/f/todayilearned
TIL Of the Bre-X fraud. The Canadian mining company was a penny stock that reportedly found billions of dollars of gold in Indonesia. The stock skyrocketed but collapsed following the suicide of one of the geologists and discovery that the core samples were salted.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by jamescookenotthatone t3_yvuzym
Submitted by sturnus-vulgaris t3_yvi5jd
TIL Anvil firing is the practice of exploding an anvil into the air. Anvils are typically fired as a celebration, be it to honor St. Clement's (the Patron Saint of blacksmiths) or in a 21 anvil salut as found in New Westminster, British Columbia.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by jamescookenotthatone t3_11e410x
TIL that in 2003, the chief officer of the German-owned cargo ship RMS Mülheim got into difficulties while on watch. His trousers caught in his chair mechanism and while trying to free himself he tripped and knocked himself unconscious. The ship grounded on rocks while he was out and later broke up
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by YalsonKSA t3_zv3pue
TIL about the Forty Elephants or Forty Thieves, an all women crime syndicate in London in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that specialized in shoplifting and pretending to be maids and robbing the wealthy families who hired them.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by Professor_Hillbilly t3_124yp1v
TIL In 1971, the Guinness World Records listed Clara as the "Most Indefatigable Cruise Passenger". For 14 years, she lived on RMS Caronia, which cost her $396 in daily fare. Without accounting for inflation, Cunard Line received $4 million from her in tickets.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by thenerdknuckle t3_youd5a
TIL that Kurt Cobain got the inspiration to make Nirvana's famous song "Smells Like Teen Spirit" when Kathleen Hanna, the singer of the band "Bikini Kill" wrote "Kurt smells like teen spirit" on a board. Teen Spirit was a woman's deodorant and he didn't knew it until he was done with the song.
theguardian.comSubmitted by WonderfulWanderer777 t3_126qji1
TIL Lake Baikal is located in southeast Siberia and is the oldest and deepest lake in the world, at 25 million years old and 1,700 meters deep. It contains 20% of the world's unfrozen freshwater and is home to a rich and unusual freshwater fauna that is of significant value to evolutionary science.
whc.unesco.orgSubmitted by wisely_lined56 t3_zpzh6z
TIL one of the first use of avant-garde technique of tape manipulation in music was the 1955 hit "Jingle Bells" by The Singing Dogs. Using a razor, Carl Weismann cut, then spliced sounds of dog barks together, correcting speed, pitch and melody of the resulting tape. It reached #22 on Billboard.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by Bubbly-Incident t3_zukh8j
TIL that in 2020, researchers tried to determine the actual effects of ingesting George's Marvelous Medicine (from the Roald Dahl book), consisting of shampoo, anti-freeze, brown paint, floor polish, and 30 other household items. It would cause vomiting, kidney injury, convulsions, and likely death.
en.wikipedia.orgSubmitted by derstherower t3_10k6zy0