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TIL the present-day Washington State was originally called "Columbia", but Congress forced the name change to "Washington" in honor of George Washington and to avoid confusion with the nation's capital, the District of Columbia

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GEPG TIL in 1969, a musician named Jim Sullivan recorded an album called “U.F.O.“, which featured strange lyrics about leaving his family and being abducted by aliens. Sullivan disappeared six years later without a trace, the only piece of evidence being his abandoned car found on a desert road.
d8yaK TIL that one night in Ontario, 1978, two men with balaclavas and guns approached a restaurant. The manager saw them coming, but, unfazed, yelled: "Sorry, we're closed" and went back to mopping. The confused robbers fled and were apprehended. At appeal they were found not guilty of attempted robbery.
74Pr TIL that under US law, companies can refuse to take cash when they charge you before providing the product, but after you get it there’s a debt, and they have to let you pay cash
B0Zr TIL The word “electrocute” is a combination of the words electro and execute, meaning you were killed by electricity. So if you don’t die, you were not electrocuted, you were shocked.
Ooor6 A hulking Arleigh Burke-class destroyer might typically burn a minimum of about 24 barrels (1,000 gallons) of fuel per hour, but this figure conceals so many factors and variables that the Navy doesn't really use it the way we use "miles per gallon."