Post * 0wwZR — Curious Curator

› added 7 years ago

66

TIL before the electric telegraph, there was a system called the semaphore telegraph, where signals were communicated visually using a network of towers topped with pivoting blades and paddles that could be rearranged to indicate different symbols

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8aX9L TIL Malcolm X said that white people could not join his black nationalist Organization of Afro-American Unity, but "if John Brown were still alive, we might accept him." Brown was a famous abolitionist convicted and hanged for treason after attempting to lead a slave rebellion in 1859.

R7vr7 TIL about Almon Brown Strowger. Strowger's undertaking business was losing clients to a competitor whose telephone-operator wife was redirecting everyone who called for Strowger. Motivated to remove the intermediary operator, he invented the first automatic telephone exchange in 1889.

mvQY TIL that Abraham Lincoln has no confirmed living descendants. His last, a great-grandson, died in 1985.

Xwpk TIL overweight or obese girls are at least 15% more likely than their recommended-weight peers to have had anal intercourse

XElRE TIL the dollar bill has been the same since 1929. The reason is that the government thinks no one would take the trouble of counterfeiting such a low denomination currency and hence it does not need the fancy updates or security features seen in the higher value currencies.