› added 6 years ago

177

TIL that Waylon Jennings was supposed to be on the plane that killed Buddy Holly, but he gave his seat to J. P. Richardson who was sick at the time. Before they left Holly jokingly said that he hoped the bus broke down, to which Jennings replied, "I hope your ol' plane crashes."

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yVVOl TIL that in Quebec, wafers used for holy communion are sold in stores as snacks
lR7B TIL Confederate cavalry general Nathan Bedford Forrest was the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. He quit the group less than two years later. In 1875 he was invited to give a speech before an organization of black Southerners advocating racial reconciliation and equality. (Speech in Comments)
R7EBj TIL that "Pistol" Pete Maravich, the greatest college basketball scorer of all time, and NBA all-star, was born with one coronary artery, while the rest of us have two. He died while playing a pickup basketball game at age 40. At death his heart was scarred and enlarged from oxygen deprivation.
wABJ TIL Lyudmila Pavlichenko, a female Soviet sniper with 309 credited kills, toured the US in 1942 to gain support for a second front in Nazi-occupied Europe; the press was more interested in her appearance and if she wore make-up on the front lines.
wLP0W TIL that if you add 250ml of ethanol to 250ml of water, you get less than 500ml of liquid. This is because strong hydrogen bonding draws the different molecules closer together, and because ethyl molecules interfere with any open spaces in the water, causing them to pack closer together.