› added 10 years ago

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TIL that when Marie Curie’s body was exhumed it was found that her radium levels were below the acceptable limit. She likely got cancer from her early work in the military, not from her pioneering research into radioactivity.

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16reV TIL the sun loses over 4 million tons of mass every second as energy
N7daE TIL that before the coup d'état in 1953 Mohammad Mosaddegh was regarded as the leading champion of secular democracy and resistance to foreign domination in Iran’s modern history, and that the coup partly took place because Iran nationalized its oil industry.
xbOB TIL Congressman Francis Walter gave President Franklin Roosevelt a letter-opener made from Japanese man’s arm. Roosevelt denied the gift and called for it to have proper burial.
GAD85 TIL Harrison Ford has only played the villain once in his 50+ year film career: the thriller "What Lies Beneath" released in 2000, co-starring Michelle Pfeiffer.
5Yao9 TIL that India requires voting booths within 2 km of every registered voter. This means some poll workers trek for days through mountains and jungles to reach small, remote villages, sometimes for only a single registered voter.