› added 12 years ago

100

TIL that in 1890 an Oberlin College professor gave a lecture on then-rare aluminum, stating ‘if anyone could make this on a commercial scale, he would be a benefactor to the world and would also make a great fortune.’ In attendance was Charles Hall, who took him up on the challenge – and succeeded.

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XXnP TIL That the Pine Ridge Indian reservation has the lowest life expectancy in the USA, and the second lowest in the Western Hemisphere, second only to Haiti.
aoAZ TIL Black Beauty wasn’t written for children; it was an appeal to the public to stop abusive practices like the use of the checkreins and overworking horses.
P98G TIL in 1938 A Jewish man Joined the German army, and had his picture used in Nazi propaganda with the description “The Ideal German Soldier”
N7DxQ TIL there is a 1000 years old Japanese poem about the fleetingness of existence, which uses each letter of the Japanese alphabet exactly once. The poem was used as a way to order the alphabet until the Meiji restauration
xQmD TIL that during the time that Pol Pot ruled Cambodia, at least 1.4 million Cambodians were killed or died. Some individuals loyal to him were even killed for failing to find enough “counter-revolutionaries” to execute.