› added 8 years ago

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TIL Canada bought a license to produce a fighter the US no longer wanted, and it ended up being so successful as a ground attack aircraft that nobody was able to catch one during more than 20 years of NATO exercises. They won first or second place in nearly every exercise they participated in.

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1aPkd TIL: Archaeologist Alexander Peev was executed by firing squad in 1943 on suspicion of sending a coded message to the Soviet Union. It was actually an ancient inscription he wanted Russian archaeologists to help him interpret. The text remains undeciphered.
m1Y9o TIL that in mediaeval England, an area of special legal jurisdiction extended around the monarch and his court and traveled with him. Legal cases that arose within a 12-mile radius of the monarch (known as the "verge") were tried before a Court of the Verge.
rNyw4 TIL the plural of sarcophagus is ‘sarcophagi’
7JrZ TIL that Switzerland has accidentally “invaded” Liechtenstein three times.
8elP TIL the famous “We can do it!” WWII propaganda poster only achieved popularity during the 1980’s. During the war, it was strictly internal to Westinghouse, displayed only during February 1943, and was not for recruitment but to exhort already-hired women to work harder.