› added 9 years ago

83

TIL “Serenity” was the first high definition movie to be cracked and torrented.

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via reddit.com

pYG1G TIL Soviet ballet prodigy Rudolf Nureyev was from a Muslim Tartar family and started dance in Bashkir folk performances. On tour in Paris, he escaped the KGB to socialize at gay bars and with foreigners. In retaliation for defecting to the West, he was banned from seeing his mother for 25 years.
LQxjZ TIL Louisa May Alcott (author of Little Women) wrote a story about taking hashish in 1876, with a happy ending
E1Knx Til the Sasanian Persians gassed Roman soldiers with sulfur dioxide during the Siege of Dura Europos. One of the earliest examples of chemical warfare
x65r5 TIL that symbols to denote irony or sarcasm in print have been around since at least the 1500s
rR1v1 TIL that a small town in West Virginia asked the Soviet Union and East Germany for help with replacing a bridge after being ignored by the West Virginian goverment. The Soviets sent a journalist to investigate and within one hour the state finally agreed to pay for it.