› added 12 years ago

113

TIL that there are 3,778 Americans claiming Asylum in other countries because they feel persecuted by America

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GY0b5 TIL In the early 1960s The Friars Club unknowingly hosted a 5-year long elaborate card cheating scheme involving celebrities, the mafia, an accomplice peering through a hole in the ceiling, and wireless codes sent to a vibrating device hidden on the cheater at the table below. Millions were lost.
yQ91w TIL that Atlanta, Idaho was founded in 1864 during the Civil War by Southerners who believed a rumor that Sherman was defeated in the Battle of Atlanta, GA. This turned out to be incredibly false, but the name stuck anyway.
x6Mo7 TIL that the US government would take federal prisoners on "Diesel therapy" where they just fly them through the country for days, or even weeks
OKPL TIL that bacteria which has evolved to be able to survive in the highly toxic Berkeley Pit superfund site produces a chemical compound not found anywhere else with anticancer potential.
78kox TIL: In 1994, an American teenager Michael Fay was convicted of spray-painting a bunch of cars in Singapore and was caned as punishment. It became such a large issue that the White House attempted to prevent it. A year later, the Simpsons released "Bart vs. Australia", which based on the event.