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TIL of the Window Tax, where England homes would be taxes according to the number of windows they had, leading to windows getting boarded up to avoid the excess tax.

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DaXp TIL a previously owned black slave was asked to calculate the number of seconds in 70 years, 17 days and 12 hours in order to prove equality in intelligence between blacks and whites. Not only did he accomplish the feat in 1.5 minutes, but he included the leap years in his calculations.
rRxGy TIL that sharks smell in "stereo," that is, they can detect the tiny delays in the time it takes for a scent to reach one nostril compared to the other and use it to determine the direction from where the scent is coming. This helps them in tracking their prey.
xJQ1 TIL Crop Circles found in Australia turned out to be made by Wallabies totally high on legally grown poppy seeds.
AbWo TIL in WW2 that Raymond Collishaw, leading pilots who were outnumbered and outgunned, flew their only Hawker Hurricane from base to base and on as many missions as possible to make the Italians believe that they had many. The plan worked as the Italians spread their resources out thinly.
jPEX TIL that to pass the “Bechdel test”, a movie must have 1) at least two named women 2) who talk to each other 3) about something other than a man. So far, only 3807 movies have passed.