› added 13 years ago

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TIL 789 grams of potent dried cannabis were found buried alongside a 2700 year old light-haired, blue-eyed Caucasian man in Northwestern China.

E1E0X TIL the first airplane dogfight was between two American mercenaries on opposing sides in the Mexican Revolution. Both men had orders to kill, but neither pilot wanted to harm the other, so they exchanged multiple volleys of pistol fire, intentionally missing before exhausting their ammunition.
9wBmp TIL that during WWII, 14,700 tons of Silver loaned from the US Treasury were used for the circuitry of the Manhattan Project, because there wasn't enough copper due to war-time shortages. All but "thirty six thousandths of one percent" were returned to the US Treasury by June 1st, 1970.
JY4Ml TIL of a study which suggests melatonin, the hormone associated with control of our sleep-wake cycles, evolved 700 million years ago from our tiny oceangoing ancestors that would swim to the surface of the sea at twilight and then sink into the depths of the ocean in a sleepy fall through the night.
kJ1eW TIL a Mexican politician accused of money laundering and participating in organized crime escaped arrest by sneaking into his own swearing-in ceremony, where he claimed parliamentary immunity
x6OyD TIL The USSR had a popular government published cookbook called “The Book of Tasty and Healthy Food“. The different editions often reflected the government’s priorities such as the removal of Stalin’s quotes after his death in 1953 as part of De-Stalinization.