› added 4 years ago

64

TIL in 1886, the Germans sent a mission to Chile to help train and modernise the Chilean army. As a result of the Germans overhaul of their army, the ceremonial uniforms, weapons and marching songs are all German or German based, and military parades look like a step into Germany 150 years ago.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

0w8pR TIL after the Pope banned joining the Freemasons in 1738, a group of Catholics started their own secret society named 'The Order of the Pug' in which initiation involved wearing a collar, walking on all fours, pawing at the door to be let in, getting barked at and kissing a pug statue's butt.
rRpZe TIL: in 1978, 2,300 students tried to set a WR for the largest tug of war game. Instead, disaster ensued. The 2,000ft long braided nylon rope snapped, recoiling several thousand pounds of stored energy. Nearly 200 students lay wounded, 5 with severed fingertips, hundreds more faced 2nd degree burns.
p860O TIL that Virginia has spent 100 years asking Minnesota for the return of a Confederate Flag captured at the Battle of Gettysburg...and Minnesota keeps saying no.
MVb TIL that a snake measuring 50 feet in length once roamed the earth, crushing its prey with a constricting force equivalent to lying under the weight of one and a half Brooklyn Bridges
Bg75k TIL that some pine trees lose their needles in the fall, just like deciduous trees do. In the northern hemisphere, the Larch is the most common such tree.