› added 3 years ago

100

TIL In '72 Billy Joel got into a legal battle with his label and was forbidden from recording. He moved to LA and played at a bar under an assumed name to earn money. This was the inspiration for the song "Piano Man". All the characters in the song were based on real people Joel had met at the bar.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

QxDk TIL that in the wake of the Katrina disaster, police from the New Orleans suburb of Gretna blocked desperate evacuees from crossing a bridge over the Mississippi River, turning back hundreds by firing guns in the air over the crowd.
R7vP8 TIL: In 2011, new students at the Wabash College in Indiana were required to play the video game Portal as part of a course on what it means to be human. The course discussed how Portal's villain presents different versions of themselves, showing a public face, while hiding a different private face.
aw0My TIL in 1926, the US Federal government poisoned alcohol in a effort to end alcohol consumption during Prohibition. By the end of Prohibition, 10,000 Americans died due to alcohol poisoning.
nKXB TIL Lego blocks are so strong that it would take a stack of 375,000 bricks to cause the bottom brick to collapse, which represents a stack 3,591 meters (11,781 ft) in height.
mxP8Y TIL blue jays aren’t actually blue