› added 8 years ago

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TIL the Euro currency was designed featuring imagery of fictitious bridges to represent architectural styles throughout time in Europe. They had to be careful not feature one country over the others, though, but the Netherlands then built the bridges in real life anyway.

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LnX0 TIL in the mid-1980s, before digital circuitry became affordable, Nissan used tiny vinyl records for their voice warning system (to tell drivers doors were open, for example)
epVQn TIL that the Embassy of Spain to the Holy See is the oldest embassy in the world. It was created in 1480 by King Ferdinand the Catholic. It is housed in the same building (Palace of Spain) since 1647, and the square in Rome where the palace is located takes the name from it (Piazza di Spagna)
X0XRr TIL in 1842, Charles Dickens visited the Whitehouse. He went to the front door and knocked, but no one answered, so he just let himself in.
v1618 TIL TNT is not dynamite. They are actually very different. Dynamite is stabilized nitroglycerin, while TNT is short for its chemical name, trinitrotoluene. TNT was first used as an explosive in 1891. Dynamite was patented in 1867.
Lwwv TIL that China is implementing a game-like scoring system that ranks all citizens’ levels of “patriotism,” rewards those that agree with the party, and punishes people for interacting with low-scoring citizens