› added 5 years ago

88

TIL - in 1941 people in Northern California and Southwestern Oregon started a push to form a new US State called Jefferson. The counties for a couple weeks would "secede every Thursday," using rifles to interdict drivers on Route 99 and hand them copies of their proclamation of independence.

164oO TIL about Sumitomo Group, a group of autonomous large Japanese corporations. It was founded in 1615 by a former Buddhist monk, Sumitomo Masatomo, as a single bookshop. Over centuries, it has gradually grown into a giant but still follows its founder's 17th century precepts.
455o TIL Farmers forcibly bypass the adolescent years of fruit trees by attaching a mature branch to a newly planted stem. The process known as grafting can also be used to grow two plants together such as tomatoes and potatoes on one plant. http://ift.tt/2rGjQpu
vPGRK TIL the longest word in the English dictionary: Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis. Defined as: it as "a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust"
9Y0Dm TIL Ho Chi Minh, leader of the communist party in Vietnam, was witnessed by American advisors on September 2, 1945, giving a speech repeating the 2nd paragraph of Jefferson's 1776 Declaration of Independence. That's why the current official motto of Vietnam is "Independence, Freedom, and Happiness."
YpybW TIL all vertebrates (except fish) have the same basic skeleton design: a column of vertebrae that supports the body and head, a skull that houses and protects the brain and sense organs, ribs that protect the heart and lungs and 4 limbs. Every limb also shares the same basic pattern and has 5 digits