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TIL: Sakamoto Ryōma was an influential samurai who loved the American system and encouraged the Imperial Court to copy it. On the first assassination attempt, he fought off his assailants with a Smith and Wesson revolver. However, he was caught unprepared the second time.

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b997a TIL that a family lived in the Siberian wilderness for over 40 years without human contact.
wrMJ TIL millions of bats in North America are dying from a disease called White Nose Syndrome. Scientists don’t know how to treat the illness. In 2008 an estimated 2.4 million pounds of insects went uneaten due to the diminished bat population, causing major strain on agriculture in New England.
RZV8 TIL of a monk who had taken an old book written by Archimedes, erased the contents, and wrote over it with prayers. Scientists have determined that that monk erased a previously unknown book by Archimedes, that laid out the foundations of Calculus thousands of years before Newton and Leibniz.
6EYAW TIL Fireflies are the most efficient lights in the world. 100% of energy is emitted as light. Fireflies: larvae & eggs glow, talk to each other with light, imitate each other, then eat other fireflies, are on almost every continent, taste bad, are medically and scientifically useful, adults live<1mo
6E8LJ TIL Because she supported the Civil Rights movement, the FBI created a fake story that actress Jean Seberg had cheated on her husband with a black man, the stress of the fake story caused her to go into labor premature and resulted in the death of her baby.