› added 5 years ago

62

TIL - Jane Austen's brother was a war hero and both of her brothers were admirals.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

j0KX TIL that between 1798 and the Civil War, the U.S. Navy lost two-thirds as many officers to dueling as it did to more than 60 years of combat at sea.
wyAY TIL that An old custom in ancient Babylon compels all women to go to the temple of Aphrodite and have sex with a stranger at least once in their lives.
b6WY9 TIL of Bridget Cleary, an Irish woman who was burned to death by her husband on suspicion of her being a fairy changeling
wLD5M TIL about Sidney Franklin, a gay Jewish man from Brooklyn who became the first American matador in Spain, befriended and was admired by Hemingway, and was known publicly as “El Yanki” or “El Torero de la Torá”
4kbWw TIL French cyclist Jean Robic would cheat in the Tour De France downhill sections by having an assistant give him a lead or mercury filled water bottle for the descent. Because of this his nickname was "The Heavy Metal Descender".