› added 3 weeks ago

5

TIL that in the 1800s, people believed that tomatoes were poisonous, until one man ate an entire basket in public to prove them wrong.

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wL1D7 TIL that a the Netherlands supposedly declared war on the Isles of Scilly (off the southwestern coast of Cornwall, England) in 1651, and essentially forgot about it until a treaty was signed 335 years later, in 1986. Not a single shot was ever fired.
YxBB TIL that US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew was forced to invent a new signature to be put on US bills. His old signature was just a bunch of loops
4Ogg TIL that Saddam Hussein used Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” as his campaign song in the 2002 election
DQV1p TIL Harrison Ford turned down the role of Bob Barnes in the 2005 film Syriana. The role went to George Clooney, who won an Oscar and a Golden Globe for his performance
9YJdp TIL British prime minister Harold Wilson was so unliked by senior members of the army and MI5 that there allegedly were discussions about a military coup against the government in 1974