› added 12 years ago

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TIL: As much as four percent of the sand on the beaches of Normandy consists of shrapnel left over from D-Day. (based off of samples taken from the beach, which reported at least 4% of the samples consisting of shrapnel. Page 5 has relevant data)

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rRg91 TIL about Sue Aikens, a woman who survived a brutal bear attack that left her with both hips pulled out of their sockets and bite marks in her skull. She was forced to treat her own wounds, go back out to kill the bear, then lie in her cabin for 10 days until medical help arrived.
509B TIL that Android was originally conceived as a camera operating system.
yV778 TIL that VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet program, was also the first "killer app" (a program that makes people buy a computer just to run the software). VisiCalc was so revolutionary, and so powerful, that people bought the $2000 Apple II (the only computer it ran on) to run the $100 application.
b9bQa TIL that Bob Marley was buried with his Gibson "Les Paul" guitar, a soccer ball, a marijuana bud, a ring that had been given to him by the Prince Asfa Wossen of Ethiopia, and a Bible. A month before his death, he was awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit.
ANRon TIL that James Cameron spent more time "on" the Titanic than the original passengers did. In 1995, he made 12 deep-sea dives, some lasting 15-17 hours, to film the wreckage. He said it felt like "going to Mecca," and inspired Cameron and his team to commit to the wreck's authenticity.