› added 7 years ago

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TIL that in the middle of the Great Depression, a man placed an offer in an Ohio newspaper, saying: If you’re in trouble, write me. Many people sent him desperate letters, needing things like shoes, a coat, mercy, food, and to save their family from despair. And back came checks, under a pseudonym.

1G0d TIL there was a man still alive in 1963 who had viewed Abraham Lincoln in an open casket.
MmXm TIL the FBI likely encouraged myths about Ma Barker being a criminal mastermind to justify shooting her during the shootout between the Barker-Karpis gang and the FBI. She likely never had any involvement in the gang’s crimes.
9w647 TIL that "Steven Universe" creator Rebecca Sugar considers the Gems, an alien species of sentient rocks in the television show, to be neurodivergent: "I think it makes perfect sense that [they] would be relatable to neurodiverse and autistic members of our audience."
4OOX TIL Roman philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca was sentenced to suicide by Roman emperor Nero. Due to his old age and diet he failed to bleed to death after severing his veins. He then, to no avail, attempted to consume poison. Finally, he suffocated during a steam bath meant to quicken blood loss.
GZR5 TIL after the courtesan Leæna (whose name means lioness) refused to reveal the name of the conspirators that tried to kill the Athenian tyrant Hippias under torture, the Athenians erected a tongueless lioness statue in her memory and placed lionesses next to statues of Aphrodite.