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TIL One year after graduating from West Point near the top of his class in 2008, Second Lt. Lawrence J Franks Jr got on a plane to Paris & spent the next 5 years in the French Foreign Legion under an assumed name. Afterward he turned himself in to the US Army & was sentenced to 4 years for desertion

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W7oNB TIL of the Community of Christ, a liberal offshoot of the Mormon Church, that has been performing same-sex marriages for ten years.
BP7e TIL the state of Ohio gives out different colored license plates for those convicted of DUI
XEjER TIL Captain Noel Godfrey Chavasse is the only British soldier to receive the Victoria Cross twice during WWI. Both times were for actions he committed while being wounded and under fire.
QNGYM TIL that at one point the sales of vodka accounted for 1/3rd of the Russian national budget.
oy5o TIL that Iceland let its banks fail instead of bailing them out. In 2008, the country started over from square one after paying off loans for consumers, forgiving homeowner debt, and throwing the offenders responsible in prison. Its economy is now growing faster than the US and European economies.