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TIL: The eastern United States was once the home of over 3 billion chestnut trees. In the early 1900's, the trees were devastated by a chestnut blight which virtually eliminated all of the them. Today, there are still efforts to revitalize these beautiful trees!

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oB7pA TIL the second American in space, Gus Grissom, suffered from severe hay fever and was nearly disqualified from the Astronaut Corps until it was discovered that pollen is nonexistent in space.
YJvP TIL that the phrase “rule of thumb” refers to estimating measurements with one’s thumb and has nothing to do with the thickness of a stick for beating one’s wife
0wmGN TIL There are 9 different accepted time standards used around the world. Many of these time standards vary from each other by hundredths of a second to several minutes (excluding time zone variations and DST).
xOm1 TIL archaeologists had found a ring inside a 9th century Viking grave that is inscribed with the phrase ‘for Allah’.
XEDaE TIL that news channels owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group are required to do 'must-run' segments. Which is a centralized system of mandating news stories, reports or segments at all 193 (soon 233) stations that SBG owns