› added 5 years ago

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TIL that "paradise" is a word derived from a proto-Iranian word that meant "walled enclosure"

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rNW10 TIL: In 1995, parts of a crashed AA flight appeared for sale around Miami. Scavengers had used a helicopter to steal the parts from the crash site. Overall sales of counterfeit airplane parts led to at least 174 airplane accidents/incidents between '73 -'96 & hundreds of convictions during the '90s.
jNNXv TIL a group of small (1 mm) adult Caenorhabditis elegans worms, living in petri dishes enclosed in aluminum canisters, survived reentry and impact with the ground and were recovered weeks after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster on February 1, 2003, found alive on April 28 of the same year.
p88XZ TIL that the only kid got poisoned from eating a Halloween candy got it from his dad.
xVJxw TIL of Usama ibn Munqidh, a Syrian poet and diplomat whose life coincided with the First and Second Crusades, and who became acquainted with leaders of the Crusader states, the Knights Templar even clearing their HQ chapel for him to pray towards Mecca.
OjPL TIL of actor William Haines (1900–1973), who quit acting in 1935 when his studio employer, MGM, tried to pressure him into ending his relationship with his male partner and entering into a “lavender marriage” to hide his homosexuality. Instead, the two started a successful interior design business.