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People Share What Historical Events They Wouldn’t Believe Had Happened If It Weren’t Actually Documented
Our history is filled with weird tales, and the best part is that some of them are true. Interested in these crazy moments, Redditor u/day-tripper96 made a post on the platform, asking other users: "What's a bizarre historical event you can't believe actually took place?" And people instantly flooded the comment section with answers.
From the CIA training a cat to spy on the Soviets to the great Emu War, continue scrolling to check out the most memorable ones together with Bored Panda's treat — an interview with Dr. Darren R. Reid, a historian who earned his Ph.D. from the University of Dundee and is now a lecturer at Coventry University.
This post may include affiliate links.
#1
The fact that Donald J. Trump was elected president of the United States of America will always shock and appall me.
Caro Caro 4 years ago
And to think there are people who would vote for him again is even more shocking.
TheDivineMsM 4 years ago
The fact the people STILL support him after all he did appalls me even more
Amanda Reicha 4 years ago
Same. My country is so messed on so many levels. :(
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Liezzzewies 4 years ago
I felt the same when Bush jr was being elected and he’s a good boy compared to Trumps. It just proves there’s always a bigger nutcase ready to take control.
Shawna Kimble 4 years ago
If ANYONE deserves to die of COVID, it's that asshole!!
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Marco Conti 4 years ago
Instantly every president in history became "pretty bad, but not the worst"
As you might understand, history isn't just about funny gags. While it has plenty of those, the subject can offer us much more.
"History gives us perspective," Dr. Reid told us. "It helps us to understand how our own experiences fit into a much broader pattern of human behavior; why do we go to war, why do we love, and why do we cause so much pain when we are trying to do the right thing."
"These are big questions with no easy answers, but understanding how and why our ancestors acted can help us to understand why we, as individuals and as a society, act as we do."
RELATED:
#2
I can’t believe i haven’t seen the siege of Weinsberg in 1140 after so much scrolling. It was negotiated that the women would be allowed to leave unharmed with whatever they could carry on their shoulders (with the intention that the men would continue to be sieged and ultimately killed/arrested). So the women carried out the men. Conrad III wasn’t even mad, he actually applauded their deception and allowed it.
DennyS (denzoren) 4 years ago
He was just like "I'm not even mad, that's impressive...fair enough" Lol
Cecily Holland 4 years ago
Well he did say whatever they could carry. Good for him for sticking to his word. That’s a rarity in leaders these days
LuckyL 4 years ago
According to the picture - not only the men but also the children - quite the accomplishment
September Meadows 4 years ago
They referenced this in the movie, Ever After starring Drew Barrymore 😃
However, once you start diving deeper, you quickly realize that historians have done so much work, it's impossible for one person to become an expert in every stage of every civilization.
"Start by learning about whatever time period or topic speaks to you," Dr. Reid suggested.
"Don't try and nail down specific periods or important people because every period and every person's history is just as valid as everyone else's. Find what speaks to you and work out from there, always being open to engaging with stories, histories, and peoples that you come across whose experiences and perspectives take you out of your intellectual comfort zone."
#3
I know it's not very old, but it still amazes me that a science fiction author can talk about wanting to create a fake religion and then proceeds to create a fake science fiction religion and it somehow has actual followers???
Caro Caro 4 years ago
The founder of Scientology, Lafayette Ronald Hubbard was born on March 13, 1911. An author of science fiction and fantasy.
Paul Davis 4 years ago
He was roommates with two other well-known sci-fi writers. He apparently one day announced out loud to them that he was sick and tired of being poor and was going to create his own religion and get rich. So not only announcing he would create a fake religion, but he would use it to get rich -- so Scientology more than any other religion requires people to pay, and pay, and pay. Using the fact that people are such incredible dumbasses. I suspect their issue with psychiatry is their fear that proper mental health care will work against their hold on their victims.
Sky Render 4 years ago
The only distinction between a cult and a religion is follower count.
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Poultry Geist 4 years ago
I want to create a religion and call it “ the church of common sense”. And church will be people sharing different things that have happened and they either dealt with it reasonably or they didn’t and at that point the congregation would share advice on how to deal with situations reasonably. I never follow through with anything so I’m sure it’ll never happen
Nicky 4 years ago
Hubbard was on a camping trip and bet Carl Sagan that he could start his own cult. Hubbard won by inventing Scientology. Without Scientology, we would be deprived of John Travolta's masterpiece, "Battlefield Earth," the best worst movie of all times.
