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TIL the community of LexPark in Lexington, Kentucky has instated an annual “Food for Fines” program - a month long food drive that allows people to at least partially pay their parking tickets in canned food, which is then donated directly to area food banks that help feed the needy

v1EOj TIL that the name of the Royal Navy ship HMS Petard means "HMS Fart". A petard is a small bomb that derives its name from middle French for “to break wind.” Pun-loving Shakespeare probably knew this when he wrote “hoist with his own petard” - or to be blasted with his own fart
E1dMw TIL In 1907, J.P. Morgan (70 yo). summoned dozens of the leading financiers to his private library and ordered them to contribute to a $25 million pool to stop the financial crisis the country was going through. he locked them in the library the whole night until they agreed on his plan.
b9D8a TIL the Fair Labor Standards Act was originally drafted in 1932 by Senator Hugo Black, whose proposal to require employers to adopt a thirty-hour workweek met fierce resistance (the Act later standardized the 40 hour work week)
GAwMQ TIL about the Battle of Blair Mountain, the largest armed uprising in American history since the Civil War and a resounding example of how far the ruling elite will go to quell any attempt to challenge their hegemony, including calling upon the U.S. Army.
N7wxQ TIL that the longest tunnel in the world is the aqueduct that takes water from upstate New York to Manhattan. It is 13.5 feet wide and 85 miles long.