› added 8 years ago

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TIL a US cargo plane crashed while moving children from Vietnam. American businessman Robert Macauley heard that it would take over a week to evacuate the survivors, so he chartered a Boeing 747 and arranged for 300 orphaned children to leave the country, paying for the trip by mortgaging his house.

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awY6A TIL My belief that the reason there is no channel 1 on TV sets was because channel 1 was reserved for the US military is WRONG! Experimental TV stations on channel 1 frequencies experienced too much radio interference. So the FCC cut channel 1 leaving channels 2 thru 12 on VHF.
ne9ob TIL a species of spider discovered in 2015 was named Godric Gryffindor, due to it's resemblance to the Sorting Hat in Harry Potter.
yGDV TIL the American Association for cancer research conducted a study using capsaicin, the antioxidant that makes peppers spicy. It was determined that cancer tumors were decreased to one-fifth their size, on average.
OGV9e TIL Fender Guitars did a study and found that 90% of new guitar players abandon playing within 1 year. The 10% that don't quit spend an average of $10,000 on hardware over their lifetime, buying 5-7 guitars and multiple amps.
neljP TIL that the finance minister of Latvia is also Woman Grandmaster of chess, the second highest-ranking chess title that exists for women