Philip Obermarck 4 years ago
First time I've heard this version. The earliest version of "the bet" I heard was that Hubbard and Robert Heinlein made a bet about starting a religion. Hubbard wrote Dyanetics and won, Heinlein wrote Stranger in a Strange Land. I've also heard it was a bet with Kurt Vonnegut.
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Miss Frankfurter 4 years ago
Watch the series by Leah Remini and a man who was very high up in Scientology who also left. What Scientologists have turned their lives into and the lives of many other people who have also left is hell with harassment that just reaches the line where you can't arrest them. Money, money, money. So many Scientologists are in massive credit card debt to pay for more and more courses to reach the ultimate state of "clear". The recovery time from having been in a cult is long and hard. I know. It took me years.
Angelar 4 years ago
If you don't mind sharing, which cult were you a victim of? I ask out of academic interest
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Following your own curiosity and intuition, you are bound to discover something you will be able to share in a similar post when it comes up. Just don't be afraid of challenges.
According to Dr. Reid, even though academic literature can be intimidating for newcomers, historians are increasingly exploring new ways of bringing their research to life for new audiences. "Many [of them] produce podcasts, for example, that provide a much more accessible gateway into a vast range of periods and peoples," he explained.
"Historians are also starting to take control of mediums that haven't always represented the past as accurately as they could have. For example, I co-directed a documentary about Charlie Chaplin and mental health called Looking for Charlie: Life and Death in the Silent Era (to be released for free - streaming in the first week in November)."
Dr. Reid suggested that works such as this are likely to become more and more popular in the near future, providing deep insights into topics, but in an accessible way that will hopefully give people the best of both worlds.
#4
The life of Zheng Yi Sao, a prostitute that became the most successful pirate lord in history, commanding 500 ships at the height of her power and battling Empire of China to a stalemate. She negotiated her surrender with honors and died peacefully at old age.
Elita One 4 years ago
The character Mistress Ching in Pirates of The Caribbean 3 is based off of her.
buttonpusher 4 years ago
Omg I was thinking this! I thought it sounded familiar.
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Łukasz Mirosław 4 years ago
Her real name was Shi Xianggu. She's been kidnaped and married by a pirate called Zheng Yi. Zheng Yi Sao literally means "Zheng Yi's Widow". She took control of the fleet after husband's death. After retirering from piracy she run a casino and brothel in Canton Province.
Miss Cris 4 years ago
So she's a pirate, not a prostitute. I'm sure nobody would ñresent a male pirate as a waiter or wathever he had to do before being a pirate.
Emperor Kitten 4 years ago
But that was a significant part of her history. She was a prostitute, managed to get brought on board as the captains consort, eventually married him (despite it being taboo), and then took his place as captain. Like, her rise in rank was unheard of. Bonus fact - she eventually struck a deal with the Chinese government that she would disband her fleet if they would wave all charges against her and let her keep her loot. She took her money and opened a series of brothels. So she started a prostitute and ended a pimp. Being a wildly successful pirate was just the middle.
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Riley Quinn 4 years ago
When men write the history books we don't learn history. Many, many women throughout the ages, on all inhabited continents, were brave warriors, illustrious stateswomen, and leaders.
#5
During the siege of Tenochtitlan, the conquistadors built a trebuchet. However, the conquistadors, being an exploratory expedition, had not brought any military engineers with them. So they winged it. Surprisingly, they did build a trebuchet, which fired exactly one shot, directly upwards, which promptly came down and smashed the trebuchet. This event is chronicled in both the journals of the conquistadors present as well as the Aztec records.
DennyS (denzoren) 4 years ago
I mean, if this wasn't a clear sign to rethink what they were doing. Lol
Allan Breum 4 years ago
I would have put a spin on it: "see what this weapon can do, imagine if we aimed it at you. Better surrender before we do."
Riley Quinn 4 years ago
Wiping out the indigenous peoples with diseases wasn't happening quickly enough.
#6
During WW1, English and German troops stopped the fighting for one day on Christmas Eve and played a game of football, exchanged gifts, and held conversations..only to go back to killing each other the next day
RaroaRaroa 4 years ago
Because they're fought by different people to those who started the argument.
