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TIL Rudolph Diesel took his inspiration for inventing the Diesel engine from watching a lecture where there was a demonstration of a Malaysian fire starting technique called the 'fire piston' which creates flames through air compression.

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gMNr9 TIL In his mid-70s, Goya created dark paintings not intended for public display, including "Two Old Ones Eating Soup"
4nmg TIL that a trivia book author included a fake entry that said ‘Philip’ was the first name of TV detective 'Columbo,’ who has no first name. When Trivial Pursuit included 'Philip Columbo’ as an answer, the author sued for $300 million, saying they had stolen their trivia from his books.
mxvLo TIL crew members of the Challenger space shuttle survived the “explosion,” manually activated their emergency breathing packs, and were very likely alive for the full 2 minute and 45 second, 65,000 foot free-fall until their crew cabin crashed into the ocean.
Jdmv TIL a 17 year-old online serial scammer was killed when one of his victims mailed him a pipe bomb.
R7yp1 TIL The Southern Tenant Farmers’ Union (STFU) was a federation of tenant farmers formed in July 1934 in Poinsett County with the immediate aim of reforming the crop-sharing system of sharecropping and tenant farming.