› added 10 months ago

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TIL Showcasing his knack for self deprecating humour, Machiavelli towards the end of his life would sign as "N.Machiavelli, historian, comedian and tragic". The word "tragic" being a double entendre(author of tragedy/a person with a tragic life)

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Z8RrB TIL when in 1988 Consumer Reports compared 4 American midsize cars, all suffered failures during the test - the Ford and Dodge had their A/C not work, the Eagle had a glovebox that did not close and an unopenable fuel filler door, and the Buick had a knocking engine and a broken door lock.
dDAp9 TIL that the white house used to be open to the public and that in 1829 a rowdy crowd of 20,000 people celebrating Andrew Jackson's inauguration had to be lured out of the White House with washtubs filled with orange juice and whiskey.
grkoA TIL that the original iPhone that Steve Jobs famously showed on stage in 2007 barely worked and could only just get through the keynote. A stable, final version of the iPhone was not developed until just weeks before global release.
9w1y7 TIL Steve McQueen turned down 10% of the profits from "The Blob" (1958), which grossed $4mil, for a larger fee, $3k, upfront.
l7lOa TIL that the Pan Am plane in the Tenerife disaster was also the first Boeing 747 to fly commercially, as well as being the first 747 to be hijacked. It was named 'Clipper Victor.'