› added 12 years ago

96

TIL the Members of Westboro Baptist Church are basically two families.

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via reddit.com

R7vg4 TIL Silly String was invented to be used as an aerosol spray to create an instant cast on broken and sprained bones. It worked, but while testing nozzles it was noticed it produced a 30' string. This inspired the inventor to change the formula to be less sticky, add color, and market it as a toy.
6m1Z TIL that the same guy who painted “A Friend in Need” (aka “Dogs Playing Poker”) also invented the carnival cutouts (where you stick your face in for a picture).
j6av TIL that the 1984 Challenger flight brought a beehive into space. Because bees do not defecate inside their hive, all 3,300 bees held it in for 7 days.
7JKP TIL that the idiom “the cat’s out of the bag” is derived from a practice by some merchants who sold piglets in bags. If the buyer was distracted, the merchant would quickly switch the piglet w/ a cat. The buyer wouldn’t realize until they got home and let the cat, and not a piglet, out of the bag.
X0aDR TIL that the H.R.152 - Hearing Protection Act is actually about gun silencers and removes silencers from the definition of firearms for purposes of the National Firearms Act.