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It’s no secret — fighting boredom is our specialty, and we recognized a long time ago that learning new and interesting insights about the world is the best way to do it. As history buffs, we love delving into remarkable moments from our past and the precious stories passed down from generation to generation. I still remember everything my grandparents told me about World War II, and I’m sure you have stories like that too.
Even so, have you ever stopped to think about the lesser-known events that have had a significant impact on the world but usually go overlooked or forgotten — our schools’ curricula frequently silent accomplices of which historical events get more recognition over others?
More often than not, we miss out on some of the most meaningful stories simply because they’re not taught in schools. They’re relegated to a small section of our books, mentioned in a line, or not included at all. And the same thing happens every day outside of school, with noteworthy but overlooked events that don’t get covered by the media, usually for lack of sensationalism or because they occur in a country far, far away from us.
Time to change that. We scoured the internet for some of the most impactful events that are often forgotten and found a goldmine of information on Reddit. This thread asked users to share which events and facts, in their opinion, make up the world’s unseen history. Thousands of users answered the call and shared their knowledge and perspectives on moments of history — both contemporary and less recent — that most people don’t know. Despite how limited our brain storage can be, some rarely mentioned events deserve their space in our memory and to be told again and again to future generations.
By exploring some of the lesser-known but significant historical events, we challenge the often limited narratives we are exposed to. From the Tulsa massacre in 1921 to the ongoing civil war in Myanmar, we’ll uncover some of the hidden history and lesser-known facts that shaped, and still do, the world as we know it.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
"Nestle buying up water rights everywhere in the world and not only is no one doing anything about it, but most idiots are also buying single-use plastic bottles to enable them by paying $$ for their own water. Ban Nestle from being allowed any water rights. They can go home to Switzerland and try it there on their own citizens and aquifers."
RELATED:
#2
SomeCollegeGwy said:
"This August a VACCINE for CANCER will begin human trials in the UK using the mRNA innovations from the covid-19 vaccine. It should be able to directly target cancer cells and only cancer cells (much much superior to chemotherapy). A vaccine for Lyme disease has been completed using the same technology. And a vaccine for Malaria has been developed using the same technology."
AnDroid5539 replied:
"One of the silver linings of the pandemic was that it pushed the development of mRNA vaccines ahead by leaps and bounds. Necessity really is the mother of invention, I guess."
RagDollLali 2 years ago
And yet there will still be so many people refusing to give their kids these vaccines BecAuSe ESsenTiAL OiLs aNd CRyStalS WorK BeTteR
#3
"26 September 1983 when a Soviet officer, Stanislav Petrov, literally saved the whole planet from nuclear war by identifying a nuclear missile attack alarm as false. Everyone owes him their lives today."
and_a_touch_of_the_’tism 2 years ago
Yup. He was one of 3 officers that had to sign off on the launch from a nuclear submarine, the other two got false information or something, but he wouldn’t sign off.
#4
"It was in this documentary I saw THE shady World of fast fashion on YouTube. All these mountains of used and unsold clothes from the first world are sold to western Africa. It's a huge business there. They are then sold to vendors who resell them. The leftover clothes are sent to a dump near the ocean and the pile of them is unbelievable. It stretches for miles. The environmental problems the textile industry causes at all levels from pesticides to water use and chemicals in dyes to transport of clothes is one of the number one pollution sources on the globe."
#5
"China, despite not having any sophisticated matching system, is the world's second-largest organ transplant industry in the world. Some human rights scientists noticed that in China one could get an organ donor with a 2-week turnaround. They thought, hmmm, the US with one of the most sophisticated match systems in the world, and the wait list is YEARS - math ain’t adding up. Well, they looked into it - found out there is rampant organ harvesting from political prisoners, and the “disappeared”. Wanna guess where the majority of those organs turned out to be originating from? First the followers of Falun Dong, and secondly the Uyghur population is China’s biggest source of organ harvesting. They were able to back calc how many people must be dying a day to hit that mark compared to in the US. 2 weeks for an organ match… for Uyghur-sourced organs alone the prediction is 25-50 thousand are being murdered annually. Many are being harvested while still alive so they can continue to be a “source”. The followers of Falun Gong? Even higher numbers initially (though this may have flipped by now). And people are claiming no genocide is happening. Bone-chilling."
