› added 6 years ago

53

TIL in WW2, Britain released over 50,000 weather balloons trailing wire to drift over Germany and shortcircuit high voltage wires.

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Y6Zx TIL During World War II, prisoners of war in Canada were treated so nicely that they didn’t want to leave Canada when they were released.
ngOP TIL that in 1969 Mick Jagger wrote to artist M.C. Escher asking him to provide an image for a Rolling Stones album cover. Escher turned him down. He’d never heard of the Stones. He’d never heard of Jagger and he objected to Jagger addressing him by his first name.
0wWRj TIL The coefficient of thermal expansion of steel is similar to that of concrete, eliminating large internal stresses due to differences in thermal expansion or contraction. This makes steel the ideal material to reinforce concrete in the world's largest structures.
l7PLB TIL: Some whales engage in 'trap' feeding behaviour essentially letting the fish swim directly into their mouths.
0wY7p TIL that Häagen-Dazs is an American company, started by two Jewish brothers in the Bronx. “Häagen Dazs” are nonsensical words invented to sound Danish because the brothers wanted to pay tribute to the Danish treatment of Jews in WWII.