› added 6 years ago

93

TIL: The Cricket As A Thermometer...Dolbear’s Law states that if you count the number of time a cricket chirps in 15 seconds, and add 40, it will give you (roughly) the temperature in degrees Fahrenheit.

KO5ME TIL that the treadmill was first introduced as a Prison Rehabilitation Device, meant to cause the incarcerated to suffer and learn from their sweat. When Oscar Wilde was sentenced to 2 years in prison in 1895, he was forced to use a treadmill as part of his punishment.
womMJ TIL In 1951, W.E.B. Du Bois was being indicted by the US government for failing to register as a "foreign agent". The judge dropped the case right after Albert Einstein offered to appear as a character witness.
rRpB0 TIL in 1956, the first modern American mall opened-- the Southdale Shopping Center in Edina, Minnesota. Upon touring, architect Frank Lloyd Wright criticized it "had all the evils of the village street and none of its charm... You should have left downtown downtown." History proved Wright wrong.
epkkE TIL that a little girl stopped growing at the age of 2. The doctors termed her condition as Syndrome X. She died at the age of 20, with the body of a 2 year old and the mentality of a 9 to 12 month old.
mxndy TIL that, when Dan Aykroyd was developing Crystal Head Vodka, he thought there would be a trademark conflict with "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull", a meeting between Aykroyd and director Steven Spielberg resulted in the drink being served at the movie's premiere