› added 9 years ago

79

TIL that in 1873 William Shanks spent 15 years of his life calculating pi to 707 places, BY HAND. However The Last Few Years Were Wasted– He Made A Mistake After The 527'th Digit.

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W5NX TIL despite being a millionaire, Steve Jobs only paid $500 a month in child support to his daughter, Lisa. A girl he named a computer after, but attempted to deny paternity for.
XERBj TIL during the winter, people spend more time indoors with the windows sealed, so they are more likely to breathe the same air as someone who has the flu and thus contract the virus.Days are shorter during the winter, and lack of sunlight leads to low levels of vitamin D decreasing immunity to virus
xVAv7 TIL that some of the retired Concordes have a pilot's hat permanently trapped in the cockpit, inserted during the final flight into a gap that opened up at high speed, but closed again as the fuselage cooled.
78n4x TIL about the Memory of the World Programme: an international initiative launched to safeguard the documentary heritage of humanity. It includes, for example, the Gutenberg Bible, Symphony No. 9 by Beethoven, and humanity's first recordings of its own voice
Le7p TIL that William Frawley, who played Fred Mertz in I Love Lucy, was such an avid Yankees fan that his DesiLu contract contained a clause allowing him to skip work if the Yanks were playing in the World Series.