› added 1 year ago

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TIL a "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire" contestant who helped another contestant cheat by coughing at the right answer had to trademark his name in order to prevent a pharmaceutical company naming cough medicine after him.

Read more theguardian.com

via reddit.com

loxgV TIL that in 1873 a man defrauded the residents of Alta, Utah out of $2,500 by claiming to be able to raise the dead. They paid him the money NOT to raise anybody. The story was later adapted into "The Twilight Zone" episode "Mr. Garrity and the graves."
8aoo4 TIL that during the Prussian siege of Paris, supplies and food were so dire that after slaughtering all the farm animals and pets, eventually the animals in the zoo were killed. There's even a copy of a restaurant menu from the time that included dishes like elephant consommé and roast camel.
l78KN TIL: There are parts of the ocean with no tides which are called amphidromic points, some even directly border land.
QJX1M TIL that in the 60s, the CIA sponsored a Harvard study where an undergraduate student was humiliated and subjected to "brutalizing psychological experiments". The student who had the worse reaction to the experiment was Ted Kaczynski who later became the Unabomber.
AD0Na TIL a teacher in South Carolina started a ‘Gentleman’s Club’ for more than 60 at-risk children to teach them important life lessons and social skills and support them so that they would grow up to become successful adults. He even provides donated jackets and ties to students who cannot afford them.