› added 11 years ago

294

TIL There are still people living in iron lungs

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9wLB TIL only 6 people attended Thomas Paine’s funeral, one of the Founding Fathers of the U.S. because of his ridicule of Christianity.
D1EAD TIL a 2003 study suggests that 1 in 200 men are direct descendants of Genghis Khan. Almost 8% of men living in the former Mongolian empire carry nearly identical Y chromosomes.
E1AbW TIL the difference between grits and polenta is the type of corn they use
P1DeL TIL about Velvalee Dickinson, a.k.a. the Doll Lady, an American doll-collector-turned-spy for imperial Japan during WW2. She sent coded letters about Navy ships, ostensibly about dolls, w/ the return addresses of other collectors with whom she'd previously had disagreements
nee1b Just getting to the centre of the Earth and surviving is impossible. The Earth's core is about 9,000°F—as hot as the sun's surface—and would instantly roast anyone who found himself there. Then there's the pressure, which can reach roughly three million times that on the Earth's surface and would crush you. But let's not sweat the details. Once you arrive at the centre of the Earth, the physics gets really interesting.