 2 hours of travel time. This initiative aims to reduce plastic waste while encouraging more people to use public transportation, thus lowering the number of cars on the road.
    via factsweird
  • 11
    Weird A man sued Pepsi after finding a mouse in his Mountain Dew. Pepsi's attorneys claimed that Mountain Dew would dissolve a mouse in 30 days, and they showed that his can was purchased 74 days after it was manufactured.
    via factsweird
  • 12
    Weird T REPRESENTATIVE In 1994, a 73-year-old man who was unable to obtain a driver's license traveled 240 miles on a 1966 John Deere lawnmower to visit his brother, who had recently suffered a stroke. At a top speed of 5 mph, the journey took six weeks. His incredible story inspired the 1999 film "The Straight Story."
    via factsweird
  • 13
    Researchers found that men walk significantly slower when accompanied by their romantic partner but maintain almost full speed when walking with a friend or acquaintance.
    via factsweird
  • 14
    Weird Highway hypnosis is a mental state in which a person can drive a vehicle for long distances, responding to external events safely and appropriately, without any clear recollection of having consciously done so. This can lead to partial or complete amnesia regarding the time spent driving.
    via factsweird
  • 15
    The longest anyone has survived on a shipwrecked raft is 133 days, achieved by a Chinese man named Poon Lim. He resorted to fishing, catching seabirds, and collecting rainwater when supplies ran low. Weird
    via factsweird
  • 16
    Weird In 1912, a boy named Bobby Dunbar went missing. Eight months later, he was discovered living with another family that claimed he was their son, Bruce Anderson. The Andersons didn't have the money to fight in court, so they lost the case. In 2004, DNA testing confirmed that the boy was not Bobby Dunbar.
    via factsweird
  • 17
    Weird Upon his death, Radio & TV star Jack Benny's widow, Mary, received a red rose. After several days, with another rose delivered each day, Mary called to find out who was sending them. The florist told her that Benny made arrangements for a rose to be sent to her every day for the rest of her life.
    via factsweird
  • 18
    Godia TEQUILA CATRON Weire EBR TNI IT Gage Skidmore/flickr During the making of "Rocky,” Sylvester Stallone asked Earnie Shavers, who is widely regarded as the hardest puncher in boxing, to punch him for real. After just one punch, Stallone vomited.
    via factsweird
  • 19
    Weird TriStar Pictures Real bees were used in the making of the 90s horror trilogy CANDYMAN. Throughout the three films, actor Tony Todd was stung 23 times and was paid $1,000 for each sting.
    via factsweird

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