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TIL that for 8 years the CIA ran Operation Midnight Climax, brothels in NYC and San Fran where they secretly administered drugs to johns to study the effects.

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1Db8 TIL after the first edit of Star Wars came back as clunky and lackluster, Lucas spliced together a cut of World War II dogfights. The space battle in the final film is a frame for frame re-enactment of this. (1h41s)
0d4yy TIL Harry Belafonte negotiated a pay-or-play contract in 1959. When network executives said "we can have black folks on TV, we can have white folks on TV. We can't have them together. You have to choose." Belafonte answered "No, but you still have to pay me."
5YmKD TIL that Lake Michigan and Lake Huron are hydrologically the same lake. They are joined by the 5 mile wide, 120ft deep Straits of Mackinac, and depending on conditions, water can flow in either direction, which keeps their water levels similar.
wLG68 TIL: The Darien Gap is a 106 km gap of nearly impassible marsh and jungle between Panama and Columbia that prevents the construction of a highway/road between North and South America and is the only missing piece in connecting the Pan-American Highway
E1xpP TIL "burking" is the death by asphyxiation caused by someone sitting on your chest and holding his hand over your mouth and nose. It is named after the Scottish serial killer William Burke, who used this method in order to leave few marks on the victims which he then sold to Anatomical Institutes.