› added 9 years ago

83

TIL that in the 1942 Cocoanut Grove fire in Boston, at least 300 people lost their lives because the doors opened inwards. This prompted the regulation that all doors in a public building must open outwards.

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xVVA1 TIL Japanese firm gives non-smokers extra six days holiday to compensate for cigarette breaks
Bjyb TIL in 2010 Mattel launched Computer Engineers Barbie. With the accompanying book we learned that CE Barbie needed the help of two men to code the game she was designing and they also needed to help her after she accidentally infected her and her sister Skipper’s computers with a virus.
yQxlv TIL That Abigail Adams Sent a Letter to John Adams, A Few Months Before the Declaration of Independence Was Signed, to "Remember the Ladies".
1alO7 TIL A scientist embedded LEDs in a prop prosthetic arm to demonstrate an electric eel attack. Each flash in the video represents the firing of the nerves in a potential predator. In each of the volleys at 600 volts, there are 200 pulses per second, a very good rate for causing pain.
9Yg1G TIL The Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust is a grain reserve of commodities and cash. In 2008 the USDA sold the remaining stocks into an all cash reserve. Since it no longer holds commodities, it can respond to local food crises outside the US, but not to a global one that affects the USA itself.