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TIL about Kitty Fisher, who was famous for simply for being famous. In one incident, she fell off her horse while riding and exposed herself. Broadsheets & prints mocked her, but she seized the attention for herself by having her portrait painted by England's most prominent painter.

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0dnEj TIL of Emma of Normandy. Becoming Queen of England after marrying Æthelred the Unready in 1002, she later went on to marry Cnut Forkbeard, the son of the man who deposed her first husband. After marrying Cnut and again becoming queen, she was the only woman to ever be Queen of England twice
DQ8vj TIL that the United Arab Emirates were original the Trucial states under British control but two of the states remained independent from the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar, while one, Ras al-Khaimah, joined up later.
kOOgE TIL Universal Studios bought the E.T. script for $1 million from Columbia Pictures (which held it from Spielberg after putting it in a "turnaround") in exchange for the latter to retain 5% of the film's net profits. Columbia stated it made more money from E.T. than it did any of its films in 1982.
o66o TIL that Michael Jackson would requested his wine be served in Diet Coke cans during flights, because he didn’t want his kids to see him drinking alcohol.
ZPA4 TIL that Louis Leakey joked to Dian Fossey that she should have her appendix removed if she were serious about studying gorillas in the wild. By the time he clarified this in a letter, she had already gotten the surgery.