› added 10 years ago

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TIL during World War II, a U.S. soldier was ambushed by 5 Japanese tanks. He single-handedly destroyed all 5 and was eventually awarded the Medal of Honor.

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RKO9 TIL Saddam Hussein made all education, including Higher Education, free for all Iraqis.
66Vl TIL The inventor of laughing gas became addicted to chloroform and one day, delirious, rushed out into the street and threw sulfuric acid on people. When his mind cleared and he realized what he had done, he killed himself, blotting out the pain with chloroform.
lodYN TIL the largest action of the American War of Independence was actually the Great Siege of Gibraltar (1779-1783) by a combined French & Spanish force, showing how the Thirteen Colonies were merely one theatre of a much wider war.
6Ed87 TIL that rollercoasters were invented to distract Americans from sin. In the 1880s, hosiery businessman LaMarcus Thompson didn’t like that Americans were going to places like saloons and brothels and created the first rollercoaster on Coney Island to persuade them to go there instead.
l7PyV TIL Galileo Galilei's middle finger is on display at the Museo Galileo in Florence, Italy.