› added 11 years ago

100

TIL South African residents can legally attach small flamethrowers to cars to repel carjackers

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XEJlr TIL during the middle Ages saffron was so expensive some traders would try to increase their profits by bulking up the herb with yellow marigold petals. When authorities in Nuremberg, where the herb was mainly traded, found out about these tainted parcels of saffron, the traders were burned alive.
9w7R6 TIL Tunisia had an infamously bad performance in modern pentathlon at the 1960 Olympics. One athlete nearly drowned; one got disqualified for firing a pistol too close to the judges; three fell off horses; and they were caught cheating in the fencing part of the event.
nexRG TIL: During the kidnapping of Israeli athletes at the Olympic games in 1972, police dressed as athletes were planning to sneak attack the kidnappers. But local television crews were broadcasting them on live TV and the kidnappers were made aware of the plan.
P77O TIL Xerox has a program called Social Service Leave that allows employees to take a year off to work for a nonprofit organization while earning their full salary and including job security.
4kEDb TIL that following the Black Death in England, peasants were able to negotiate better wages due to labour shortages. In response Parliament passed the Statute of Labourers 1351 which prohibited the soliciting of wages above pre-plague levels. This contributed to the English Peasant's Revolt of 1381.