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TIL the world's supply of Brazil nuts comes almost exclusively from wild trees. Brazil nut trees can't be farmed effectively because the complex symbiotic relationships it depends on for pollination are too difficult to replicate.

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5Ydm8 TIL Hitler wanted to burn Paris to the ground before the Allies retook the city, but the order was disobeyed by "Saviour of Paris" General Dietrich von Choltitz who later asserted his affection for the French Capital and his belief that Hitler had gone insane as reasons for his defiance
newe9 TIL that in 1950, Republican Margaret Chase Smith became the first to denounce McCarthyism on the Senate floor. She also claimed that though a GOP victory in the '52 election was needed, she couldn't support a campaign founded on "the Four Horsemen of Calumny -- Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear."
8a5vZ TIL that Navajo language was used in the WWII by the U.S. Armed Forces in the Pacific to encrypt communications. They simply had Navajo Indians talking to each other, and since the language is exceedingly complex and has no written form, not a single person in Japan knew anything about it.
N7rxQ TIL that Charles Darwin went on an expedition as a naturalist to gather evidence that would refute the notion of evolution. Upon his return, he eventually came to conclude the opposite and created the Theory of Evolution.
QJWmd TIL 100 years ago Rupert Murdoch's father, a journalist, conspired with anti-Semitic war historian Charles Bean, to convince the Prime Minister of Australia to de-mote Australian General and commander of the Western front John Monash, a man stongly admired by his troops and of Jewish heritage.