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TIL China was one of the only places in the world that did not release Elvis Presley's music at the time of its initial release. The few Elvis fans who managed to get their hands on his records often saw the material set ablaze by Red Guards and the government denounced his music as pornography

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J9k4 TIL at its height in the early 00s, Blockbuster Video earned nearly $800 million through late fees alone, making up 16% of its revenue.
ANmbl TIL that in Taxco, they celebrate Easter (and the week leading up to it) with masked men carrying thorny blackberry canes tied to their arms while others carry crosses, whip themselves and carry candles. The latter done while shackled.
Yp5xP TIL that James Bond creator Ian Fleming named one of his most famous villains, Auric Goldfinger, after the architect in revenge for his bulldozing of a number of Victorian villas in order to build his own modern home at Willow Road in Hampstead.
AOw4 TIL of the “Night-Witches,” a Russian regiment of all-female aviators during WWII. Despite only flying slow, obsolete planes, the regiment is said to have dropped over 3,000 tons of bombs and each pilot to have flown over 1,000 missions.
ElLW TIL In the 1950s, full size B-47 nuclear bombers would do a partial backflip called an “Immelman maneuver” and fling their nuclear weapons in a parabolic arc towards the target . This was so they would not be consumed by the 40,000 foot tall fireball from their own weapons.