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Jo Choto 4 years ago
I did my thesis on the war in Northern France. I even interviewed men who fought there (they were old then, but now dead of course). None of them wanted to be there. None of them bore any animosity towards the men they were killing. They knew they are part of a machine and they had no choice but to play their proscribed role.
Deborah B 4 years ago
Sadder than that - they didn't want to go back to killing each other. The troops weren't shooting at each other for several days, or if forced to shoot by direct order, would deliberately miss. The commanders had to bully them back into action.
Death Metal Kitty 4 years ago
At the start of WWI... men did exactly that, they hesitated when they had to shoot their enemies. They fired off to the side or had to stop and force themselves to fire. So much so that the army had to train men to overcome their natural aversion to killing another person.
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lara 4 years ago
War is a horror. Men, generally, are not. People, generally, are not. It is governments that forbid honor, dignity, and charity.
Soggy Crumpet 4 years ago
Agree. Men have honor and government should be kept out of our lives
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Jerry Mathers 4 years ago
I would love for this to happen on national scale just once. The troops on both sides would just all stand up, spend a half day getting know one another, and refuse to fight. Maybe force the leaders to settle their disputes a different way. I know it's unlikely, but it always bugs me that it's folks who are trying to do what they see as right end up paying for the madness of leaders.
Luis Hernandez Dauajare 4 years ago
The Christmas Truce. In some place it went on until New Year's Eve. And they did not go back to killing each other, that was the problem. Soldiers refused to fight those who had met over Christmas. Many officers were arrested, some even shot, and men sent to penal battalions. British, French and German newspapers were banned from reporting further news, as governments were afraid the public opinion turned against the war.
#7
The Erfurt Latrine Disaster of 1184 where a bunch of nobles met in a church, where it turned out the wooden floor couldn't hold their weight, so it broke and they tumbled into the latrine in the cellar, and about 60 people drowned in poop.
Queserasera423 4 years ago
Can we talk about how there was a wood floor built on top of a poop pit? The odor in the church must have been awful.
Johanna 4 years ago
There was another floor between this. And the building was very high. So, when they did fall, they suffered also from many injuries.
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Alex Boyd 4 years ago
Hadn't heard of that one, but I did once read an article about the same thing happening in a school outhouse. Google "Cincinnati Privy Disaster." It happened in 1904, and 9 schoolgirls died. (The outhouse was unusually crowded because a rainstorm started during recess, and about 30 girls ran into the privy for shelter.)
buttonpusher 4 years ago
Heard things like this were common. Reminds me of Samuel Pepys going to his cellar and crap had leaked through the wall and the stepping in turds and, which I laughed at, "Which I found that Mr. Turner's house of office is full and comes into my cellar, which do trouble me". I heard it on an audiobook and it was her description made it seem so funny.
#8
Putting a man on the moon with a small fraction of the computing power used to write this message.
Jo Choto 4 years ago
Because they relied on "computers" who were people. Watch the movie "Hidden Figures". These women used their own mathematical skills to calculate speeds, trajectories, targets, all the calculations that were required for safe moon landings. That's the real wow of the moon landings.
I I 4 years ago
i really enjoyed it , teaches us a bit of history thats not very widely reported on
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WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
And today a million times more computing power has been used to "debunk" this achievement. Which shows that idiots would do everything to deny facts because one fool told them they aren't true.
Niall Mac Iomera 4 years ago
The computers now are doing very different things though. Displaying in colour for example uses a lot more processing power, but doesn't really offer any mathematical advantage.
Daniel Atkins 4 years ago
Plus the computing was done on earth and sent to the astronauts. The computer in the spacecraft controlled the craft and wasn't designed for computation.
K.Kobayashi 4 years ago
No, the onboard computer did guidance, navigation and control. Look up "Apollo Guidance Computer," there are many excellent articles online.
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Patti Vance 4 years ago
i recently read an article on the fact that the phones we carry have more computing ability than the machines that were used for this event. but, it must be remembered that it was people who did the calculations and not machines at this historic times. as someone mentioned before, hidden figures film, although it was 'hollywooded' up, is pretty accurate in the basis of the plot.
K.Kobayashi 4 years ago
True, but even a pocket scientific calculator from the 80s had more computing power than a room full of humans.
