› added 10 years ago

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TIL a Soviet aircraft carrier was sold to a Chinese travel agency to convert it into a hotel and casino. It was all a cover story and the ship is now part of the Chinese navy fleet!

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via reddit.com

rRgKx TIL that in 1999, an improperly set up hot tub at a garden show in Bovenkarspel, The Netherlands, caused an outbreak of 206 cases of Legionnaire’s disease and 32 confirmed deaths
pYAn4 TIL It’s likely that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt never had polio. Studies have suggested that Guillain–Barré syndrome caused his paralysis, and it was misdiagnosed as polio.
WkrXd TIL Tolar, NM has the distinction of being the only town in the USA to be bombed out of existence in World War II. Not that it was a large town at the time. The explosion from an accidental railroad disaster left a crater about 20-feet deep and 60-feet wide - the town was pretty much obliterated.
pwme TIL Witches created potions including a mix of opium poppies, belladona, hashish, fly-agaric mushrooms and toad skins (containing DMT) in a hempseed oil based “flying ointment” that the witches would administer vaginally using a special dildo. This was the the witches “broomstick!”
KOkE6 TIL that, despite being widely panned by critics and audiences, Roger Ebert actually gave the film "The Happening" by M. Night Shyamalan a 3 star rating, even going so far as to call it "too thoughtful for the summer action season"!