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TIL that the FBI wrongly accused Steven Hatfill of being behind the 2001 anthrax-filled letter attacks. He was compensated with $4.6 million.

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ZpDKp TIL France sent huge numbers of convicts to French Guinea until 1938, where 75-95% eventually died
7rBeM TIL that "the Defenestration of Prague" was an actual historic event that shaped world history and led to 8 million deaths. (Yes, they really mean "defenestration". I never knew how that hilarious word came to be, but turns out this is the origin.)
GMPN TIL Adolphe Sax (inventor of the saxophone) survived a three story fall, a gunpowder explosion, drinking a bowl of sulfuric water, a near-poisoning due to furniture varnish, and falling into a speeding river - all before the age of nine. His neighbors called him “little Sax, the ghost.”
AdY4 TIL The plastic card where the U.S. nuclear launch codes are written includes codes which have no meaning. The president must memorize where the correct code is located on the list, which allows him to positively identify himself as the commander-in-chief and thereby authenticate a launch order.
M9vK TIL that the movie, U-571, states that Americans were responsible for capturing the first enigma machine. The truth is that the first enigma machine was captured by the British, 7 months before the Americans entered the war.