› added 11 months ago

29

TIL that Able Archer 83 was a war exercise conducted by NATO that panicked the Soviets into thinking they were really being attacked and so nearly launched a nuclear retaliation in response; it is now considered to be the nearest that mankind went into nuclear war since the Cuban Missile Crisis

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

XB4j TIL that Prince wrote The Bangles’ 1986 hit “Manic Monday”. It was rumored by various writers that Prince gave the song to The Bangles rhythm guitarist Susanna Hoffs so that she would sleep with him.
J0dl TIL of Oliver Sipple, who saved then President Gerald Ford’s life from an assassin, was subsequently outed as gay by the press, disowned by his family and ultimately died regretting saving the President
6eDJ TIL that while in the army Mr. T was given the punishment of chopping down trees. The sergeant didn’t tell him how many, so Mr. T single-handedly chopped down 70 in 3.5 hours.
KY9Ya TIL the first video game in which jiggly breasts were a notable feature was "Fatal Fury 2," released in 1992.
jwln TIL that Salad Fingers animator David Firth had a satirical cartoon series removed from Newgrounds due to its lack of quality, this cartoon was later commissioned by the BBC for their website