› added 6 years ago

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TIL blimps use the same amount of fuel in 2 weeks that a 747 uses to taxi to the runway

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OZoY TIL the Temple liberties in the City of London, founded by the Knights Templar, are exempt from the jurisdiction of the Lord Mayor and Corporation of the City; when the LM tried to enter with his ceremonial swordbearer in 1668, students imprisoned the LM overnight and took his sword away.
78PZr TIL that the expression "bête noire" is an allusion to the french Beast of Gévaudan
mxpZv TIL that a farmer called Almon Strowger invented automatic telephone switching because he didn't trust his local telephone operator. She was the wife of his competition and Strowger suspected that she was diverting requests for his services to her husband’s business instead.
6EKo8 TIL for 26 years, German feminists Ottilie Assing and African-American Abolitionist Frederick Douglass were believed to be having an affair. I’m August 1884, after learning Douglass remarried to Helen Pitts, Assing killed herself by swallowing cyanide in a public park in Paris.
kOYrd TIL M&M's were created in 1941 to provide the military with chocolate that didn't melt. During WW2 M&M's were exclusively sold to the military.