› added 1 year ago

245

TIL about "Staff D" at the CIA

Read more cia.gov

via reddit.com

LQy89 TIL that silver fulminate is so unstable that the weight of a falling feather will cause a few milligrams to explode. It also can't be collected in larger quantities because it self-detonates under its own weight.
V1g0 TIL Jake Lloyd, who played Anakin Skywalker in The Phantom Menace, was so tormented as a result of his role that he gave up acting. “Other children were really mean to me…They would make the sound of the lightsaber every time they saw me.”
N7pl6 TIL that in 1828, a painter named Sarah Goodridge painted a miniature portrait of her own breasts and sent it to a man in what is probably one of the earliest cases of someone sending nudes.
OGj5L TIL a tornado rating of EFU exists, and is for tornadoes that aren't strong enough/ didn't impact an area with observable damage, so they are of unknown intensity. Hence, EFU.
P1aAn TIL that the religious group known as the Shakers are completely celibate and cannot have children, so they can only gain new members by converting outsiders. As a result, there were only two people in the last existing Shaker community as of 2020, although they gained a single new member in 2021.