› added 8 months ago

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TIL that the game Snooker was invented by a British Army officer in India called Neville Chamberlain (Not the former Prime Minister). The name "Snooker" came from and was used as a derogatory term for first year, inexperiended soldiers

Read more snookerusa.com

via reddit.com

gMPE8 TIL in 1857, a congressman from New York killed the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia over the attorney’s affair with his wife. He claimed temporary insanity (thanks to his wife’s infidelity), the first time this defense was used in U.S. history. He was acquitted.
Wkbbo TIL in a passage referring to people with unique and special abillities, St Augustine, the father of western christianity, praises flatulists: people with such control over their bowels they can produce music with their farts
mZWY TIL the blobfish doesn’t look like that in the deep sea (i.e. when it’s alive), it just looks like a normal fish
8aMjP TIL There is an active volcano in Colorado, USA that last erupted around the same time as the pyramids were being built in Egypt.
voZB TIL that Hitler came to power in a democracy with a highly liberal constitution, and in part by using democratic freedoms to undermine and then destroy democracy itself.