› added 11 years ago

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TIL that when he was challenged to a duel by Prussian statesman Otto von Bismarck in 1885, scientist Rudolf Virchow selected two pork sausages as the weapons to be used.

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R5pYQ TIL: BoomBurbs are places in the top 50 Metro areas in the U.S.A of more than 100,000 residents, that are not core cities in their metro areas and have maintained double-digit rates of growth since 1970!
NXdAJ TIL of the discovery of chemotherapy. During WWII it was discovered that mustard gas reduced white blood cell counts. In the 1940s, two pharmacologists examined the effects of mustard gas in treating lymphoma in mice. They then treated a patient with nonHodgkin's lymphoma with the chemical agent.
nGZG TIL that word formations like LGBTQ and USA are technically not acronyms, they are “initialisms” or “alphabetisms”. NATO and laser are acronyms, because they are pronounced as words and not just as a string of letters.
GA9j5 TIL for the 2002 DVD release of “E.T. the Extra- Terrestrial,” some changes were done to the original film. Director Steven Spielberg replaced the agents’ weapons with walkie-talkies, and the word “terr0rist” was replaced with “hippie”. This led to many saying that Spielberg “sanitized” the film.
E6Lx TIL: The Scold’s Bridle, a British invention, possibly originating in Scotland, used between the 16th and 19th Century. It was a device used to control, humiliate and punish gossiping, troublesome women by effectively gagging them.