› added 10 years ago

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TIL that “flotsam” is floating wreckage, “jetsam” is cargo that is purposely thrown overboard, “lagan” is goods lying at the bottom of the ocean but reclaimable, and “derelict” is cargo at the bottom of the ocean but lost. These terms are part of the law of admiralty and marine salvage.

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mxEXP TIL Charlie Chaplin was the subject of an FBI investigation due to alleged communist sympathies during the height of McCarthyism. He later said "As for politics, I am an anarchist. I hate government and rules - and fetters ... People must be free."
bbWN TIL in 2001 a Los Angeles man, upset at the poor exit signage on the 110 Freeway, modified an overhead sign under the cover of night. Caltrans investigated it, approved of the workmanship, and left it up for eight years.
V8yp TIL though alchemists never succeeded in transmuting lead to gold, in 1981 physicists used the particle accelerator at Berkeley to shoot Carbon nuclei at thin foils of Bismuth- the resulting collisions did produced a tiny amount of Gold atoms
yQKGw TIL of Jeanne de Clisson. After her husband was beheaded by the french, she sold all of her land and holdings to fund a pirate army. She hunted and destroyed all the French ships that they could. When she caught nobles, she personally beheaded them with an axe.
WWmY TIL the original Washington monument paid for by Congress was a statue of him shirtless as Zeus called “Enthroned Washington.” It became a laughing stock, inspired a group of citizens to raise money privately for the current monument, and now resides in the Smithsonian.