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TIL that “Baby Huey” was a 400lbs Chicago soul singer who died at age 26 after releasing a single unsuccessful album. The album later became hugely influential on early hiphop artists, eventually being sampled on hundreds of hiphop tracks over the past 35 years

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VMQjB TIL that the Dragon’s Breath, the world’s second hottest pepper, was developed for its essential oil having potential as a skin anaesthetic, and later cultivated by a breeder who had not planned to breed the chili for record heat, but rather was trying to grow an attractive pepper plant.
5YnG8 TIL that in 1666 the Dutch painter Willem van de Velde, when tasked with portraying a sea battle, manned a ship himself to make live drawings of the ongoing Four Days Battle from as close as possible.
neg4r TIL of Bekim Fehmiu, a Yugoslavian actor who was the first Eastern European to headline a Hollywood movie during the Cold War.
6EAg7 TIL Gary Gygax's wife was convinced he was having an affair so she followed him to a dimly lit basement and burst into the room only to find him and his friends hunched over hand drawn maps. Gary would go on to invent the role playing game "Dungeons and Dragons"
p8YxO TIL that 'Randy' from George Lopez was played by Nick Offerman.