› added 4 years ago

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TIL Victorians sent "Vinegar Valentines" which contained anti-love messages, caricatures, insulting poems and cost the recipient 1 penny to read.

Read more brightonmuseums.org.uk

via reddit.com

LkJ7p TIL that one of the most effective weapons in WW2 was the proximity fuzed shell: the allies were so terrified of the enemy getting hold of samples they were initially only to be used over water by the Navy - there was an embargo on their use over land until 1944.
PR0w TIL JK Rowling’s first husband was a 23 year old student who claimed that he was the first to read Harry Potter. Their marriage fell apart less than a year later after he forced her out of the apartment with their baby daughter at 5 in the morning
4XXlR TIL on January 12, 2017, the Federal Government officially changed the nickname of people from the state of Indiana from "Indianans" to "Hoosiers", making Indiana the first state not to have a version of their state name in their nickname ("Illinoisans", "Texans", etc.)
a89LJ TIL A contaminated rooftop air-conditioning unit at the Opera House Hotel in the Bronx caused the biggest outbreak of Legionnaires' disease in New York, where 12 people died
Z8xda TIL Charles Kuentz fought for the Germans during WW1 but became a French citizen after his homeland, Alsace-Lorraine, was taken back by France after the war. When France surrendered to Germany in 1940 he became a German citizen until the fall of the Third Reich which again made him a French citizen.