› added 5 years ago

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TIL That Spongebob Squarepants was originally going to be called Spongeboy and the show was originally going to be called Spongeboy Ahoy, but they had to change his name after it turned out that Spongeboy was the copyrighted name of a mop.

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PYyRG TIL that dental fluoride was discovered due to a chemist investigating the weird staining on the teeth of people living in a small town in Colorado.
BrMOW TIL Rage Against The Machine bassist Tim Commerford was arrested at the 2000 MTV VMAs for protesting Limp Bizkit by climbing the show’s set. The band pleaded with him not to but video director Michael Moore told him, "Timmy, Follow your heart." He then rushed the stage. The band broke up soon after.
xVxk7 TIL that a dam failure in China, 1975 caused as many as 240,000 deaths. The chief engineer predicted it beforehand, and was removed from the project. It was covered up for decades
JYKb8 TIL The influenza epidemic of 1918 killed an estimated 675,000 Americans (far more than the 53,402 who died in combat in World War I). The impact was so profound as to depress average life expectancy in the U.S. by >10 years & may have played a significant role in ending the World War 1 conflict.
OorP1 TIL during WWII, Winston Churchill had a private bathroom in his bunker, that was actually hiding a direct phone-link to the president of the USA. So, when the lock on the door was switched from ‘vacant’ to ‘engaged’, Churchill wasn’t using the toilet, he was instead conducting important business.