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TIL that nine year old John Clem enlisted in the Union Army during the American Civil War, shot a Confederate Colonel and was promoted to Sergeant by they age of 12, and retired at the rank of Major General in 1915.

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n5gr TIL “anti-social” is commonly misused to describe someone who is actually “asocial”. “Anti-social” describes a person who commits immoral acts.
JYOnQ TIL you had a 20% survival chance as a man on the Titanic, but 75% as a woman
VNLm TIL that an archaeologist and biblical scholar suggested that Jesus is a mushroom. “The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross argued that Jesus in the Gospels was in fact a code for a type of hallucinogen, the Amanita muscaria, and that Christianity was the product of an ancient ‘sex-and-mushroom’ cult.”
b9bnZ TIL a working flying car was made in 1949. The reason it was unsuccessful was due to a lack of demand.
yVW8w TIL that the world's largest desert is not the Sahara, but Antarctica. While the Sahara is the largest hot desert, Antarctica is the largest cold desert, spanning over 14 million square kilometers.