› added 5 years ago

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TIL: John Anthony Walker, a US Navy officer who reported secrets to the Soviet Union for 18 years. He got his son involved, and even tried to involve his daughter. He was finally exposed when his ex-wife reported him. When asked about his spying, he said "KMart has better security than the Navy".

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6EelZ TIL a therapy cat named Oscar predicted the impending death of some 50 terminally ill patients by napping next to them a few hours before they died. After he accurately predicted 25 deaths, staff started calling family members of residents as soon as they discovered him sleeping close to someone
m1ZRR TIL that the Catholic Church forbade people with epilepsy from becoming ordained as priests, all the way until the mid-1980s, due to superstition about evil influences
wox46 TIL that Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the only US President to be successfully elected more than two times leading to the ratification of the 22nd amendment in response to his death.
NmBM TIL While the “Shining” was playing in New York and Los Angeles, Stanley Kubrick ordered projectionists to cut the original final scene from the film by hand, and mail the deleted film strips back to Warner Bros. The original ending has never been released since.
myPM TIL the Roman civilization technically lasted for 2,200 years. It was founded as a monarchy in 753 BC, became a republic in 509 BC, turned into an empire in 27 BC, shifted capital to Constantinople in 330 AD, and finally fell only in 1453 AD.