› added 9 years ago

361

TIL Eleanor Roosevelt regularly refused Secret Service protection, and instead traveled with a .22 Smith and Wesson on her person.

Read more slate.com

via ift.tt

xa0b TIL that half of the uranium used in US power plants comes from recycled Russian nuclear weapons under an agreement that actually runs out this year.
M7yg8 TIL that sperm whales can generate sounds up to 230 decibels - far beyond the fatality threshold for humans.
mxdZM TIL that during a NASA auction in 1976, an intern called G. George bought 218$ worth of film roll. It turns out that they were original videotape recordings of the Apollo 11 moon landing. Sotheby's has since resold it for about 1.8 million dollars.
Merb TIL for centuries there was a class of slave-soldier called the Mamluks. They were so powerful, free men would sell themselves into slavery hoping to join them. Also, they were wiped out in a purge not unlike the Jedi.
W7DkL TIL Jeanne Weber, a French woman, strangled at least 10 children, including her own. Convicted and declared insane in 1908, she hanged herself in 1918.