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TIL of the University of Sydney Pirates. In 1957, a group of 10 students dressed as pirates and boarded the U.S.S. Bennington. They then snuck to the bridge where they proclaimed, over the PA system of the ship, that "The U.S.S. Bennington has been captured by Sydney University pirates!"

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ADd0B TIL That only half of the 100 million AK -47 rifles used worldwide are genuine.
LQyy0 TIL that the psychiatrist Henry Cotton would sometimes extract all of a patient's teeth as he believed infected teeth to be the cause of psychiatric disorders. If that didn't work, he'd remove testicles, ovaries, gall bladders, stomachs, spleens, cervixes and colons.
G8O7 TIL the September 11th massacre of 9 AD in the Teutoburg Forest was literally an inside job. The Romans lost over 10,000 to an insider who betrayed them.
6DE8 TIL Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer was created by the department store chain Montgomery Ward as one way to save money on some of their annual Christmas promotions
5YVVk TIL a nationwide study conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey in 1999 and 2000 found low levels of pharmaceuticals—including antibiotics, hormones, contraceptives and steroids—in 80 percent of the rivers and streams sampled.