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TIL that a British tail gunner in WWII jumped out of a plane without a parachute rather than burn to death. He fell 18,000 feet and survived. He was captured and questioned by the Gestapo. They were so impressed, they issued him a certificate verifying the story.

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YGZP TIL all the presidents of the USA except Martin Van Buren are descended from King John of England.
9YB57 TIL Mitch Hedberg was the Jimmy John's voiceover guy in 2005
P1Xn TIL that during WWII, George de Hevesy dissolved two Nobel Prize medals with aqua regia to prevent the Nazis from stealing them. After the war, the gold was precipitated out of the acid, and the medals recast.
d89p9 TIL that one of the first synthetic dyes, Perkin's Mauve, was discovered by William Perkin after his professor challenged the then-18-year-old to synthesise the anti-malarial quinine.
4XkyX TIL that researchers identified two different types of mind-wandering: intentional mind-wandering, which tends to occur when people engage in easy tasks, and unintentional mind-wandering, which tends to occur when people engage in difficult tasks.