› added 10 years ago

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TIL that Hershey’s chocolate is flavored with sour-tasting butyric acid, which also gives vomit its aroma. This is why people unaccustomed to American chocolate sometimes compare it to vomit.

b9W4Q TIL: Lady Dai, death in 163 BC, considered the best preserved mummy in the world. Upon discovery she still had moist, soft skin, movable limbs, intact organs and veins with still small amounts of type A blood in them, distinct finger prints and more!
b6X79 TIL that of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany, King George of England, and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, the three rulers who contributed immensely to the outbreak and spread of World War I, the first two were grandchildren of Queen Victoria, and the third was her grandson-in-law.
L9Gm TIL that because of Delaware, corporate transparency is essentially a joke in the US. Delaware gets a huge portion of the state budget from incorporations while asking little about the identity of the true owner which attracts major money laundering criminals from all over the world.
rmgM TIL The oldest parachute design appears in an anonymous manuscript from 1470s Renaissance Italy (over 400 years before the airplane), showing a free-hanging man clutching a cross bar frame attached to a conical canopy. As a safety measure, four straps run from the ends of the rods to a waist belt.
GAwQg TIL in Icelandic folklore there's a cat called Jólaköttur or Yule Cat. It lurks in the snowy countryside during the Christmas season and eats people who do not receive new clothing before Christmas Eve.