› added 4 years ago

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TIL in World War II, U.S. Navy ship accidentally got in proximity with the Japanese ship, Someone decided to throw potatoes in panic. Japanese thought they were grenades and they threw it back which resulted in a potato fight. While they were distracted, the U.S. successfully sunk the enemy ship.

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0wMeN TIL At the time of the English settlement at Jamestown, established in 1607, Opechancanough was a much-feared warrior and a charismatic leader of the Powhatans. In 1646, forces under Royal Governor William Berkeley captured and killed him when he was in his 90s
XEjZQ TIL when Tony Soprano says "Gabagool" he's really meaning "Capicola" but because of the Italian dialect from southern Italy mixing with Jersey/New York it turned into "Gabagool".
rRXLd TIL in 1941, with a lot of the Home Guard unarmed, Churchill wrote to the War Office that "every man must have a weapon of some sort, be it only a mace or a pike". The War Office took him literally and order 250,000 pikes, there was an uproar and none were ever issued.
78Gnr TIL that the Gibson Desert in Australia was named after Alfred Gibson, an explorer who disappeared while trying to cross it, and whose brother William had previously disappeared with the Franklin Expedition.
6YoZ TIL that China cannot recall the loans it has made to the U.S. as the resulting collapse of the U.S. dollar would tank the Chinese economy along with the rest of the world.