Time and progress, as we know it, work in mysterious ways. While most of us enjoy technological achievements in celluloid form à la “Barbenheimer,” one of the oldest indigenous tribes in the world, the Yanomami, are fighting for their survival in the Amazon.
But this is just a mere example of the different timelines that happen at the same time, yet in different parts of the world. As u/Cuish, who asked the AskReddit community “What other things oddly existed at the same time?”, noted, the last execution by guillotine in France occurred in 1977, the same year that George Lucas’ Star Wars forever altered the course of sci-fi movies. Scroll down below and explore these intriguing random facts for yourself.
#1
Orville Wright of the Wright brothers lived long enough to see Chuck Yaeger break the sound barrier and travel on an airliner that had a wingspan equal to the distance he covered in his first flight (37m)
Image source: cruiserman_80, Wikipedia
#2
Oxford University celebrated its 200th graduating class by the time the Aztec Empire started in Central America.
Image source: LambertonRegistry, Ben Seymour
#3
My favourite that I’ve seen:
When Harvard opened, they didn’t have calculus classes because *calculus hadn’t been invented yet.*
Image source: DJBlok, Emily Karakis
#4
The last mammoths lived at the time the pyramids were under construction.
Image source: Hopeful_Mecha_Angel, Andrés Dallimonti
#5
I always found it strange that Victorian England and the Wild West happened at the same time.
Image source: Latvian_Pete, Abigail Keenan
#6
Dmitri Shostakovich (major Russian composer who became huge in the 1920s) attended a performance of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Jesus Christ Superstar” in London, 1975. He actually loved it and watched it again the next day, claiming he wished he could’ve written something for a rock band.
Image source: guiporto32
#7
I watched the first moon landing with a woman who’d been in Paris for Lindbergh’s first transcontinental flight landing.
Edit: wow this blew up! And my first award!! Trippy, thanks—and I owe it all to Mrs. B.
Image source: zestyspleen, NASA
#8
*Frozen* came out the same year Mississippi officially abolished slavery.
Image source: ItsGotThatBang, Disney
#9
The last execution by guillotine occurred on September 10th, 1977.
The Atari 2600, the first successful home video game console, released the very next day. In a sense, the boundary separating the “era of guillotines” and the “era of video games” is less than 24 hours. It’s basically a fine line with no overlap.
Image source: SleeplessShitposter, Paul Glazzard
#10
Samurai, the fax machine, and Abraham Lincoln all existed at the same time
Image source: An-Ugly-Croissant17, Ryunosuke Kikuno
#11
Women in Switzerland got right to vote in 1971 when India was already having a woman prime minister !
Image source: sumidawasi
#12
Nintendo was founded when Jack the Ripper was roaming the streets of London.
Image source: SublimeVibe, Alvaro Reyes
#13
Dali designed the Chupa Chups lollipop logo.
Image source: botulizard, Mstroeck
#14
Harriet Tubman was alive at the same time as both Thomas Jefferson and Ronald Reagan.
Image source: notasleannotasmean, Kirt Morris
#15
In 1922, Betty White and the Ottoman Empire both existed.
Image source: Glade_Runner, Angela George
#16
People walked on the moon before we put wheels on a suitcase
Image source: Blythyvxr
#17
Something that oddly did NOT exist at the same time: Tyrannosaurus Rex is closer in time to humans than to a Stegosaurus.
Image source: Ts4EVER, Jon Butterworth
#18
Sharks are older than trees and Saturn’s rings.
Image source: jjc89, Jonas Allert
#19
Salvador Dali attended an Alice Cooper concert once
Image source: tmfult
#20
The Qing Dynasty of China collapsed in 1912, the same year as the Titanic disaster.
Image source: TailsxCream4Eva, Clay Banks
#21
Bro, South African Apartheid ended the year that Jurassic Park came out. We were eating popcorn drooling over dinosaur puppets, while they were still fighting to use the same toilet as white people. Pitiful it took so long. Of course, hindsight tells us Apartheid started and ended with $$$ in mind. It was economic disparity that finally pushed for the end of said segregation…As it goes with much of the civil rights successes throughout the 20th century 😑
Image source: Concert-Turbulent
#22
2 empires, The Roman Empire and The Ottoman Empire, spanned the entire gap from Jesus to Babe Ruth.
Image source: Choice_Hold2805, David Libeert
#23
Winston Churchill:
• rode in a cavalry charge
• commanded nuclear weapons
Image source: armsandhearts
#24
William Shakespeare and Pocahontas were alive at the same time.
Image source: Dabrigstar, Taha
#25
Prisoners began to arrive to Auschwitz a few days after McDonald’s was founded.
Image source: delifte, Jurij Kenda
#26
The last surviving witness to the Lincoln assassination appeared on the TV game show *I’ve Got a Secret* several weeks before his death in 1954.
Image source: the2belo, Wikipedia
#27
Queen Elisabeth II and Marilyn Monroe were born in the same year, 1926.
Image source: cosmic_jenny
#28
The first episode of Doctor Who aired the day after Kennedy was assassinated.
Image source: EightThreeEight838, History in HD
#29
Pablo Picasso died the same year Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side Of The Moon” was released.
Image source: PrescottEagle, Beatriz Miller
#30
Humans and Dodo birds coexisted up until the 1600s
Image source: Ledge_r, BazzaDaRambler
#31
You were alive at the same time as the last living Civil War widow. She only died three years ago.
Image source: badgersprite
#32
Musashi was wandering around Japan having duels when Michelangelo was painting the Sistine chapel
Image source: Cream-of-Mushrooom, Calvin Craig
#33
The last WW1 veteran lived long enough to see the release of Minecraft.
Image source: planetary_facts, Oberon Copeland @veryinformed.com
#34
Anne Frank, Martin Luther King Jr., and Barbara Walters [were born in 1929.](https://twitter.com/WhatTheFFacts/status/446672526572519425), Barbra Walter died in December 2022.
Image source: NYSenseOfHumor, Ronni Kurtz
#35
Laws making interacial marriage illegal in Mississippi were still on the books in 1994.
Image source: sbrooks84
#36
There are definitely Japanese people alive right now who have interacted with actual samurai.
(Japan started modernizing and abolishing the samurai in the 1860s, so a samurai born in the 1840s that lived to be 100 would overlap with the lifespan of someone who is 80+ years old)
Image source: sailormegtune, Krys Amon
#37
If you were born before January 7, 1989, you existed at the same time as Emperor Hirohito.
Image source: RockVonCleveland
#38
Galileo Galilei could have taught at Harvard.
Image source: mosquitohater2023
#39
Cleopatra lives closer to us than when the pyramids were built
Image source: TheBlazingFire123
#40
The Titanic maiden voyage happened the same year as MDMA was created.
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