› added 11 years ago

87

TIL carrots used to be purple until they were bred orange.

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gM7bD TIL Not only are all four Ninja Turtles (Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael, and Michelangelo) named for Renaissance Artists but so is Splinter- which was a nickname for a Florentine painter named Masaccio
poNb TIL that the largest bank heist in history was $920 Million. Qusay Hussein walked into the Central Bank of Iraq with a handwritten note signed by his father Saddam Hussein, and was hauled out in 3 semi-trucks.
PY49L TIL that in the UK there used to be tax exemption for lunch vouchers given out by employers. It was worth 15p and wasn't adjusted for inflation, ever. If it had kept with inflation since 1948 when the scheme started, it would be worth £5.58, which would be a pretty good lunch.
GrjJ TIL that the replacement for ivory billiard balls were ones made from nitrocellulose, which occasionally exploded on impact with another ball. A bar owner wrote to the inventor saying that they didn’t bother him much but for the fact that every man in his saloon immediately pulled a gun at the sound
rMGo TIL Russia has launched a campaign on ‘selfie safety’, following a spate of selfie-related accidents, among which included two men killed by a live grenade they were posing with.