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TIL that German-born soldiers made up about 10% of Union forces during the Civil War. Some of them were exiled supporters of the 1848 revolutions that swept Europe. After the war, the Forty-Eighters supported improved labor laws, and also advanced development in education, medicine, and journalism.

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VBbb8 TIL that a French guy tried (and failed) to settle on a remote island in the Southern Indian Ocean, leaving 5 cows on the island in 1871. The cattle would go on to multiply, destroy the islands' forest, and contributed to the extinction of some endemic birds.
XE6x6 TIL that up until the year 1916, London's famed department store Harrods offered packages of morphine and cocaine complete with syringe and spare needles, which was recommended as “A Useful Present for Friends at the Front.”
MeaE7 TIL Mississippi set up a commission that became a de facto intelligence organization which surveilled people suspected of being anti-segregationist. The commission was eventually linked to the murder of three civil rights workers. It existed between 1956 and 1977 and profiled over 87 000 people.
g1y TIL that there is a company that uses human fetal kidney cells to develop and amplify flavors. They are partnered with Nestle, Campbell’s Soup, Kraft Foods and Pepsi.
0eYL TIL whilst working as an army chaplain just before WW1 Rev. Reginald Dean drank an ‘immortality potion’ given to him by an indian doctor. Now Britain’s oldest man, last week he celebrated his 110th birthday.