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TIL that Ming the Clam, the world’s oldest animal at 507, was killed by researchers trying to tell how old it was

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wLBrY TIL that Walt Disney accidentally "kidnapped" Richard Nixon by dispatching his monorail train before the Secret Service could get on. The agents ran after the train and attempted to jump onboard but the doors had already closed. Monorail pilot Bob Gurr was terrified; Nixon got a kick out of it.
DrEp TIL that the Eiffel Tower was originally supposed to be in Barcelona. But thinking the thing would end up looking like an eyesore, the city rejected Gustave Eiffel’s plans, and he was forced to repitch the project elsewhere. Luckily, Eiffel found a home for his idea in Paris.
4xEb TIL gorillas have been observed dismantling snares after a member of their troop was killed by one
W7omX TIL Astronomer Edward Barnard discovered Amalthea, the fifth satellite of Jupiter, using an eyepiece that yielded 520x on the 36-inch Lick Observatory telescope. Barnard observed Saturn's moon at 2,600x at the highest but 1000x power is enough to show a disk
8GBb TIL That Mark Twain was born shortly after Halley’s Comet and predicted he would “go out with it” too. He died a day after the comet’s subsequent return