› added 2 years ago

49

TIL there's a town in the Netherlands called Poortugaal. About 10Km south of the center of Rotterdam, the town's flag and coat of arms are also heavily inspired by Portugal's.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

nemeB TIL former Ugandan president Idi Amin called himself: "His Excellency, President for Life... Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Seas and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular", in addition to his claim of being uncrowned King of Scotland.
7O1b TIL a chimpanzee that was socialized to humans since birth could log onto a computer to look at pictures, watch television using a remote control, brush his teeth, feed hay to his owner’s horses, water plants and learned the schedule of passing ice cream trucks.
X4dj TIL in 1999 Martin Luther King Jr’s family won a wrongful death lawsuit, the jury found that the US Government had some doing in his assassination. The family only asked for $100 in restitution to prove the suit was not for financial gain.
DRDP TIL that CGI rendering software, used to model gravitational lensing around black holes and wormholes, in the film ‘Interstellar’ was so accurate it’s creation produced three scientific papers and are likely the best visualizations of said effects ever created.
v1gJj TIL of spray paint on sidewalks called “utility graffiti,” which uses colors and symbols to identify pipes and wires underground. Marking the ground wasn’t standard until 1976, when a dig in Los Angeles punctured a gas line and created a “wall of fire” that killed 9 people and destroyed 7 buildings.