› added 7 months ago

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TIL during 1904 Olympics men's marathon winner was disqualified as he rode in a car for part of the race. The actual winner was near collapse and hallucinating, an effect of being fed brandy, raw eggs, and strychnine by his trainers. The fourth-place finisher took a nap after eating spoiled apples.

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oBaMR TIL that executives at McGraw Hill were curious to find out why their accountant was on television racing a Mclaren F1 GTR, chartering Concorde trips and showing up to work in a Ferrari. Turns out he had been embezzling £2.8 million from them the past 5 years since he was recruited!
69vBw TIL Use of amphetamines (such as Pervitin and Benzedrine) to stay alert and active longer was pretty widely used in WWII by both sides.
9yaX TIL in 1976, Japan donated 53 bonsai trees to the US for its bicentennial, including a white pine that had been tended daily since 1625 and survived the Hiroshima atomic blast. Its history was unknown until 2001, when two brothers showed up at the museum to check on their grandfather’s tree.
XoE TIL that there is a body of water in space that is large enough to give every person on earth enough water to fill the planet’s oceans.
j66VE TIL of the Mapogo Lion Coalition, a brutal pack of 6 lions who feasted across Africa and taking over 170,000 acres of land. They killed 100 lions and cubs in a year, split up briefly after arguments, and died protecting each other in a final battle.