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147

TIL, it is probable that severe bleeding hemorrhoids were the cause of the death of the Scottish explorer David Livingstone at the end of his third African journey

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J1MO8 TIL that, in the UK, if you have bought gold jewelry since 1984, it is likely to contain traces of gold stolen in the £26 million Brink's-Mat robbery.
GY0g1 TIL that Norm Macdonald's famous 'Moth Joke' was mostly improvised on the spot when he realised he had been booked for an additional segment on Conan for which he had not prepared, turning an old classic 20 second joke into a long drawn out domestic moth tragedy to fill the time.
R7eR4 TIL that before women became the mainstay telephone operators were teenage boys. The change came about when the lads being pesky teenagers pulled too many pranks, got drunk on the job and swore down the phone
9YQkp TIL the Manhattan Project scientists originally wanted to bomb Kyoto, but Secretary of War Henry Stimson successfully convinced the president that it would be needless culture vandalism, as he had toured the city on his honeymoon and knew it was not a military target.
XwEX TIL Soviet Russia built a flying tank.