Post * mxO5Y — Curious Curator

› added 6 years ago

150

TIL Despite rigorously training the dogs that went into space, when Soviet scientists had one escape days before a flight they simply grabbed a stray and sent him instead. His flight was successful.

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R5aA8 TIL the IAU definition of planet that excludes Pluto from being considered one also excludes Mercury.

dD0r7 TIL that the curveball was invented by a baseball player named Candy Cummings. He was also the first player ever to pitch two complete games in one day and later invented a device to safely couple railroad cars together.

YpMjd TIL about Yasuteru Yamada, a retired engineer who after watching the news coverage of the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster, organized a group of 200+ fellow retirees and volunteered to go to the site and assist in the cleanup so the younger generation didn't have to and risk exposure to radiation.

X05W6 TIL that visitors to the Grand Canyon National Parks Museum were exposed to unsafe levels of radiation for nearly two decades due to uranium ore being improperly stored in 5-gallon paint buckets next to a taxidermy exhibit

P1bOZ TIL about Victor Lustig, a con artist who famously "sold" the Eiffel Tower twice in 1925 to scrap metal dealers in one of the most audacious scams in history.