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TIL that Shakespeare’s scripts contain over 2200 never-before-seen words—a diverse collection of loan-words from foreign languages, compound words from existing English terms, nouns turned into verbs, and creatively applied prefixes—many of which have entered into everyday language.

JYgO8 TIL France had a "proto-internet" called Minitel, to which half the population had access. It allowed for buying plane tickets, shopping, 24-hr news, message boards & adult chat services. It was used to coordinate a national strike in 1986. Some believe it hindered the internet's adoption in France.
KmAJ TIL there’s a group called “Science Cheerleaders”, made up of NBA and NFL cheerleaders who also work or study in STEM fields, that encourage girls to get into science studies
LkVkZ TIL that between 1937 and 1939, 100k Irish children were encouraged to seek out the oldest person they knew and gather their stories. This has been compiled into an archive searchable by any topic ranging from the supernatural to natural remedies.
4kl9X TIL the oldest bones found in Antarctica belonged to an indigenous woman from Chile who died in her early 20s. Found on a beach, it's estimated she came to Antarctica between 1819 and 1825. There are no surviving documents explaining how or why a young woman came to be in Antarctica during this era
4Xk5b TIL that Kiribati, an island chain in the Pacific Ocean, is the only country in the world that is situated within all four hemispheres of the globe