› added 11 years ago

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TIL that the shooting of US President James Garfield in July 1881 directly led to the invention of both the metal detector and indoor air conditioning

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Vxj4 TIL that the line often attributed to John Lennon - “Ringo isn’t the best drummer in the world. He isn’t even the best drummer in the Beatles” - was actually said by comedian Jasper Carrott three years after Lennon’s death
07Zy TIL Napoleon Bonaparte has a living heir
XEDwQ TIL scientists made a mouse utopia called Universe 25. It started with 4 males and 4 females, peaked at 2200 mice, then declined to extinction - the mice lost instinctual behavors. Humans now demonstrate similar traits.
JYNe1 TIL Alan Rickman was originally offered to voice Lord Farquaad in Shrek but he turned it down to play Severus Snape
N7pne TIL of Aeschylus, an ancient Greek tragedian, who died in 456 or 455 BC when an eagle dropped a tortoise on his bald head mistaking it for a rock suitable for shattering the shell of the reptile.