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TIL Alec Guinness agreed to be in Star Wars (Obi-Wan Kenobi) only after his initial salary was doubled, and that he would receive 2.25% of all gross royalties paid to George Lucas, and never have to make a publicity appearance.

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8aD94 TIL Harriet Tubman suffered a violent head injury as a child causing her to frequently slip into into sleep like states. These would produce vivid dreamlike hallucinations that Tubman interpreted as messages from god, to devote her life to freeing southern slaves through the Underground Railroad.
neKYG TIL the word Geek was originally an early 20th-century term for a carnival worker who was so unskilled that the only thing they could do at a carnival to attract a crowd was to bite off the heads of live animals such as chickens, snakes and rats and swallow them
KO8rw TIL that ducklings have abstract thoughts. Within hours of hatching, these baby birds can learn concepts like “same” or “different” — and they do so faster than human infants
5YvkB TIL that Tom Morello once worked as a stripper
EGRx TIL Dreamworks’ Antz was made by former Disney employee who was told the story for Pixar’s A Bug’s Life years in advance. When he left Disney, he co-founded Dreamworks and used the story to make Antz, rushed production and released it a month before Pixar did. Pixar still grossed $70 million more.