On August 25, 2006, two naturalists discovered Hyperion: the tallest known living tree on Earth. 🌲 Currently at around 380 feet tall, it’s higher than the Statue of Liberty but standing beneath it, you might not even realize you’re looking at a world record holder. #Hyperion #Redwood #Re

Astronomers gathered in Prague on August 24, 2006 and literally voted on what should count as a planet. The result: Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet, ending its seventy-six-year run as the ninth planet in our Solar System. #Pluto #Astronomy #SpaceHistory #OnThisDay #Dwarf

Natascha Kampusch was kidnapped as a child and held captive for eight years before escaping in Austria in 2006. In the years since, she has spoken about what happened, supported charitable causes, and taken ownership of the house where she was imprisoned but seems to have recently started to be cru

Around the launch of Paris Hilton’s debut album Banksy secretly slipped hundreds of altered copies of Paris into UK record stores, complete with fake artwork, satirical track names and a completely different CD inside. Some unsuspecting buyers essentially walked out of HMV with a Banksy. #Banksy

In August 2006, John Mark Karr confessed to being with JonBenét Ramsey when she died and for a few days it looked like one of America’s most notorious unsolved murders had finally been solved. Then the story completely fell apart. #JonBenetRamsey #JohnMarkKarr #TrueCrime #2000sthrow

Operation Overt was one of Britain’s biggest counter-terrorism investigations as well as being one of the most successful. MI5 and Scotland Yard monitored the UK cell, while U.S. and Pakistani intelligence helped trace its links to Al-Qaeda figures in Pakistan. The operation ended after Pakis

On August 8th, 2006, the Jonas Brothers released their debut album It’s About Time and almost nobody noticed. After months of delays, mall shows, support slots and soundtrack work, the album peaked at just 91 and Columbia soon dropped the band. But one song was already taking off on Radio Disney:

On August 6, 2006, Flavor of Love returned with an infamous reality-TV moment. The staircase incident was humiliating but it also showed just how far VH1’s “Celebreality” era was willing to go for ratings. #FlavorOfLove #RealityTV #VH1 #2000sNostalgia #flavorflav

By the early 2000s, Steve Burns had already left, children's television was changing, and Nickelodeon was trying to evolve one of its biggest preschool brands rather than simply ending it. Blue's Room was an experiment that gave Blue a voice, replaced the famous three-clue format, and a

On July 30, 2006, Top of the Pops ended its weekly run after 42 years on British television. From the Beatles and Bowie to Nirvana and the Spice Girls, it helped define how generations discovered pop music but the show now carries a much darker undertone because of Jimmy Savile’s prominent role.

Ashanti, Woody Allen, Nicolas Cage and Jamie Foxx were all battling for moviegoers on July 28, 2006, as Scoop, The Ant Bully, Miami Vice and John Tucker Must Die hit U.S. theaters. #johntuckermustdie #miamivice #theantbully #scoop #2000sMovies

On July 28, 2006, Mel Gibson was arrested for DUI in Malibu but the leaked police report quickly turned a celebrity arrest into a major Hollywood scandal. The fallout reached from The Passion of the Christ to Apocalypto, his attempted comeback, and eventually Hacksaw Ridge. #MelGibson #tmz

On July 27, 2006, four days after winning the 2006 Tour de France, Floyd Landis was revealed as the rider behind an abnormal doping test from his extraordinary Stage 17 comeback. The scandal would eventually cost him the Tour title and become part of a much bigger reckoning over doping in professio

On July 26, 2006, Andrea Yates was found not guilty by reason of insanity in her retrial. Her first murder conviction had been overturned after false testimony about a Law & Order episode that never existed. The case would also become a direct inspiration for Dennis Lehane’s Shutter Island. #

Twenty years after Little Miss Sunshine first premiered at Sundance, much of the Hoover family returned to Park City. Greg Kinnear, Toni Collette, Paul Dano and Abigail Breslin reunited with directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris and Oscar-winning writer Michael Arndt for a special 20th-ann

Little Miss Sunshine began its unlikely journey from just seven theaters to more than $100 million worldwide on July 26, 2006. Written by Michael Arndt and directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, the 2006 indie hit turned a dysfunctional family road trip into one of the decade’s most belo

Jeffrey Epstein was arrested in Palm Beach, Florida on July 23rd, 2006. What followed was a controversial plea deal, an FBI investigation, and years of continued connections with powerful public figures. #JeffreyEpstein #epsteinfiles #OnThisDay #TrueCrime #ghislainemaxwell #harveywe

Worldwide Lady in the Water earned around $73 million against a production budget of roughly $70 million nowhere near enough to cover its total costs and won two golden raspberries #ladyinthewater #mnightshyamalan #signs #split #2000smovies

On July 18, 2006, the U.S. House voted 236–187 in favor of a constitutional amendment defining marriage as only between a man and a woman but it fell short of the two-thirds majority required. The Senate had already failed to advance its own version a month earlier, with a 49–48 procedural vote tha