Load More Replies... K.Kobayashi 4 years ago
If you are talking about the Apollo Guidance Computer, the internal clock speed was 1.024 MHz.
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J. F. 4 years ago
It's actually quite a wonder they survived this - The navigation computer bugged out so Armstrong had to land manually, the lever handle for the thrust control broke and had to be replaced with a pencil
K.Kobayashi 4 years ago
It was the circuit breaker for the ascent engine, not the landing thrust control. And it was a felt-tip pen, not a pencil. And it was Aldrin, not Armstrong.
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#9
Mel Blanc (the voice actor who voiced every male character on Looney Tunes, as well as characters like Barney Rubble on The Flintstones and Mr. Spacely on The Jetsons) was in a head-on collision driving his sports car in a dangerous intersection known as “Dead Man’s Curve” in Los Angeles in 1961 (the same “Dead Man’s Curve” from the Jan and Dean song). His legs and pelvis were fractured, and he was left in a coma. For weeks, doctors tried everything to get Blanc to wake up. Eventually, when things were looking bleak, one of his neurologists decided to address one of Blanc’s characters instead of Blanc himself, asking him “How are you feeling today, Bugs Bunny?” After a slight pause, the previously-comatose Blanc answered, “Eh... just fine, Doc. How are you?” Mel Blanc made a full recovery.
When he got out of the hospital, he sued the city of Los Angeles for $500,000, finally leading to the city reconstructing Dead Man’s Curve.
chrissy goodman 4 years ago
they still do even tho its not as bad if ur going fast enough forget it
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Riley Quinn 4 years ago
It took the deaths of four teenagers who were on their way to a classmate's funeral to alter our local "dead man's curve". The funeral was for a girl who had died on the exact same curve days earlier. The other original passengers were all permanently disabled.
IlovemydogShilo 4 years ago
When he was discharged from hospital he was sent home in a body cast and given a hospital bed. The Hannah Barbera studios sent over recording equipment so he could record his voice for Barney Rubble. There is a picture of a bedridden Blanc recording with cast mates Bea Benaderet (Betty) and Jean Vander Pyl (Wilma). He recorded around 40 episodes this way.
Celtic Pirate Queen 4 years ago
Why are people driving so fast on a known dangerous stretch of road?
#10
The Cobra Effect. Basically during the British rule of India, they were concerned about the number of snakes in the capital, so they ordered a bounty on Cobras. For a while their population definitely declined, but soon people started breeding snakes just to collect the bounty. When the British became aware of this, they cancelled the bounty and so the breeders/snake catchers had huge numbers of now-worthless snakes which they let go in the wild, in turn actually increasing the population of Cobras in Delhi.
Piet Puk 4 years ago (edited)
Can't remember where or when, but something similairly stupid happened when a bounty for archaeology finds was handed out. People would smash ancient bones into tiny fragments because they were paid per piece, not per size.
lara 4 years ago
Mao did something worse. He thought that birds were eating too much grain. He put a bounty on birds, paid so much per bird. So many birds were killed that for the next ten years insects destroyed the crops and starvation wiped out hundreds of thousands of Chinese because there were no birds to eat the insects. "According to Mao Zedong, sparrows were getting in the way of the economic development of the People’s Republic of China. During the next three years, 45 million people died in a famine caused by economic mismanagement, environmental disaster, and state terror." WWW. vintage news.
Emperor Kitten 4 years ago
Thats only half the story though. He then waged war on the bugs and sprayed so much pesticide that he sterilized a massive portion of China's agricultural country. He basically turned the countryside into a new desert. China is still trying to recover it's pollinator population.
Load More Replies... Sky Render 4 years ago
The problem with setting up any system for humans to follow is that humans are exceptionally good at finding loopholes in systems...
Mary Peace 4 years ago
Especially if they can get some money out of that system.
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Nicole Weymann 4 years ago
Terry Pratchett paraphrased the phenomenon in his discworld novels, only he made it about rats. Ankh Morpork's new patrician handled the problem from another angle: he taxed the rat farms
Marco Conti 4 years ago
The law of unintended consequences. I'll bet they kept the rat population down though.
Aisling Allan 4 years ago
There was one in the UK where people were payed by the amount of rat tails handed in, and by the healthiness of the rat tail. So there was rat farms where people would cut the tails off young adults then breed them afterwards.
