› added 4 years ago

46

TIL that Napoleon used to fight with one of his classmates at the Military Academy of Paris (Sidney Smith). Then at 1799 during the Siege of Acre Sidney Smith meet Napoleon again but now in battlefield, where Napoleon was defeated.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

5YOx8 TIL that there is a widespread belief—one with no historical or grammatical foundation—that it is an error to begin a sentence with a conjunction such as and, but or so. In fact, a substantial percentage (often as many as 10 percent) of the sentences in first-rate writing begin with conjunctions.
e0OMb TIL that comet tails always point in the opposite direction of the sun. The tail is created by an interaction with either solar winds or photons from the sun.
kOOgE TIL Universal Studios bought the E.T. script for $1 million from Columbia Pictures (which held it from Spielberg after putting it in a "turnaround") in exchange for the latter to retain 5% of the film's net profits. Columbia stated it made more money from E.T. than it did any of its films in 1982.
KxgE TIL since the sun doesn’t set all summer long in Alaska, it’s common for cabbage to weigh up to 75lbs. Alaska holds the 2012 world record of 138lbs. [Thanks Good Eats blurb]
OoB91 TIL that there is a disaster scenario where North Korea starts blasting satellites out of the air just out of spite, ruining communications for the entire world