› added 6 years ago

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TIL In 1943, a new volcano started growing in Hokkaido, Japan. The Imperial Japanese government censored the news because it considered this a bad wartime omen. Therefore, all we know about this volcano's development comes from the records local postmaster Masao Mimatsu made on his own volition.

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ne5mG TIL many bird species engage in "anting", where they actively rub ants onto themselves to excrete their body's chemicals. As to why, hypotheses include using the chemicals to ward off pests, preparing them to eat, for grooming their feathers, and for stimulating themselves.
kJpJB TIL that mathematician John von Neumann had an unusual ability to solve new problems. When presented with a problem in programming on which there had been no published literature, he said "Oh, that!", then gave a lecture of over an hour explaining how to solve it using a hitherto unconceived theory
AN64l TIL Kathleen Caronna was in a month-long coma after a Thanksgiving Day parade float knocked a lamppost onto her head in 1997. She bought a nice apartment with the settlement money and 9 years later, Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle crashed his plane into her high rise and the engine landed in her bedroom.
pJMp TIL Buzz Aldrin received his doctorate from MIT for developing a technique for orbital rendezvous by eye, which he used in Gemini 12 when the radar broke
0wP4M TIL Germany lost the First World War in major part because of underdeveloped agriculture and over reliance on import of food (the British Navy blocked it when the conflict began; learnt from the book "Cities" by John Reader)