Agnes Jekyll 4 years ago
Just do not f** with Mother Nature. How many times do we have to learn this.
#11
1866: Lichtenstein goes to guard a spot with 80 men, returns with 81 men.
The Scout 4 years ago
This is said to have been the only time the Liechtenstein army acutally left the country. Quite an accomplishment for a country that managed to get invaded by neutral Switzerland three times - all three times by accident, though, as suisse soldiers did make some navigational errors at the unmarked border. Liechtenstein would not have been able to defend itself, though, as it completely disbanded its army as soon as 1868.
JP 4 years ago
During the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, Liechtenstein sent an army of 80 strong to guard the Brenner Pass between Austria and Italy while a reserve of 20 men stayed behind. While the deployed force was there to defend the territory against any attack from the Prussian-allied Italians, according to War History Online, “there was really nothing to do but sit in the beautiful mountains, drink wine and beer, smoke a pipe and take it easy.” In the main theater of the war, the Battle of Königgrätz would earn Prussia a victory, decisively ending the war. In 1866, 80 men went to war — When they marched home, however, their numbers had grown to 81. According to one version, an Austrian liaison officer joined them. Another version named the newcomer an “Italian friend” — other sources have suggested that he was a defector. None of the stories seem to be substantiated — but no one has debunked them either.
James Hunter 4 years ago
When you out Swiss the Swiss There's an Overly Sarcastic Productions video that touches on the event, that's how I found out about it.
Chewie Baron 4 years ago
This also happened with Luxembourg during WWI, they weren't allowed to fight, just act as observers. When they went back to Luxembourg they'd picked up an unemployed Italian. Exact same numbers as well.
Mickie Shea 4 years ago
Okay, what's the mystery. Think'n, perhaps, one soldier was a woman and had a baby.
More Thinking Needed 4 years ago
Doesn't compare to when Grand Fenwick declared war on the US and won.
#12
The dancing plague of 1518, so from what I remember about what I learned, a few people randomly just started dancing in the town center for no apparent reason, even seeming a bit distraught not really having fun, well randomly people started joining seemingly against their will, I think it was reported that nearly 400 people were eventually involved and danced for literal days without stop, this event was apparently well documented and a few people even died from literal exhaustion, pretty much ended like it started too, everyone just kinda stopped.
Giovanna 4 years ago
Yes, if I remember well, a fungus grown in the rye flour
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Kathryn Baylis 4 years ago (edited)
Anyone wearing red ballet shoes? (Lame, I know. I’ll let my self out the back.)
lara 4 years ago
Ergot poisoning. Ergot is a fungus that infects flour or grain that has become damp and then "sealed" in a bag and the fungus grows so that when the grain is ground into flour who ever makes the bread spreads the fungus. It is very poisonous and it will cause a great many neurological symptoms eventually leading to death.
Nadya Raymond 3 years ago
From what I learnt it was called 'Danzmania' and they would dance from town to town... village to village none stop...well until it abruptly ended.:.still no one knows what caused it.
Eithne Griffiths 4 years ago
St,Virus dance... Sydenham chorea, also called St. Vitus Dance, chorea minor, infectious chorea, or rheumatic chorea, a neurological disorder characterized by irregular and involuntary movements of muscle groups in various parts of the body that follow streptococcal infection.
#13
In 1920, President Paul Deschanel of France fell through the window of the train while traveling on the Orient Express. He stumbled up to the nearest signal box in his pajamas and told the signalman that he needed help and that he was the President of France. The signalman reportedly replied 'And I'm Napoleon Bonaparte.'
Ryan Deschanel 4 years ago
It is still better than what happened to Félix Faure. Long story short : death by blow job.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago (edited)
Better than the guy who had sex on a suspended piano that started to lift up and crushed him against the ceiling. The other person survived.
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#14
Europe declaring war on Napoleon.
Not France...Napoleon.
ShadowLand 🇨🇦 4 years ago (edited)
For clarification: After Napoleon returned to Paris from exile..... "At the Congress of Vienna, the Great Powers of Europe (Austria, Great Britain, Prussia and Russia) and their allies declared Napoleon an outlaw, and with the signing of this declaration on 13 March 1815, so began the War of the Seventh Coalition." Wikipedia
buttonpusher 4 years ago
He was dumped on an island somewhere to live out his days, was he? I dunno but I'm listening to a whole lot of audiobooks about various things.
