› added 7 years ago

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TIL that Alfred Wegener, the father of Continental Drift (which became plate tectonics) and a pioneer in paleoclimatology died lost in a blizzard on an expedition. His theories were ridiculed until decades later.

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XEL1k TIL Crocodiles Do Not Die of Old Age
7r6ar TIL after the Napoleonic Wars, scavengers harvested bones from the battlefields to use as fertilizer.
rRd7M TIL that the world's first mental health hospital was built in Baghdad, Iraq in 705 AD. While mental health patients were being condemned, punished, and even burned in Europe, 8th and 9th century mental health patients in Iraq, Egypt, and Syria were given more proper hospitalization and treatment.
WkeoY TIL In 1971 Fleetwood Mac had to cancel a sold out show booked at the Whiskey A Go Go when their guitarist Jeremy Spencer simply vanished into thin air. He was eventually found having cut off all his hair, dressed in shabby clothes, and joined a cult called The Children of God.
Wkjvo TIL the Swiss Federal Railways’ centralised lost and found service is still seeking the owner of a packet of gold bars worth CHF182k (since Oct '19). The most valuable misplaced object on their trains, however, remains a 1727 Stradivarius violin in 2012, estimated to be worth CHF2.6 million.