› added 1 year ago

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TIL about the "catapult-able cockpit", created by Romanian inventor Anastase Dragomir and successfully tested in 1929 at the Paris-Orly Airport, which featured a parachuted chair that was ejected from an aircraft. It was the first modern layout for an ejection seat, later perfected during WWII.

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mxwxy TIL Ty Burrell‘s (Phil Dunphy from Modern Family) Great-great Grandmother was mulatto child of a slave owner and a thirteen year old slave
9YQbX TIL that the first commercial passenger airliner to be shot down by hostile forces was refurbished, returned to service, and later became the third commercial passenger airliner to be shot down by hostile forces.
5Vx9k TIL that Steve Buscemi directed the highest rated episode of The Sopranos (on IMDB)
N5Xe TIL X-Men has often been compared to the African-American Civil Rights movement, with Xavier as MLK and Magneto as Malcom X.
WZpN TIL: Nikola Tesla was offered the task of completely redesigning the Edison Company’s direct current generators for fifty thousand dollars. After months of work, when Tesla asked for payment Edison refused and said “Tesla, you don’t understand our American humor”