› added 10 years ago

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TIL that the Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird was so fast, the designers did not even consider evasive maneuvers; the pilot was simply instructed to accelerate. This could effectively elude any threat, including surface-to-air missiles.

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ADke4 TIL Mark Twain based the character Huckleberry Finn on a real person named Tom Blankenship. Tom was four years older than Twain, and they knew each other growing up in Hannibal, Missouri.
jN8rp TIL that Caligula once tricked a man into buying 13 gladiators for the high price of 9 million Roman sesterces. He had been selling off some gladiators to replenish the Roman treasury, when he saw a man fall asleep at the auction. He told the auctioneer to consider each of the mans nods as a bid.
RPP1 TIL that many of the legendary scenes in Star Wars are not physical sets, but matte oil paintings.
rRvb1 TIL sound therapists came together to create a song specifically designed to reduce anxiety. Listening to that one song — “Weightless” — resulted in a 65% reduction in participants’ overall anxiety, and a 35% reduction in their usual physiological resting rates.
NMvN TIL Mel Gibson was dropped from The Hangover Part ll because the cast wasn’t comfortable working with him after allegations of spousal abuse