Did you know shrapnel came from a guy named Henry Shrapnel?

Because I didn't until just now. Henry Shrapnel was an officer in the British Army that invented a new type of exploding cannon shell back in 1780s. Nasty weapon, actually - it was designed to explode overhead of an enemy army and rain metal down on them. Thus, the word shrapnel was born. I always thought it was one of those loanwords from a foreign language that was just assimilated into the English vocabulary. Learn something new everyday.