Incredible discoveries, people just stumbled into

[Dan]

http://www.cracked.com/article_19554_8-incredible-discoveries-people-just-sort-stumbled-into.html?wa_user1=1&wa_user2=Weird+World&wa_user3=article&wa_user4=feature_module

This is a great read

 

[The Gronk]

The story of penicillin is a pretty nice fluke.

 

[ManlyBacker]

Carter first started working for Lord Carnarvon in 1907 and on exploration in the Valley of the Kings in 1914. He was the only one to believe there was one last 18th Dynasty discovery to be made and that didn't occur until November 1922. It was a very long search compared to the way this article presents it.

The same goes for the Rosetta Stone. It was a lucky find but took around 20 years before it was deciphered by Jean-François Champollion.