› added 7 years ago

71

TIL that the reason spray paint cans have a marble inside them to mix up the propellant and paint inside the can.

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wLnw6 TIL of the Texas City Disaster, the deadliest industrial accident in United States history. The explosion, caused by a ship full of ammonium nitrate catching fire, was so large that the ship's anchor serves as a memorial to the explosion where it landed... a mile and a half inland.
P1jpZ TIL of the Knights of the Golden Circle, a secret society during the American Civil War that aimed to create a new country based in Havana, by expanding the Confederacy around the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea
rLDe TIL the book ‘Walden’ by Henry David Thoreau is often seen as a 'bible’ for self-sufficiency enthusiasts. However, while many picture Thoreau as a hermit in the woods, his cabin on the lake was about a mile from town, where he would often go to visit his mother, who did his laundry for him.
Ooe64 TIL: Since 1945, all British tanks have been equipped with boiling vessels allowing them to make tea.
PYJKZ TIL the first reliable pregnancy tests involved doctors injecting women's urine into frogs; if they laid eggs without mating, the woman was pregnant. This test was called the "Hogben Test" and was used widely for about 20 years until doctors began injecting mice and rabbits instead.