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TIL Coastal Redwood fossils date back more than 200 million years to the Jurassic period. California's gold rush caused logging old growth lumber. Today, only 5 percent of the original old-growth coast redwood forest remains.

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8gMa TIL the word “mesmerize” comes from 18th century German physician Franz Mesmer, who used the sounds from Benjamin Franklin’s glass armonica to induce “animal magnetism” in patients. “Animal magnetism” would later be renamed “hypnosis” by Scottish surgeon James Braid in 1841.
06Ay TIL that scientists at Edinburgh University successfully made diamonds from peanut butter using extremely high pressures, even greater than that found at the centre of the earth.
x6Xb7 TIL during the rise of Japan as a major economic power, seen as an economic threat to the US, anti-Japanese sentiment was so high that a Chinese American was beaten to death before his wedding on the assumption that he was Japanese. In 1987, US congressmen smashed Toshiba products on Capitol Hill
m1lGP TIL that when ascending to the throne, royals may pick their regnal name from any of their Christian or middle names. Charles Philip Arthur George could also be King Philip, King Arthur, or King George if he wanted to.
JRp4 TIL that the Roadrunner actually owned the Acme Corporation that supplied Wile E. Coyote with defective explosives, rockets and other roadrunner killing products, which of course, explains why none of them ever worked.