› added 9 years ago

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TIL that in 2007, the First Mount Olive Free Will Baptist Church purchased a $150,000 Bentley, neglected to pay their $12,000 water bill, and defaulted on their $1.5 million mortgage. The church was struck by lightning and the subsequent fire completely destroyed the building.

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jN9Ov TIL "This is a present from a small distant world, a token of our sounds, our science, our images, our music, our thoughts, and our feelings. We are attempting to survive our time so we may live into yours" - Is the message NASA launched as a record into space in 1977 attached to Voyager 1.
NX79M TIL Precursors to chewing gum date back 5,000 years with the first commercial chewing gum released in 1848. To sweeten these early gums chewers would repeatedly dip the gum in a plate of powdered sugar to reconstitute the sweetness while they chewed.
wLdME TIL that unicorn hunting is legal in Michigan and you can get an actual license for it. It originated from a Unicorn Hunters Club in the 70's only to gain publicity, but it grew and came to actual issued licenses for unicorn hunting.
Z8LkB TIL: While filming the 1925 Ben-Hur the director split Italian extras based on fascist or antifascist factions to make the fighting more realistic. Real swords were removed from the scene to prevent things from getting too out of hand
O4EX TIL that Alan Shepard, the first American in space, wet his spacesuit before getting there—which opened up a whole new research field—space urination