› added 5 years ago

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TIL about the botched execution of William Williams. The sheriff miscalculated the length of the rope, resulting in Williams hitting the floor, 3 deputies held his body up by the rope for over 14 minutes, he died of strangulation. The state of Minnesota abolished capital punishment right after.

1rND TIL A 2-year study that linked Ecstasy to Parkinsons was retracted from the journal Science after the authors realized they had accidentally used meth instead.
e0lDD TIL a woman was sentenced to life in prison for poisoning her child to death with antifreeze. She gave birth to a second child while in prison, who was given to foster care. But he became sick with the same symptoms, indicating a genetic metabolic disorder, not poisoning. She was later released.
Wknk4 TIL these two guys (see link) flew a clock around the world in different directions and proved Einstein's theory of relativity - 50 years ago. The airline tickets (the clock needed seats too) and hotels cost $8000.
D1NNY TIL an American man built a log cabin in Alaska and then just kept adding more and more floors until he reached 185-feet. At this point, he was forced to stop building as federal airspace starts at 200 feet. In the future, he still intends to squeeze in one more floor.
4Ejg TIL in 1961 a B-52 broke up over Goldsboro, NC dropping two 3.8MT H-bombs, each exceeding the yield of all detonations in worldwide history by TNT, gunpowder, conv. bombs, and the WWII nuclear blasts combined. One came perilously close to detonating and creating “a very large Bay of North Carolina.“