› added 11 years ago

138

TIL that the Titanic sistership RMS Olympic was told not to go rescue Titanic survivors, as “it would cause panic amongst the survivors of the disaster to see a virtual mirror-image of the Titanic appear and ask them to board”…

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

gAQW TIL penguins were found in the arctic, but only from 1936-1949. They were introduced to replace the great auk, which had been hunted to extinction. The penguins survived the conditions well, but were also hunted to extinction. One was beaten to death by a local woman, whom mistook it for a demon.
gMrM4 TIL that Austria, even though they qualified, couldn't play in the 1938 worldcup because of the Austrian Anschluss to Germany.
xVMQ0 TIL that writing a giant SOS on a beach has the added advantage of being an ambigram: SOS can be read right side up or upside down
gM0G9 TIL that Lake Champlain was officially recognized as the sixth Great Lake for 18 days in March of 1998.
X9xQ TIL: That years after defeating Napoleon at Waterloo, the Duke of Wellington attended a party in Vienna, in which French guests turned their backs to him in anger. When the hostess apologised, the Duke replied: “It’s alright Madam, I’ve seen their backs before”