› added 1 year ago

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TIL immediately after his Gettysburg speech, Lincoln came down with a mild case of smallpox to which he quipped: "For once in my life as president, I am in a position to give everybody something."

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5YdAQ TIL that the chemist whose research department invented the gas used to kill jews in concentration camps was not only a jew but also won the nobel peace prize for his prior work of extracting nitrogen from air, allowing us to feed billions.
Z8ZjG TIL that a 2010 Pew survey found that atheists and agnostics are one of the highest scoring groups when it comes to general religious knowledge
KYbba TIL back in 2009, Burger King launched the "Whopper sacrifice" campaign, wherein one could get a free Whopper by unfriending 10 people on Facebook. However, Facebook stopped the promotion as Burger King was informing those removed from the list about their reward of a burger.
Y7VaW TIL that the Giotto spacecraft, whose aim was to study Halley's comet as it passed close to Earth in 1986, takes its name from the Italian painter Giotto di Bondone, who in 1305 depicted the star of Bethlehem as a comet in painting his Adoration of the Magi. Halley passed close to Earth in 1301.
neGkP TIL about the "Murder Castle", a building owned by the serial killer H. H. Holmes. This complicated building included maze-like hallways, seemingly leading to nowhere airtight rooms used as elaborate torture rooms, acid vats a crematorium and more. It is suspected that Holmes had around 200 victims.