Adam Jeff 4 years ago
Yes, not once but twice. After he came back from the first island and caused another massive war, amazingly his punishment was... send him to an island (but further away this time)
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Two_rolling_black_eyes 4 years ago
The US declared war on Bin Laden, not Saudi Arabia. They decided the man, not the country, was the threat to destroy and that Saudi Arabia was not responsible for their citizens' behavior.
Cecily Holland 4 years ago (edited)
And Macron wants to look out because he’s heading the same way highjacking UK fishing boats, throwing tantrums over Submarine deals and generally being an annoying short pest
Tee Witt 4 years ago
Typical though isn't it? We want everything and not giving you anything, one thing the French have always been good at. By the way, you forgot to mention FISHING
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Ryan Deschanel 4 years ago
Well... He was not actually the legitimate ruler of France, just a criminal rebel messing with everything, so... Yeah, it makes sense. PS : long live the king. Not the "emperor". The king.
#15
Henry starting a whole new religion because he wanted a divorce and the Pope gave him the finger
Caro Caro 4 years ago
The English Reformation took place in 16th-century England when the Church of England broke away from the authority of the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church. These events were, in part, associated with the wider European Protestant Reformation, a religious and political movement that affected the practice of Christianity in western and central Europe. Causes included the invention of the printing press, increased circulation of the Bible and the transmission of new knowledge and ideas among scholars, the upper and middle classes and readers in general.
Daniel Marsh 4 years ago
Another understimated cause: the Black death and subsequent population rebound. During the Middle Ages, the population was held in check (despite a relative lack and war and health being much better than most modern people ever suspect) by an abundance of no-sex feast days and a sizeable chaste living well on expansive tracts of fertile land. When the population collapsed, these lands went fallow, and became highly envied when the population rebounded. The collapse in international trade also led to a craftsman middle class, disaffected to the manorial life and its feast days which had unwittingly functioned as population control. The new middle class became literate with the printing press but also because trade demanded it, and soon English (and German and whatever other local languages there were) began to supplant Latin as a written language. Thus, theology based in Greco-Latin thought were very difficult to communicate into English.
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Laura 4 years ago
Yep. Basically Henry VIII was a narcissist that needed to secure a rather obscure an questionable Tudor dinasty on the English trhone with a male heir. A king unable to produce a son was "feeble" and a female successor would bring another civil war. In private, Henry still was a catholic until his death, didn't care about peasant's knowledge and sentenced to death reformers that had went too far calling them heretics. For him, the Reformation was the means to solve the "Kings Great Matter", and to gain more power and money not a religious conscience.
Patti Vance 4 years ago
it was many factors that brought this on but, primarily, it was his desire to marry anne b, the second wife. thus began the church of england which was protestant in nature but, nonetheless, the result of his desperate obsession for a male heir. what always gets me is the fact that the one offspring he tried to deny, elizabeth I, is the one that made england the great nation.
sofacushionfort 4 years ago
Did he really have a choice? No heir = a reboot of the War of the Roses. England would be a 2nd/3rd rate power, sidelined while France and the Holy Roman Empire fought for supremacy, which France would lose; after which the Inquisition would purge all Protestantism. No Enlightenment, no Democracy.
Rob 4 years ago
If only he'd known that his nutty son would die young and his daughter would save the day anyway.
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Sophia Atkinson 4 years ago
I’m going through a SIX craze the moment, the moment I saw this it made me think of Don’t Lose Ur Head
LuckyL 4 years ago
okay, i googled myself ^^ - By 1536, Henry had broken with Rome, seized assets of the Catholic Church in England and Wales and declared the Church of England as the established church with himself as its head. Pope Paul III excommunicated Henry in 1538 over his divorce from Catherine of Aragon.
Load More Replies... Pamela Blue 3 years ago
It wasn't really new. Other countries were already breaking away from the RCs before Luther. He was just the famous one who everyone thinks started it.
#16
When Teddy Roosevelt was shot before he was supposed to give a speech.
The bullet was slowed down by the folded up 50-page speech, so it did not kill him. The bullet was inside him and he was bleeding, but he still went on and gave the speech, which was 84 minutes long.
