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TIL that despite being aligned with Nazi Germany in WWII, Finnish Jews were not persecuted by the government of Finland. The Finnish Army set up the only field synagogue on the Eastern Front and Finnish Jews fought with Germans in support of the Axis Powers.

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R79kl TIL that availability of potatoes played an important role in spurring economic growth in the 18th & 19th centuries. The introduction of the potato explains the 25–26% of the increase in old world population and 27–34% of the increase in urbanization between 1700 - 1900.
woP Michael Jackson was so keen to play Spider-Man that he attempted to buy Marvel Comics from Stan Lee
xVKEo TIL: A chemistry professor imported coca leaves to Germany that he gave his student to analyze. The student isolated a compound that had "a bitter taste, promote the flow of saliva and leave a peculiar numbness, followed by a sense of cold when applied to the tongue.” The compound was cocaine.
p8x1Q TIL that after their victory at the Battle of Marathon, the Greeks carved a statue of Nemesis (the goddess who punishes the arrogant) out of an enormous block of marble that the Persians had brought to the battle with the intention of carving a monument to their victory over the Greeks.
p8Z7A TIL TV sitcom stars from Friends were paid $100,000 per episode in season five, $125,000 in season six, $750,000 in seasons seven and eight, and $1 million in seasons nine and ten, making Jennifer Aniston, Courtney’s Cox, and Lisa Kudrow the highest paid TV actresses of all-time.