› added 12 years ago

113

TIL a man planned a roller coaster designed to kill its passengers.

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7rDdZ TIL Tamil Siddhas carve iconic symbols for the Hindu god Shiva out of solidified mercury, using a secret process to solidify the mercury passed down through centuries which has still not been totally understood or replicated using modern chemistry
r9O0 TIL the Berlin Wall was torn down by mistakenly-empowered citizens after an East German spokesman misspoke at a press conference and mentioned immediate border crossing privileges for every citizen.
a8ryL TIL that Stephen Hawking had to be convinced to drop every equation in the manuscript of A Brief History of Time except for E = mc^2 because supposedly every equation would cut the number of people interested in half.
7B7P TIL due to Niger having the world’s highest fertility rate, nearly 50% of the entire population is under the age of 14 years old
emVg TIL that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt couple sold the rights for the first images of their twins to People and Hello! magazines for $14 million—making them the most expensive celebrity pictures ever taken. The money went to the Jolie-Pitt Foundation.