#6
CompMolNeuro said:
"Bugs. We're losing insect populations at a staggering rate. Those beasties are central to many ecosystems. If there were ever to be a trigger to catastrophic, ecological collapse, then removing the creatures at the bottom of the food chain would do it. That's what's happening all over the world right now."
zeldafitzgeraldscat replied:
"It used to be that when you were driving at night, you would see 1000s of bugs in your headlights, and you would have to stop every so often to clean them all off your windshield."
Viv Justviv 2 years ago
A few years ago I moved back to Ohio from Southern California & one of the first things I noticed was the lack of lightning bugs. It used to be, right after dusk on humid summer nights, you'd see hundreds of beautiful little lights blinking - no more. Now, I feel lucky if I see maybe 10 or 15 bugs lighting up at dusk. I did google it at the time & discovered that I am not imagining the loss of the lightning bugs, but I blocked out any specifics from my mind, I'm so heartbroken. So, for any reasons or theories about the loss of lightning bugs, you'd have to google it, sorry. I can't even handle the bad news of it today :(
#7
YeetMeDaddio said:
"People in southern Madagascar have been facing severe drought for the last two years. More than a million left starving."
Emotional_Area_2754 replied:
"From Madagascar and currently in Madagascar rn, I confirm this...
To give more info, we are your typical predatory government state, with high corruption, not a lot of development projects, etc. I am not a huge fan myself of donating money to NGOs as it is often a band-aid solution, that isn’t sustainable, and exacerbates corruption in countries like mine (source: my international development BA and personal experience). But having been to the south myself, and seeing how scarce the resources are. Supporting NGOs that actively distribute food while waiting for the government to take responsibility is the humane thing to do. I linked an NGO that I know is helping out by giving food to the south.
It’s in French: Action contre la faim [action contre la faim] action contre la faim.
The situation: Madagascar is bigger than France in terms of surface which is a fact that not a lot of people realize. We are a biodiversity hotspot, as diverse as Costa Rica, and the south is our very own desert. It’s hard to access, as road infrastructures are poor, and it’s a very dry area, we are on the brink of the first climate change-induced famine. And there is in general no infrastructure such as schools, healthcare, etc. Hope you have a blessed day, it’s so nice to see people care, and one thing that could help is tourism, it’s a beautiful country, I am hoping you guys can google the south of Madagascar, and maybe hop on a flight and boost our local economy. Jokes aside, it’s worth it."
#8
iremovebrains said:
"It's not that people don't know about it, you just can't imagine the scale. The opioid epidemic is extraordinary. Before I started as the medical examiner I was aware but not really aware. A full 30% of my cases are drug deaths. It's a silent genocide. There are no class, race, or religious lines. Just a parade of sick people who never got help for their trauma or mental illness and died chasing a solution for their unaddressed pain."
lowblowbro1 replied:
"For anyone reading this and wanting to know more, I'd really recommend reading the book Dopesick. Horrific actually seeing the stats on what's happened as a result of the Sackler family and their greed. The TV show was incredibly hard to watch but very well done also."
Jason Traver 2 years ago
As a 17 year addict, now clean over 4 years, I can say the biggest block to me getting help, at first, was the looks, whispers, and outright knowledge of people calling me junkie...people are dying, my friends are dying and tho we hear nice words...where's the help?
#9
Madmarrdegan said:
"Pol pot wiped out almost a quarter of Cambodia's population during his reign using the Khmer Rouge. He died peacefully in his sleep in 1998, never being held accountable."
Historical_Wash_1114 replied:
"When I was a kid I saw a documentary about Pol Pot and it fu*ked me up for MONTHS! I became obsessed with the country and learned everything I could about Cambodia. Probably the first time kid me saw the true darkness of humanity. I can't even put into words how distraught I was."
Der Kommissar 2 years ago
I lived in Cambodia for 9 years. Sadly, most young Cambodian people don't know much about the genocide. It is not taught in local schools. There is a Genocide Museum called Tuol Sleng, that is the most depressing place I have every been. Most of the visitors are Western tourists, I rarely saw Cambodians there, as I had to go there regularly, whenever one of my friends would visit me.
#10
"The Carrington Event. It was the most severe recorded geomagnetic storm that happened in the 1800s. It was so powerful it set fires in telegram stations. If we had one of equal strength today it would be catastrophic and, I'm pulling a number out of my a*s here, the death toll would probably be in the millions because of how much most of the developed world depends on power. Hospitals, aircraft, etc. That's on the more extreme end of the course, we get hit by smaller solar flares often and don't even realize."
