› added 5 years ago

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TIL that Alice Huyler Ramsey was the first woman to drive coast-to-coast across the USA in 1909. The 22-year-old housewife and mother completed the 3,800-mile journey from New York to San Francisco in a green Maxwell 30. The 59-day trek took 3-weeks longer than planned & 96% of the route was unpaved

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rR4xd TIL that Vincent Van Gogh didn’t start to paint until the age of 28 and only started drawing at the age of 26. In the 9 years, until his death at 37, he painted over 800 paintings.
yQ78a TIL, authors will write themselves into their own stories for various purposes. Stephen King wrote himself into the Dark Tower series after a near-fatal accident. (Stephen King in the book also suffers the same accident)
6EbD7 TIL Yuan Shikai was elected the first official president of the Republic of China, and was active in establishing modern industrial, judicial and educational systems as well as unifying the currency. As a young man, Yuan was also sent to Korea as supreme adviser on Korean government policies
oRN1r TIL that breast cancer used to be known as "Nun's disease" due to the higher prevalence amongst nuns, who were at increased risk due to their celibate lifestyle. An association between reproductive history and cancer risk wasn't proven for about 250 years after it was associated with nuns.
l7RWB TIL the founder of FedEx took the company's last $5,000 to Las Vegas and won $27,000 gambling on blackjack, allowing the company to survive another week