› added 10 years ago

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TIL that the claw on the end of a tape measure is supposed to be loose. The distance it moves is equal to the thickness of the claw, to take into account the difference between placing the end over an edge and pressing it against an object.

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wLXkE TIL Florida has almost twice as many boating accidents as the next highest state(California) which has about twice as many as the third highest (New York)
mjWx TIL That the euro in Comic Sans originally had a cartoon eye, but was later removed because “The EU was going to sue us over that.”
GYPO1 TIL In WWII British tanks, one man's job was to handle the radio, hull machine gun, and brewing tea whenever there was an opportunity.
woww1 TIL: Historian Herodotus described a hairy fox-sized “ant” in Asia that dug up gold from the earth, which would be collected by locals. This was likely the Himalayan marmot, which often makes its burrows in gold-rich soil. Tribal peoples of Pakistan have collected the gold for generations.
JY8rj TIL: That during the design process of the World Trade Center, engineers had considered and done an analysis of a scenario where a jet airliner impacted a tower.