› added 12 years ago

87

TIL Edgar Allen Poe wrote an essay about the universe begining from a “single originating particle” 80 years before the idea of The Big Bang.

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vPPkr TIL the boy whose exorcism was the inspiration behind The Exorcist grew up to be a NASA engineer. His work contributed to the Apollo mission in the '60s.
n759 TIL that each year on April Fools Day, James Randi gives an award to expose frauds called the Pigasus Award.
OoM84 TIL Parks and Recreation was going to have a connection to The Office. Originally after trying to fix the Dunder Mifflin Scranton copier it was sent to a warehouse and repaired, then ended up in the Parks and Recreation Department in Pawnee.
jN54n TIL Joe Walsh's Maserati 5000 GT couldn't do 185 (closer to 170) mph, but the top speedometer marking is 300 kph (186 mph). It was impounded by Austrailian authorities after being inspected for the presence of asbestos. Also, each 5000 GT had a custom body so each one is unique. Links in comments.
8eBAG TIL that the F-22 Raptor took so long to develop, that the CPUs for its in flight computer had become obsolete by three generations by the time the first production jet flew in 1997, resulting in even further delays as a new flight computer had to be designed based on the PowerPC processor.