› added 1 year ago

125

TIL that Bolaji Badejo, a 6 foot 10 Nigerian visual artist, played the original Alien (1979)’s xenomorph. His height and slender body convinced Ridley Scott that he was a perfect choice for the villain. He also died from sickle cell disease at age 39.

Read more cnn.com

via reddit.com

6AOw TIL that 78 percent of NFL football players go bankrupt
JMkB TIL during the 1990s, anti-sweatshop activists from rich countries succeeded in shutting down sweatshops in Bangladesh, forcing thousands of children into prostitution, crime, and starvation.
4JOR TIL that prior to 1999, the mythical American Express Black Card was just that: a myth. The myth became so pervasive that AmEx decided to capitalize on it and actually make a black, ultra exclusive credit card.
kpO5 TIL that, in 200 BCE, Eratosthenes measured the Earth’s circumference to an accuracy of 98.4% by measuring the angle of the sun in two different cities
rdgo TIL Anders Celsius originally created the temperature scale with 100 degrees as freezing and 0 degrees as boiling. Carl Linnaeus, another scientist, waited until he died to change the scale to what it is today.