› added 9 years ago

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TIL that during World War 1, New Zealand raised an army of 100,000 men, from a population of just over a million people.

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P49G TIL that actor James Doohan was shot six times on D-day after successfully leading his men through a minefield and killing two German snipers. One of the shots to the chest would have been fatal except he had a silver cigarette case there, given to him by his brother.
4kkvX TIL that 10 million people (1/4 of USA population!!) physically attended the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, 1876 (see link, Yale Univ. Professor Blight, at time 6:00 in video)
dD7Bj TIL when mathematician Évariste Galois was still in his teens, he was able to solve a problem that had been open for 350 years. Then at the age of 20, for reasons that remain obscure, he fought in a duel and died from the wounds he suffered.
d8aEQ TIL that Zeppo, the youngest Marx Brother, invented a wristwatch that monitored the pulse rate of cardiac patients and gave off an alarm if the heartbeat became irregular. He was a friend of Frank Sinatra, with whom his wife Barbara had an affair and later married. He became a theatrical agent.
eeEg TIL that there are many untouched plane wrecks in various parts of the UK, dating back to the Second World War, and that removing them is forbidden.