TIL : During the Blitz, the British military set up “Starfish towns” as decoys to draw bombers off real towns and military targets. They were bombed over 700 times, saving 2000+ lives. https://ift.tt/B0sGLPD

TIL: San Fransisco has very few cemeteries. But the city was once full of cemeteries. As San Francisco's population rapidly grew, "people turned against the cemeteries". Eventually, most of the cemeteries were dug up and transferred out of the city. https://ift.tt/19xlISg

TIL The voice actor Charles Martinet, most famous for being the iconic voices of the Nintendo-characters Mario and Luigi, is also the voice of the dragon Paarthurnax in "The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim". https://ift.tt/rx9Py2d

TIL that food assistance programs were made to get rid of excess cheese that the government bought from farmers https://ift.tt/w5bT0r9

TIL: In 1914, the exchange rate of the German mark to the American dollar was about 4.2 to one. Nine years later, it was 4.2 trillion to one. The price of a loaf of bread went from 250 marks in January 1923 to 200 trillion in November https://ift.tt/emzYBuE

TIL. Physiologist Giles Brindley, in 1983 presented his treatment for erectile disfunction by injecting himself before his talk and dropping his pants to show the crowd of urologists. https://ift.tt/80KNm51

TIL The 10k steps a day benchmark was actually just a marketing campaign from a Japanese company called Yamasa who made the first wearable pedometer https://ift.tt/sqtGEgC

TIL TGI Fridays stopped requiring employees to wear flair after Office Space came out and customers began making jokes about the flair https://ift.tt/blrjTuX

TIL that during a prisoner revolt at Auschwitz in 1944, prisoners threw a particularly brutal SS guard into a lit crematory oven while the guard was still alive. https://ift.tt/NydB6UE

TIL Yellowstone hot spring pools are acidic and can dissolve an entire person https://ift.tt/hMOJI91

TIL in 2001 MTV taped a pilot called “Dude, This Sucks”, where two team captains would do stunts to win money. In the second half two 13 year old girls were sprayed with feces by grown men. There was a lawsuit and the game show was never aired. https://ift.tt/Zs8Y9n2

TIL With the exception of the Hooded Pitohui and the Ifrita kowaldi, both of Papua, New Guinea, all bird eggs are edible. https://ift.tt/W2kFVR7

TIL about Giles Corey, who was accused of witchcraft during the Salem trials. He used a legal loophole and refused to plea, which meant he couldn't be tried. He was then tortured to death, but still refused to plea, allowing his children to claim their inheritance. https://ift.tt/cujPB6A

TIL that in an effort to save $43.5, the Canadian Mint mailed the dies of the new $1 coin via a discount courier over using an armored car- which were promptly stolen and have never been found. This would lead to the adoption of the Loonie design as an emergency replacement. https://ift.tt/f1HSQh5

TIL Oscar the Therapy Cat accurately predicted 25 deaths. After this the staff started notifying family members of residents to come say goodbye if Oscar was curled up next to them. https://ift.tt/mAsndS6

TIL Critical Periods: Periods of time where an organism's brain is extremely malleable and sensitive to stimuli. If the organism doesn't receive the appropriate stimulus during this critical period to learn a given skill- it maybe difficult or even impossible to develop certain associated functions https://ift.tt/LMbmZJN

TIL: Andrew Bonar Law is the only Canadian to have served as Prime Minister of the UK. He was born in New-Brunswick which was a British colony at the time. https://ift.tt/6a8IArq

TIL despite their strong 'drinking culture', it's actually against the law for Brits to get drunk inside a pub. The punishment for the crime is a fine of up to £200. https://ift.tt/ATcYIRC

TIL that after the highly influential singing group "The Ink Spots" broke up in the 1950s, so many former members and even non-members used "The Ink Spots" group name that in 1967, a Federal Judge ruled that it had become Public Domain and was free for anyone to use. Over 100 groups have done so. https://ift.tt/a0xTXgF

TIL that scientists had to rename genes because MS Excel would convert those names into dates https://ift.tt/GE9Jdct

TIL NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar agreed to appear in the movie "Airplane!" on the condition he be paid $35,000..the exact price of a rug he wanted to purchase. https://ift.tt/bBjtLCe