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TIL that Mansfield Cumming, first director of Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) started using semen as invisible ink during World War 1, but they stopped it because of the smell and questions regarding the masturbatory habits of the agents involved.

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yQYK8 TIL the game Candyland was invented by a woman during the polio pandemic. The woman, Eleanor Abbott, was recovering in hospital she created the game to entertain the children in her hospital wing as they were left by family members for long periods of time to recover.
JOeV TIL In June 1974, while President Nixon was on his way to a scheduled stop in Syria, Syrian fighter jets intercepted Air Force One to act as escorts. However, the Air Force One crew was not informed in advance and, as a result, took evasive action including a dive.
0wrZj TIL that, in 1913, a Nebraska man took a butcher knife and threatened to kill his wife and newborn son. The mother left him, remarried, and had the boy's name changed to that of his step-father. The boy, now known as Gerald Ford, later went on to become the 38th President of the United States.
GAp11 TIL The Romans had the first newspaper in the world, the Acta Diurna, or Daily Doings, in 59 BC. Although no copies of this paper have survived, it is widely believed to have published chronicles of events, assemblies, births, deaths, and daily gossip.
6EkKJ TIL that Napoleon was once interested in considering a submarine as a weapon in his military arsenal to combat ships. When it came time to look at the Nautilus, designed by American inventor Robert Fulton, Napoleon decided that Fulton was a swindler and a charlatan after learning the vessel leaked.