Interesting facts

Strange and surprising facts about many different topics
written and recorded by Jaksyn Peacock

Listen&Learn: Letter cases
Learn why English uses two types of letters

Listen&Learn: Origins of trick-or-treat
Learn why children ask for candy on Halloween

Listen&Learn: Doomsday predictions
Learn about times people have predicted the end of the world

Listen&Learn: The Great Blue Hole
Learn about a hole in the ocean

Listen&Learn: Midnight sun
Learn about the long days on the Earth’s poles

Listen&Learn: Mountweazels
Learn why some encyclopedias might contain fake articles.

Listen&Learn: Twin language
Learn about the invented languages of children.

Listen&Learn: April Fools’ Day
Learn facts and theories about the annual celebration of pranks.

Listen&Learn: Missouri cheese caves
Learn about the cheese the US government stores underground.

Listen&Learn: Tetrachromacy
Learn about the rare eye condition that allows people to see more colours.

Listen&Learn: The QWERTY keyboard
Learn about the standard English keyboard.

Listen&Learn: Space espresso
Learn how astronauts drink coffee.

Listen&Learn: The Future Library
Learn about the stories written for people 100 years from now.

Listen&Learn: Dominant hands
Learn about the differences between right-handed and left-handed people.

Listen&Learn: Deep-sea gigantism
Learn why animals that live in deep water grow so large.

Listen&Learn: Greenland sharks
Learn about the sharks that can live for hundreds of years.

Listen&Learn: The Beale ciphers
Learn about the mystery of possible buried treasure in Virginia.

Listen&Learn: Pando
Learn about the thousands of trees that share the same roots.

Listen&Learn: The D. B. Cooper case
Learn about a fascinating unsolved mystery.

Listen&Learn: Esperanto
Learn about the constructed language with over 100,000 speakers.

Listen&Learn: The holiday space prank
Learn about the Christmas prank played by two astronauts.

Listen&Learn: Military dolphins
Learn about the dolphins that are trained for war.

Listen&Learn: The town that banned death
Learn about the town where dying is not allowed.

Listen&Learn: Alaska’s cat mayor
Learn about the cat that was voted into office.

Listen&Learn: Koko the gorilla
Learn about the gorilla who used sign language to communicate.

Listen&Learn: Human Libraries
Places for people to tell their stories and learn about each other.

Listen&Learn: The language of flowers
Learn how people used flowers to send messages in the 19th century.

Listen&Learn: Whale songs
Learn some different theories about why whales sing.

Listen&Learn: The Mandela Effect
How groups of people can share memories that aren’t real.

Listen&Learn: The town with one resident
Learn about Monowi, Nebraska – a town with a population of one.

Listen&Learn: The dog who knows 1,000 words
Learn about Chaser, the border collie known as the smartest dog in the world.

Listen&Learn: Why hurricanes have human names
Find out why and how tropical storms are given their names.

Listen&Learn: Australia’s bright pink lake
This lake confused scientists and fascinated tourists.

Listen&Learn: The “Rabbit Island” in Japan
An adorable tourist destination with a surprising history.

Listen&Learn: The cat who helped write a scientific paper
The reason why a physicist decided to name his cat as the co-author of his research paper.

Listen&Learn: The library of discarded books
A library in Turkey that rescues books that have been thrown away.

Listen&Learn: Rubber ducks lost in the ocean
How a failed shipment of rubber ducks helped scientists understand ocean currents.

Listen&Learn: The Voynich manuscript
A mysterious book written in an unknown language.

The Mona Lisa
How the world’s most famous painting became so popular.

All About Mardi Gras
Food, parades, dancing, and masks – learn about the Mardi Gras celebration.

The Haunted Vending Machine in Seattle, Washington
All about the vending machine that might have been owned by ghosts.