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TIL that the Giant Tortoise failed to get a scientific name for 300 years after its discovery because it was so delicious that no one could bring a specimen back to Europe without eating it. This includes Darwin himself.

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via reddit.com

XXYE TIL there’s a lot of plastic trash in the ocean. We dumped about five shopping bags full of plastic for every foot of coastline in the world in 2010 alone.
Zp8Dv TIL that Charles Lindbergh’s son, Charles Lindbergh Jr., was kidnapped at 20 months old. The kidnapper picked up a cash ransom for $50,000 leaving a note of the child’s location. The child was not found at the location. The child’s remains were found a month later not far from the Lindbergh’s home.
l7OpB TIL that the largest battle of the American Revolutionary War took place in Europe. America’s Spanish and French allies besieged Gibraltar, at one point attacking with 60,000 men, but were defeated by the 5,000 British defenders.
woKW1 TIL about the "catapult-able cockpit", created by Romanian inventor Anastase Dragomir and successfully tested in 1929 at the Paris-Orly Airport, which featured a parachuted chair that was ejected from an aircraft. It was the first modern layout for an ejection seat, later perfected during WWII.
j6dXE TIL of Dr. Benjamin Spock, a pediatrician whose 1946 book "Baby and Child Care" is one of the best-selling books of the twentieth century. His then unconventional advice to parents to show affection to their children and to see them as individuals revolutionized how parents raised their children.