He started it off with "It takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose" and showed the crowd the speech with the hole in it.
GlitterQueen541 4 years ago
He was a pretty badass dude...politics aside, he was metal af
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David Martin 4 years ago
From what I understand, he also personally ran down the shooter to kick his ass. The bullet entered his chest slightly, and Teddy opted not to ever have it removed...he would rather live out his life with a bullet in his body than risk dying on an operating table. I truly hope those facts are also a true part of this story, because I love and respect the kind of badass that Roosevelt was
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
Would've been better than the second Woodrow you got in 2016.
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Benjamin Sussman 4 years ago
The book, How To Fight U.S. Presidents, was remarked by the author inside to be an excuse to write about how much of a bad-ass teddy Roosevelt was (and make some money off of it).
#17
The Halifax Explosion. 100 years ago two ships did a sh**t job of passing each other while entering / leaving Halifax Harbour, in Nova Scotia. One of them was LOADED with explosives destined for WW1. They collided and one of them burned for a while, then exploded. The blast was a ~2/3 again larger than the one we saw in Beirut last year.
Thousands died or were blinded by shattering windows. There was a local tsunami (which followed a brief moment where the seabed was exposed to air), and then a monster snowstorm covered the relief effort in snow.
Largest human-made explosion even until the nuclear bomb, and I think it remains the largest maritime accident ever.
Dash Blue 4 years ago
Dang. I had not heard of The Halifax Explosion before. I am curious to know more. Yahoo Search here I come.
Mike Crow 4 years ago
The death toll could have been worse had it not been for the self-sacrifice of an Intercolonial Railway dispatcher, Patrick Vincent (Vince) Coleman, operating at the railyard about 750 feet (230 m) from Pier 6, where the explosion occurred. He and his co-worker, William Lovett, learned of the dangerous cargo aboard the burning Mont-Blanc from a sailor and began to flee. Coleman remembered that an incoming passenger train from Saint John, New Brunswick, was due to arrive at the railyard within minutes. He returned to his post alone and continued to send out urgent telegraph messages to stop the train. "Hold up the train. Ammunition ship afire in harbor making for Pier 6 and will explode. Guess this will be my last message. Good-bye boys." Coleman's message was responsible for bringing all incoming trains to a stop. (Wikipedia)
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TTorrest Author 4 years ago (edited)
People from Boston Massachusetts aided in the relief efforts, and Nova Scotia has sent them a Christmas tree as a thank you every year since: https://www.huffpost.com/archive/ca/entry/boston-nova-scotia-christmas-tree-tradition_ca_5fc54d4dc5b6e4b1ea4dd4e7
Linda Roy 4 years ago
🇨🇦 here. In school we were taught that hundreds were saved by the supplies and medical personnel Boston immediately sent to Halifax. It's been more than a hundred years since that awful time and Canada will never forget what Bostonians did for us.
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Travis Fox 4 years ago
No wonder. Anyone reliant on yahoo search for information isn't gonna be up to date or informed. I thought that search engine gave up years ago.
J Baker 4 years ago
Dunno, it's feels on par with the Halifax Municipal government, so it's probably legit
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Natalie Kelsey 4 years ago
Rescue personnel came from all over Canada and New England to help. Now, even more than a hundred years later, Boston receives its Christmas tree every year from Nova Scotia as thanks for the Boston Red Cross and Massachusetts public safety committee's help during the disaster.
NOLAHusker 4 years ago
I heard about this very recently, but, for the life of me, cannot remember where. Might have been on WWOZ, the locally publicly-funded radio station in New Orleans not affiliated with NPR.
ravenswood1000 4 years ago
The cemetery in Halifax has quite a lot of people who passed because of the explosion.
Pamela Blue 3 years ago
Yes. Apparently the entire area which led away from the harbour was flattened. Nearly everyone died within a huge area of that harbour, and those who didn't die were terribly injured. It was awful.
#18
Good old Operation Mincemeat.
Basically, during WWII, the British find some dead body of some poor guy, dress it up like a British officer, attach some fake intel onto him, then throw him into the ocean, hoping he floats to enemy territory to mislead them.
It worked.