Stardust she/her 2 years ago
We nearly missed a Carrington level of magnitude solar flare back in 2012. If it had hit Earth, society would just fall apart and millions I believe will die due to many problems. Navigation will be tough as our satellites responisble for GPS may be knocked offline so even using most of modern technology won’t do anything. Our power grid would’ve also suffered and estimates for fixing it would be really expensive. We would still be fixing up the power grid if the storm had hit us 10 years ago
#11
Frances_E_Farmer said:
"In the Armenian Genocide, around 1 million were killed during WW1 by the Ottoman Empire. Turkey still denies it to this day and the US only just recognized it last year."
skeletorbilly replied:
"If it wasn't for the System of Down even fewer people would know about it. It's just not taught in school."
Crouching hippo hidden panda 2 years ago
Shockingly I learned about it from hearing something written about the Kardashians. I’m not a fan of them, but it was interesting to come across something actually newsworthy regarding them
#12
Reddit user said:
"The Ogallala Aquifer, the largest aquifer in the world, has been drying up."
Kevin_Uxbridge replied:
"I think you mean 'being pumped dry'."
liz MacClain 2 years ago
Another theft of rights and life from the native American imagine that! We are so loud about everything happening everywhere but our own backyard
#13
"It’s not that people don’t know about Hurricane Katrina, it’s that people don’t realize that there are still people who live with its impacts, to this day, and many of their people might not have even been accounted for (Aka, missing). Many of the victims may have been swept out into the ocean, and many of them were bussed to various parts of the country. Many of these people were children separated from their parents, and never heard from again. let that marinate. I’m not saying this to spread conspiracy theories, I’m saying this because we tend to think that New Orleans rebuilt, that people died and that the dust settled. But there are thousands of people who were never accounted for, so we don’t know whether they lived or died. We don’t know how many kids were taken advantage of, or anything."
Linda R 2 years ago
They also don't realize that coastal Mississippi was the "unnamed land mass between Louisiana and Alabama where Katrina actually made landfall. Many of the homes and businesses were washed away in the surge, which reached 30 feet in Bay St. Louis. It actually broke the Interstate 10 bridge that crosses the Pascagoula River, which was closed for weeks, forcing the interstate traffic inland. The alternate route was Highway 90 along the coast, but one entire lane of a low bridge at the lower Pascagoula River was also washed out with huge strips of asphalt standing on end. It took me nearly two hours to commute the normal 30-minute drive to work for weeks.
#14
Coliebear86 said:
"The oldest known plague graves from "The Black Death" 1338-1352ish are in Kyrgyzstan. It is believed yersinia pestis made the jump from animals to people there, then spread across to Europe. It came back about every 50 years and is still around today."
soymrdannal replied:
"I lived in Kyrgyzstan for a short while pre-Covid. Bubonic plague is very much still a thing there, but luckily we have antibiotics to help treat it. People still die of it in extremely rural areas, though."
#15
GreatJothulhu said:
"Witch Hunting in Africa."
sometimesagreat replied:
"People with albinism are targeted and their body parts are highly prized by witch doctors."
RagDollLali 2 years ago
There are a lot of really good documentaries available for free online about this, some of them are brutal but really really good in discussing how ugly it really is
#16
"Both foreign and domestic massive companies are buying massive swaths of residential real estate, sometimes entire towns' worth, causing rent prices to soar and obliterating the possibility of homeownership for young adults. The US and Canada have taken steps to try to prevent this, but in the US the fastest fix to stop a takeover is actually HOAs making rules against rentals."
Stay Off My Lawn 2 years ago
I never thought I’d have anything nice to say about HOAs, but that is a point I’ve never considered.
#17
"Modern-day slave markets in Uganda. Humans being sold for $14."
kitten levels tokyo 2 years ago (edited)
Bucket list: buy an enslaved person and set them free. Edit: @Thomas Sherwin and @Nicole Weymann, you make good points. I’ve always thought that giving an enslaved human being their freedom would be a great thing to do. I was not thinking about supply and demand issues.
