› added 11 years ago

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TIL that the United States has less than 5% of the world’s population, but almost a quarter of the world’s prisoners. The United States has more citizens in prison than any other country in the world.

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N7rbN TIL Helium was first discovered in 1868 on the SUN. Astronomers at the time noticed a certain wavelength in sunlight which could not be produced by any known element at the time. It was thought that the gas was only present on the sun, thus was named after the Greek god Helios.
kJ75B TIL “Ped Xing” is not Chinese, but actually short for “Pedestrian Crossing”
BrYXx TIL that John Parr (writer and singer of St Elmos Fire) had an even more well known hit: he wrote the Gillette “the best a man can get” jingle.
nebYB TIL the two Koreas were split before for roughly 300 years.
WEaA TIL 30 million people witnessed the opening of an Al Capone safe only to find dirt and empty moonshine bottles