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TIL that the first rap song to top #1 on the Billboard charts was Blondie’s “Rapture”, sung by Debbie Harry, a white female. It was also the first rap music video to appear on MTV.

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vEQ4 TIL That sunspots are correlated with revolutionary behavior and other human mass excitability events.
X07PE TIL that in order to obtain silk the silk worm is boiled or gassed inside their cocoons. 6,600 cocoons equaling 1 kilo of silk.
Bk6y TIL while on trial for treason the lawyer of Michel Ney, one of Napoleon’s marshals, argued that French courts could not try Ney because he was Prussian since his hometown had been annexed by Prussia. Ney ruined the defense by interrupting, “I am French and will remain French.” Ney was executed.
wLKBW TIL that abolitionist martyrJohn Brown was “cheerful” awaiting execution. Brown, a devout Christian recognizing the power of martyrdom, was “fully persuaded that I am worth inconceivably more to hang than any other purpose.” Emerson: “If he shall suffer. the gallows will be glorious like the cross.”
neD19 TIL that mystery writer and the inventor of the detective novel Edgar Allen Poe's death is actually a mystery itself. The death certificate and medical records were lost and there is no definitive cause of death.