› added 11 years ago

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TIL that in 1984, a giant pee-icicle formed on the outside of the space shuttle Discovery. Astronauts had to break it off using a robotic arm and shut down the toilet for the remainder of the mission.

dDrnB TIL people say "Jesus H Christ" probably because English commoners read the insignia of the first three letters of Jesus's name in Greek ΙΗΣ as JHC and misheard the Lords payer as "Harold be thy name" and thought Harold was Jesus's middle name and Christ his last.
XEnkP TIL about Brigham Young, a Mormon who stated that "the idea of plural marriage" made him "desire the grave.". He went on to have fifty-five wives and fifty-six children.
p8d5e TIL Indian Maharaja Jam Sahib adopted 640 Polish orphans during WWII. He brought the children to the royal palace in Bombay, had a dormitory built for them, and brought in Polish teachers and chefs so the children would feel at home and "recover their health and forget the ordeal they went through".
rom4 TIL Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha (YKK) produces nearly 7 billion zippers a year. Their every stage of the zipper making process is in house i.e. from smelting their own brass and building the zipper-making machines to making the boxes they ship in.
neBPd TIL: Mill Ends Park in Portland Oregon is the smallest park in the World. The park is a small circle 2 ft across, with a total area of 452 square inches. Intended to be the site for a light pole; When the pole failed to appear, Dick Fagan (a columnist) planted flowers and named it after his column.