› added 5 years ago

212

TIL: the U. S. Government encouraged the extinction of the American Bison to starve and force Native Americans onto reservations.

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7rlE7 TIL, Vesta Stoudt, who had the idea for duct tape, couldnt get her bosses at a military ordnance plant to take her seriously. So she sent a letter to FDR who recommended it to the War Production Board where it was approved for use on ammo boxes.
6o9Q TIL Stephen Fry spent time in prison for credit card fraud
8ea9X TIL that Streaking (running nude in public) was so popular in 1974 that a song called "The Streak" by Ray Stevens made the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in the US, spending three weeks at the top in May 1974. It sold over five million copies internationally.
16o7r TIL that Vatican City's GDP is less than the median US income(no idea how that makes sense)
VMQ5Z TIL that in 1980, President Carter and Fidel Castro agreed to allow 125,000 Cubans to immigrate to America during an economic recession. Later, it was discovered that many of the emigrants had been sent directly from Cuban prisons and asylums.