› added 9 years ago

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TIL a 14yo Syrian boy who ran away from home to join ISIS soon became disillusioned after seeing the conduct of the other fighters. To escape the group, he volunteered to act as a suicide bomber, but instead of activated the explosives he turned himself in to Iraqi authorities.

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9wQj6 TIL Reynolds Wrap was founded in 1919 to make foil wrappers for the new concept of packs of cigarettes (Camel, 1913) of the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., who later expanded to include Winston, Salem, Newport, Pall Mall. The Founder of Reynolds Wrap was the nephew of R.J. Reynolds, Richard Reynolds.
p8Z1e TIL the Welsh word Hireath means to have a homesickness or to long for something, someone, or somewhere that may not have existed or no longer exist and there’s no English equivalent.
0d6pL TIL about the skull of a 14 year-old girl believed to be a victim of cannibalism “starving time” at the Jamestown colony in the winter of 1609. Butchery marks can be seen on the skull.
rNnEW TIL about SN 1006, a supernova in the year 1006 CE that was described by observers on multiple continents, some 600 years before the first telescope. It was visible in the daytime sky for weeks, and the gamma rays it emitted created a sedimentary record on Earth. We have images of its remnants.
dDeV8 TIL if the town of Hempstead, New York, were to be incorporated as a city it would be the second-largest in New York after NYC, with a population of 793,409. It is three times the size of Buffalo, New York's current second-largest city.