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TIL the unit of speed the knot, used extensively throughout the world in aviation, weather, and nautical contexts, comes from literal knots of the "common log" device. This 17th century device was a coil of rope with uniformly spaced knots, attached to a piece of wood shaped like a slice of pie.

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DV4e TIL a man named Robert Wiggen, who spent 3 years in prison, started a website that posts mug shots taken from police department websites and makes them easily searchable on sites like Google and then charges money to have the images removed. His own mug shot is absent from the site.
GApKG TIL about Project Venona, the US effort to decrypt KGB/GRU intercepts leading to some of the greatest intelligence breakthroughs during the cold war. Including exposing critical Soviet assets, (ie. the Rosenbergs, David Greenglass, and Kim Philby)
18K8 TIL that after a typhoon swept through Microneasian island Pingelap, leaving olny about 20 survivors, 10% of the population is now affected by rare color blindness, because of one male survivor
M7gl8 TIL of Bikini Atoll, a coral reef in the Marshall Islands which served as a nuclear test site for the US in WWII, and after which the bikini swimsuit and Spongebob's Bikini Bottom are named.
XEEd6 It's largely about how it feels in the mouth. Once a piece of cheddar has been heated to around 150°F, the matrix of milk proteins that provide its structure begins to break down, and the cheese takes on a creamy texture that many people find appealing.