#18
syzygy_is_a_word said:
"Ongoing and hugely important: the global NPK fertilizer shortage. NPK (Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium) fertilizer is essential for modern agriculture, and around a quarter of the global supply used to come from Ukraine and Western Russia. Because of the war, Ukraine isn't making any, and ships aren't putting into port in the Black Sea to get out of Russia. A lot of countries absolutely depend on fertilizer from Russia to even achieve subsistence-level farming, mostly in Africa and the Middle East, but in India. China and Brazil are pretty big consumers too and Brazil is one of the largest food exporters. So by this fall, thanks to Putin's war, we're likely to see food shortages and famine across a lot of the planet."
Xirenec_ replied:
"Also, Ukraine was producing huge amounts of world neon supply(supposedly over half of it), and it is needed for something in chip manufacturing."
#19
JaThatOneGooner said:
"There is a civil war in Myanmar (formerly Burma) between a Junta coup and the people who are anti-junta. The Junta is responsible for the coup that saw the deposition of a popular democratically elected politician."
Philosophical_gump replied:
"It is insane what has happened/is going on there. The whole military Junta was in control for decades, followed by voluntary democratic reform (with the cooperation of a woman who was jailed for 15 years and is a Nobel Peace Prize winner) only to be followed by the most recent coup. I remember watching that fitness instructor video on youtube where the military vehicles roll down the street in the background when the coup started. But the real tragedy is the campaign of ethnic cleansing/genocide being carried out on the Rohingya people. A Muslim minority ethnic group. Even the now deposed Nobel peace prize winner has now been accused of ignoring/being complicit with the genocide."
Debby Keir 2 years ago
But the Nobel prize winning democratic leader has never condemned or done ANYTHING about the treatment of the Rohingya, and she narrowly avoided having her Peace Prize withdrawn in 2018, when amnesty international withdrew their previous award to her. Listen to Philosphical_gump
#20
"There's a current civil war in Ethiopia that has left approximately 600,000 dead since the beginning of 2018. It is a vicious war where both sides have been accused of forcing civilians to fight with very little training."
#21
SuperTanker2017 said:
"That sand is the most stolen and unregulated resource in the world."
pickupurdirtyclothes replied:
"It’s the raw material for concrete (or cement—I always confuse the two). And it’s specifically river sand that’s needed because its irregular shape serves as a better binding agent. We can’t start using sand from say, the Sahara, because it’s round and can’t bind. China has used a huge percentage of the world’s sand in the last couple of decades."
Der Kommissar 2 years ago (edited)
I lived in Cambodia, which sold a lot of sand to Singapore, legally (condoned by the corrupt government) and illegally . There was a headline once in the Cambodia Daily; "Illegal sand exports to be taxed" which shows you what a corrupt, wacky country Cambodia is.
#22
BoxytheBandit said:
"The Mount Toba eruption decimated the human population around 70,000 years ago. It could have been the end for us."
schilll replied:
"It's estimated that less than 1000 people existed on the southern tip of South Africa for 1000-3000 years. I've read the research that estimated less than 250 people at its lowest point. Almost all people can trace their lineage to those people. It is also speculated that fingertips wrinkle in water comes from that period. Since most of their food consisted of seafood like snails, crabs, etc. Those who were able to get the most food were also more able to reproduce. This is one of the reasons that I don't think humans will go extinct. We are like a virus, you can only kill 99.99%.of us. Some will survive and develop new traits that make us harder to kill."
#23
"Tunguska Blast. Meteor blew up a few hundred meters above the forest in Siberia. Flattened hundreds of acres of trees. Only two or three minutes earlier, and it would’ve airburst over any number of European capital cities."
RagDollLali 2 years ago
I had never heard about this before, but I'm definitely going to go look it up now!
#24
"There’s a research that is supposed to put bioluminescent molecules in trees so streets could be lit naturally (not counting the benefit of having trees in cities)."
#25
"Everyone is talking about climate change and a few years ago Polynesia was already under water. Some of its citizens tried to migrate to Australia but were refused because "ecological refugee" is not an UN-approved refugee status..."
#26
"A dictator's son was just "elected" in the Philippines a few months ago."
Der Kommissar 2 years ago
Unfortunately, he was legally elected. His name is Bong-Bong and his mom has an awesome shoe collection, paid for by the people of the Philippines
#27
HeavyGooses said:
"Not a singular event, but that's why it was basically forgotten about: the drying of the Aral Sea."
Cathalised replied:
"It's been great seeing Kazakhstan stepping up, damming (and consequently slowly saving) their side of it with fauna returning to the area. If only Uzbekistan could do the same..."
