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TIL: Patrick Stewart thought he would be fired from Star Trek: The Next Generation and didn’t unpack his bags for 6 weeks

Py9e TIL Vikings used the bones of slain animals when smithing new weapons believing this would enchant the weapon with the animals spirit. This actually made the weapons stronger because the carbon in the bones coupled with the iron made a primitive version of steel.
jNKxX TIL: During the filming of The Rocky Horror Picture Show the crew held an easter egg hunt on set. Some of the eggs that weren't found can actually be seen in the film. This is suggested as the origin of the term.
YpQG7 TIL Djibouti author Abdourahman Waberi wrote a story about a world in which Africa was more advanced compared to the West. In her writing, Zurich held the highest rate of AIDS infections and African leaders were making broad pronouncements about the hoards of impoverished, starving Japanese
6YbX TIL that one of the weapons America would have used in the planned invasion of Japan was Little David, a 36" (914mm) mortar used to test aerial bombs. Converted into a mobile siege gun, it fired 3650 lb (1.6k kg) shells at a range of 6 miles, and would have been the largest calibre gun ever fielded.
R5jX1 TIL In 1949, a Spanish-language version of Orson Welles' 1938 War of the Worlds radio adaptation aired in Ecuador. When listeners in the capital city of Quito learned it was fiction, the citizens rioted and burned down the radio station and news outlet, killing at least seven people.