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TIL The Shanghai heroin trade in the 1920s was dominated by two men. One was Chief of Police, the other was head of the government Anti-Opium Board.

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ne1pd TIL anthropologists have recreated the name of the ancient Indo-European sky god Dyēus or Dyḗus Phtḗr(Sky Father)from which is derived Deus, Dio, Zeus/Zeus Pater, Jove/Jupiter, द्यौष्(Dyáuṣ), Deva, Tyr, Day, Tuesday, and Deity among many others
j6Pnp TIL: The massive, multinational tableware company Oneida started in 1848 as a sex cult that invented the term "free love" and featured, among other things, middle-aged women acting as sexual mentors to adolescent boys and a focus on men withholding their orgasm during intercourse (coitus reservatus)
6E5o8 TIL Cornelius Vanderbilt was the richest man in the world with net worth of US $215 billion (inflation-adjusted 2016). In comparison Jeff Bezos's net worth is US$137 billion (January 2019). By a 1973 family reunion, not one of the 120 Vanderbilt descendants present was a millionaire.
74xr TIL that the average American thinks that 26% of the federal budget goes to foreign aid, while it in reality is less than 1%, or 0.17% of GNI (compared to 1.4% of Sweden’s GNI)
mA1Y TIL George Crum invented the potato chips after a customer complaint that his french fries were too thick and soft. In order to teach him a lesson, he cut the potatoes as thin as possible, deep fried them to a crisp and salted them. The customers loved them and the potato chips were invented.