› added 5 years ago

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TIL During WWII, there was a unit of Japanese schoolgirls who looked after Kamikaze pilots before they went on suicide missions. Called the Nadeshiko, they were aged between 14-15 and lived and worked on a military base with the men, preparing meals and befriending them before they went to die.

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rNmNe TIL that over 5,000 dead fish, crabs, and other sea creatures were embedded in the ice skating rink at Space World in Japan. Some were arranged to spell "HELLO". Visitors called it a waste of life, so a memorial service was held and the fish repurposed as fertilizer.
lo7Dr TIL 6 masterpieces for solo piano were discovered to great excitement, and confirmed by the leading experts to be genuine works by Haydn. They were later proved not to be by him, and are now largely ignored; despite them being genuinely original music which had the aficionados enthralled.
neOXb TIL Anthony Michael Hall was the first choice to play the lead role of Private Joker in "Full Metal Jacket". Hall spent eight months preparing for the role but could not reach an agreement with Stanley Kubrick regarding monetary compensation, and was replaced by Matthew Modine.
wLdmM TIL: The US military was already using UAV drone technology in WWII. The primary manufacturer at that time, Radioplane Company, had a drone assembler named Norma Jeane Dougherty, who eventually changed her name to Marilyn Monroe.
8ova TIL that there are well over a dozen different region-specific styles of BBQ food in the US