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TIL that when author, journalist, and LGBT activist Dan Savage began writing his advice column pertaining to homosexuality, he urged his editors to let him name it “Hey, Faggot!” so he could reclaim the hate word.

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nRKB TIL Walt Disney personally hated the Goofy character and found its cartoons to be ‘stupid’. The only reason he didn’t axe the character is because it gave work to so many animators.
BrV8x TIL that the textbook "Teaching with Calvin and Hobbes" is the only rare example of creator Bill Watterson licensing his famous characters for anything. Developed by a speech language pathologist and a learning disabilities educator, this 1993 textbook can cost up to $34,000.
wLRbP TIL That Pygmies Have a Life Expectancy of Only 16-24 Years
wLd1P TIL the phrase being on "cloud nine" actually comes from a cloud atlas published in 1896 that divides clouds into 10 basic types, the ninth type being cumulonimbus clouds, the most puffy-looking ones. See A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson, Part V Chapter 17 Into the Troposphere.
Y11r TIL When Walter Washington, the first mayor of Washington D.C. and first African-American mayor of major US city, sent his proposed budget to congress, Democratic Representative John L. McMillan sent a truckload of watermelons to his office in response.