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TIL in 1945 Ireland's president and prime minister both offered official condolences to Germany upon the death of Hitler. They were the only Western European democracy to do so.

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1aoDP TIL Captive Giant Pandas were shown a video of pandas mating in the wild, in an effort to get them to mate in the female's 3-day breeding cycle. When "Yongyong" tried to mount "Ke Lin", she fought him off; but after Ke Lin viewed the "panda pornography," the pair mated successfully.
gMVX7 TIL about segregation academies, private schools founded in the US after Brown v. BoE to preserve segregation. They persist, segregated to this day, many segregation academies have student bodies that are >84% white in school districts where the student body is as little as <10% white.
9YnB6 TIL 99 years ago 4,500 tonnes of a mixture incl. ammonium nitrate fertilizer exploded at BASF in Oppau, Germany, killing 500-600 people, injuring 2000 more. The explosion, estimated to have 1–2 kilotonnes TNT equivalent, could still be heard more than 300km away in north-eastern France and Munich.
YpKl7 TIL the Cookie Monster has a real name. It`s Sid.
yVbrJ TIL in 1900 William Schmidt, a gold miner, began hand-digging a half-mile tunnel in the Mojave Desert to transport ore for processing. After 20 years the ore could easily be transported on a new road, but Schmidt spent another two decades years finishing the tunnel, which was never used.