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TIL that Steve Jobs often went to his biological father's Mediterranean restaurant in San Jose and even shook his hand. At the time, his dad didn't know that Jobs was the baby he gave away for adoption, and Jobs didn't know that he was his father.

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j6VPX TIL Robert Oppenheimer thought highly of physicist Hans Bethe and chose him to head the Theoretical Division at Los Alamos. After the War, Bethe declined to participate in developing thermonuclear weapons as he believed that the world would not be worth preserving after a war with such weapons
yx0v TIL that an engineer at NASA spent fifteen years trying to become an astronaut, being rejected fourteen times before finally being selected in 1998.
wo7kY TIL that part of the reason public executions were seen as ineffective in deterring crime was because it was common for pickpocketers to take advantage of the giant crowds of people watching the execution and steal from them.
m7Ov TIL that F. Scott Fitzgerald died believing he was a failure. Two years later 155,000 copies of ‘The Great Gatsby’ were shipped to WWII soldiers overseas, making it a widespread success. As of 1945 it’s believed to be a classic, selling 500,000 copies annually.
D1a4v TIL lightning can heat the surrounding air to as hot as 50,000 °F, three time hotter than the surface of the sun. As the super heated air cools, it produces a particular vacuum. The rapid contraction and expansion of this air is what causes thunder.