Silvermidnight 2 years ago
I learned about this in History class. Looking at the miles and miles of desert that used to be water and the creaking old buildings with no one there . . . it's heartbreaking.💔
#28
nocticis said:
"It took me to watch HBO watchmen to learn about the Tulsa massacre. Like as many history classes I’ve had and not once was it brought up is wild."
SaltySinclair replied:
"I watched videos on it growing up. Then again I grew up in Oklahoma City so it was part of their history. It kinda shocked me when everyone started talking about it like they never heard of it then I remind myself."
Christy Means-Stephens 2 years ago
I grew up in Tulsa, and when I was in school 70’s - 80’s, it was barely taught. It’s appalling that 1) it ever happened at all and 2) how long it was swept under the rug 😡
#29
Ursus_Arctos-42 said:
"Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017) had a plot where a major drug dealer poisoned drugs with a slow-killing poison. He then offers the antidote if the USA stops the war on drugs. Instead, the President sees this as a win-win. The world will get rid of addicts, and the war on drugs can be won. The reality is even darker. The doctors pushed too strong and addictive drugs on their patients, making money for themselves and the manufacturer. When the patients got hooked, and couldn’t cut the use nor get a new prescription, they turned into illegal sources, turning themselves for raw material for the prison industry."
Jibebelele replied:
"This is a tragedy of the American capitalistic healthcare system. A healthcare system powered by greed, what could go wrong."
and_a_touch_of_the_’tism 2 years ago
Tbh if it weren’t for family I’d move out of the US as soon as legally possible. Although Canada seems close enough.
#30
SuvenPan said:
"The northern white rhinoceros or northern white rhino used to be found in several countries in East and Central Africa south of the Sahara. Since 19 March 2018, there are only two known rhinos of this subspecies left, which makes the subspecies functionally extinct. The two female rhinos live in the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya and are protected round-the-clock by armed guards."
luxxlifenow replied:
"I learned this no joke at Disney World at Animal Kingdom during the kilowhatever safari ride. The tour guide told us. She also mentioned embryos are made of this species so more might be coming about soon."
Neuridivergent 2 years ago
They must have collected sperm from males before they died. Someone had the job of jacking off a rhinoceros.
What do you think ?
Susie Elle 2 years ago
On a more positive note: it's been discovered that mealworms can eat styrofoam and other forms of nondegradable plastic. They eat it and poop out monomers, so to say, and afterwards the mealworms are still safe to eat so you don't lose them as a potential foodsource. Parallel to this another group isolated two enzymes responsible for plastic breakdown in the GI tract of these worms, and determined the structure of the proteins. If you know the structure, then it's possible to produce them on a larger scale in the future for more effective plastic waste management. https://news.stanford.edu/2019/12/19/mealworms-provide-plastic-solution/ (and the paper: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282046766_Biodegradation_and_Mineralization_of_Polystyrene_by_Plastic-Eating_Mealworms_Part_1_Chemical_and_Physical_Characterization_and_Isotopic_Tests_
Deborah Harris2 2 years ago
A Redditt cut and paste with comments from Redditt already left on there to save any of us making any comments from BP..... wow ... be still my beating heart ... such originality ...
and_a_touch_of_the_’tism 2 years ago
Yep. Usually BP at least cuts out the comments. Sigh.
Load More Replies...
Susie Elle 2 years ago
On a more positive note: it's been discovered that mealworms can eat styrofoam and other forms of nondegradable plastic. They eat it and poop out monomers, so to say, and afterwards the mealworms are still safe to eat so you don't lose them as a potential foodsource. Parallel to this another group isolated two enzymes responsible for plastic breakdown in the GI tract of these worms, and determined the structure of the proteins. If you know the structure, then it's possible to produce them on a larger scale in the future for more effective plastic waste management. https://news.stanford.edu/2019/12/19/mealworms-provide-plastic-solution/ (and the paper: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282046766_Biodegradation_and_Mineralization_of_Polystyrene_by_Plastic-Eating_Mealworms_Part_1_Chemical_and_Physical_Characterization_and_Isotopic_Tests_
Deborah Harris2 2 years ago
A Redditt cut and paste with comments from Redditt already left on there to save any of us making any comments from BP..... wow ... be still my beating heart ... such originality ...
and_a_touch_of_the_’tism 2 years ago
Yep. Usually BP at least cuts out the comments. Sigh.
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