786YX TIL only about 10% of actively managed large cap funds have beaten the S&P 500 over the past decade, meaning 90% of people who paid wealth managers would have been better off just throwing everything into the most popular index there is
kJb1E TIL that ancient scrolls can be scanned in 3D, then virtually unfolded and read
Eg7D7 TIL Laura Dern is Diane Ladd's Daughter (Ladd passed away today). In 1993 they each were in separate movies about genetically engineered dinosaur experiments going awry. One was Jurassic Park and the other was Carnosaur.
Y7b0d TIL That the Seige of Kaffa was most likely NOT how the Black Death came to Europe via biological warfare
BgY1e TIL that Captain Leopold McLaglen claimed to be a jujitsu master and trained soldiers for WW1 trench warfare. In fact he was a conman who once posed as his own brother - movie star Victor McLaglen - and ended up involved in a failed Nazi plot to assassinate "Hollywood Jews" including Charlie Chaplin
rNb4M TIL Some animals can’t walk backwards
NXJd6 TIL in the Middle Ages, the Reynard the Fox literary cycle was so popular in France that the word to describe "fox" went from "goupil" to "renard"
l7bla TIL Grand Duchess Elizabeth was the Aunt and Sister-in-Law of Tsar Nicholas II. After her husband's assassination in 1905, she joined a convent and devoted her life to the poor, even selling off her own wedding ring. Despite this, she would be murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1918.
8eOEb TIL in New York City, 111 8th Ave takes over one city block (2.9 mil square ft), it was originally built for the Port Authority of NY and NJ. Google owns the entire building since 2010.
P1DEZ TIL that Charles Guiteau, the man who shot and killed James A. Garfield, dictated an autobiography from prison to the New York Herald and ended it with a personal ad for a "nice Christian lady under 30 years of age."
epblg TIL that in the year 1600 a Basque nun fled the convent, took on a new identity as a boy, and spent the following decades living a life of adventure (military service, general violence, betrothals, etc.) in Spain and Spanish America
VBbYG TIL of the Siege of Caffa which took place in 1343-1344 and was conducted by Jani Beg of the Golden Horde. Facing the dire situation of weakened forces due to the plague and a fortified city, Beg decided to catapult bodies of plague-infected soldiers over the city walls to infect Caffa's inhabitants