Submitted by UlisKromwell t3_yfedf3
/f/todayilearned
TIL about Charles Howard, 20th Earl of Suffolk. He was responsible for rescuing a team of French nuclear scientists and the entire world stockpile of heavy water from France during WW2. He also served as part of an unexploded bomb detachment, successfully tackling 34 unexploded bombs
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by SteO153 t3_yfyf21
TIL: During the US Civil War, a father issued a writ of habeus corpus to get his underaged Son out of the US Army, when the writ was delivered to the camp, the provost had both the lawyer who had delivered the writ, and the Judge who had issued the writ arrested and imprisoned.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by hoosyourdaddyo t3_y44jeh
TIL Devon Allen, track & field athlete/Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver, was disqualified in the World Athletic Championships for a controversial false start. The starting blocks measured his reaction time from the time the gun went off at 0.099, which is 0.001 seconds faster than legally allowed.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by The_Critical_Cynic t3_yfezcn
TIL when it was discovered in 1963 that the Winchester manuscript of Le Morte d'Arthur was indeed Thomas Malory's, John Steinbeck caught wind of it and decided to translate it into modern English. Ultimately he abandoned the project, but what remained was published after his death.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by psgamemaster t3_yf4wx3
TIL Amedeo Avogadro's contribution to chemistry, known as Avogadro's law, did not initially receive much attention when he published his paper in 1811. It was only a century later that his work was recognized, when the King of Italy attended a meeting commemorating the paper's 100th anniversary.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by dustofoblivion123 t3_ycu19z
TIL that the fragrance/perfume given as a gift to the Marquis de Lafayette by George Washington, is still produced by the same manufacturer today. The fragrance has been worn by Washington, John Quincy Adams, JFK, George Gershwin, and countless others.
caswellmassey.comSubmitted by mcmcplok t3_yeao9p
Submitted by trinerr t3_yf3z0b
TIL that the famous author Thomas Pynchon has avoided publicity during his fifty-year career to the point that almost all known photos of him are from the 1950s. However, he voiced himself in two episodes of The Simpsons, where his dialogue consisted entirely of puns on the titles of his books.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by IHad360K_KarmaDammit t3_ybrkgp