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TIL - Harry Houdini once sued a police officer who accused him of making his escapes via bribery. He won his case by opening the judge’s safe.

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N7xkE TIL The USAF and later Atomic Energy Commission tried to develop a nuclear propulsion system for aircrafts between 1946 and 1961 at a total cost of about $1 billion. Two of assemblies, consisting of a reactor and two modified turbojets each, is on display at Idaho National Laboratory.
R7kV4 TIL that on his travels through the Arctic, naturalist George Steller described a mysterious creature known as the Danish Sea Ape. While this has since perplexed scientists, evidence indicates that he was not describing an animal, but rather subtly mocking the ship's Danish captain, who he despised.
0d5N TIL that in France in the 1500s, women could charge their husbands with impotence. He would have to become erect and show he could ejaculate in a courtroom. If he failed, he could demand a Trial by Congress and attempt to have sex with his wife in front of the experts.
l58V TIL The abacus is still manufactured and widely used in Japan. The latest versions of it include a dual bead and digital calculator
y6Yp TIL that the world’s oldest known complaint letter was written to a Sumerian copper merchant named Ea-Nasir almost 4000 years ago on a clay tablet: “You put ingots which were not good before my messenger and said: ‘If you want to take them, take them; if you do not want to take them, go away!’”