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TIL The Russians tried to interfere in the 1960 presidential election on behalf of Adlai Stevenson II, offering him propaganda support to help him "succeed". He declined their offer and informed the New York Times about the incident.

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e0jvk TIL there is a spider species, Bagheera kiplingi, that is mostly herbivorous, even actively avoiding confrontation with other insects while foraging for food. They sometimes rarely steal ant larvae or cannibalize during dry season, when the plant they prefer would be unavailable.
LQjeZ TIL Before her marriage to Mao Zedong, Jiang Qing was an actress in 1930s Chinese cinema. Her co-star an actress named Li Lili frequently upstaged her. Decades later during the Cultural Revolution, Jiang ordered the arrest and torture of Li and her husband. Li survived but her husband did not.
KOZ4R TIL that the dust storm that sets off the events in the film "The Martian" isn't plausible because the atmosphere on Mars is about 1% as dense as Earth's and the winds in the strongest Martian storms top out at about 60 miles per hour, unlikely to tip or rip apart major mechanical equipment.
9Ylrm TIL that in 1976, a giant inflatable pig being used in a Pink Floyd photo shoot broke free and caused all flights at London Heathrow to be grounded and the Royal Air Force to send helicopters to search for it. It landed in a farmer's field unscathed where it scared all of his cows.
N7aBb TIL that the producer behind the Backstreet Boys and NSYNC was convicted of running one of the largest and longest Ponzi schemes in history