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TIL that in 1869, Republican President Ulysses S. Grant tried to annex the Dominican Republic to use it as a safe haven for blacks fleeing persecution. Although the D.R. agreed to the annexation treaty, it ultimately failed to pass the Senate.

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N7Oge TIL in 2003, North Korea suggested several symbols which were included in international Unicode, later becoming emojis. They requested ☕ to mark tea houses on maps and ⚐ & ⚑ for military battles and victories. They also requested ⬆, ⬇, ⬅ (but no right arrow), ☔, ⚡, ⚠ and ⏏.
LkWDd TIL in World War II, a few engineers wanted to reinforce the (returned) fighter planes where most of the bullet holes were. Mr. Abraham Wald then said: Let's reinforce them where no bullet holes are instead - because apparently, airplanes hit in these spots did NOT return.
R7XJ9 TIL Billy Crystal and Robin Williams had an impromptu cameo on Friends. Crystal and Williams wandered in from a nearby set and improvised the opening scene for "The One With The Ultimate Fighting Champion".
1KnP TIL the official definition of a second is 9,192,631,770 cycles of the Cesium atoms resonant frequency, and the NIST-F1 cesium atomic clock can produce a frequency so precise that its time error per day is about 0.03 nanoseconds, meaning the clock would lose one second in 100 million years
X0LVP TIL that vitamin D deficiency worsens respiratory tract infections. That's one of the reasons why in summer there are fewer cases of flu than in winter.