NsG 4 years ago
They went to extraordinary lengths to give him a full back story, including a fiancee, celebrating a recent promotion etc. And they made the actual fake intel as difficult to decode as any of their real intel. It was as close to complete accuracy while being totally faked as possible. The corpse was buried with full military honours.
lara 4 years ago
I remember they even went to hospitals looking for military personnel who died of pneumonia. That would be detected as 'drowning" during an autopsy. Good movie about it and excellent book, as well.
Wilf 4 years ago
They used the body of a random tramp who had died from eating rat poison, because they needed to find someone with no relatives who would try to claim the body for burial.
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Lee Kerr 4 years ago
A remake of The Man Who Never Was? I’ll watch out for it; the original was good too.
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Andy Smith 4 years ago
There was a movie my mom loved called “The Man Who Never Was” based on this event
#19
What they did to the guy who told them that you need clean hands before you put them inside someone. (Ignaz Semmelweis)
buttonpusher 4 years ago (edited)
The father of sterilization? Just because they had a bruised ego... He saved so many lives. I heard about how they used to walk from the pathology room, hands covered in corpse fluid, and then deliver a baby. And then the mother would die days later. Awful.
IlovemydogShilo 4 years ago
WOW. That's really bad. Your comment is more informative than the actual post.
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WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
To save you the search: They had him committed to a mental hospital where he died of injuries caused by the guards who beat him up. He wasn't insane, but his family found it embarrassing that he wouldn't let any opportunity pass to lecture about the use of washing your hands. Full story: https://www.grunge.com/247211/the-tragic-story-of-the-doctor-who-pioneered-hand-washing/
J R 4 years ago
Thank you for that! Unsure why the post doesn't actually tell us this...
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Red Hair Blue Soul 4 years ago
Kinda like how we don't believe doctors and scientists during the COVID-19 pandemic. Funny how humans keep repeating their mistakes
Sam Chilton 4 years ago
It's a select minority who don't. Some for stupid reasons, others out of fear.
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Katchen 4 years ago
I have a face mask that says “Official Ignaz Semmelweis Fan Club.” https://www.redbubble.com/i/mask/Science-and-Medicine-Ignaz-Semmelweis-Fan-Club-light-text-by-Ofeefee/46504416.9G0D8
theflyingcicero 4 years ago
Not here in Austria, where he lived. For decades a lot of babies here in Vienna - like one of my sons - were born at the Ignaz Semmelweis hospital.
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Romenriel 4 years ago
I don't think it was because of bruised ego. The article caused massive panic, some doctors commited suicide because of it and many other obviously convinced themselves (and others) that it must be a misinformation because they couldn't cope, hence the witchhunt on poor Semmelweis. Tragic story all around.
Evelyn Haskins 4 years ago
Not to mention that it is STILL hard to get men to wash their hand OR shut the flyscreen doors!
#20
Lincoln stopping a fight with a gentleman before it started, with a broadsword.
Most people know Lincoln was incredibly tall, but he was also immensely strong. A lifetime of grit, graft, and chopping wood made his wiry frame tight with corded muscles.
A gentleman of parliament challenged Lincoln to a duel for his honour, one day. Lincoln picked the weapons. Broadswords.
Lincoln showed up to the field of the duel the following day, and with one enormous one handed swing overhead, lopped a sizeable limb off a tree. From a standing start.
The gentleman backed out of the duel moments after witnessing the man dismember a tree as casually as one might behead a floret of broccoli.
Otter 4 years ago
In duels, the person challenged got to pick the location and weapons. So there was a duel where one guy didn't want to fight, but couldnt back out without being dishonored and forever scorned... so he chose a pitch-black unlit cellar for the location, and huge carpenters's axes that neither combatant could life for the weapons.
Reuben BirkHaskell 4 years ago
I heard about a situation where a well known dealer challenged a blacksmith. The duler was a rather small man and the blacksmith was apparently over six feet tall. The duler expected the blacksmith to chose swords or pistols but the blacksmith knew he couldn't win against him in a fair fight. He told him that the dual would take place a noon, in a shallow lake (about five feet tall) with sledge hammers. The duler apologized.
Mickie Shea 4 years ago
And its a good thing he did back out as Lincoln could really swing said sword.
#21
If I had a nickel for every time there was a Defenestration of Prague, I'd have ten cents, which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
According to several sources there were 3 defenestrations. https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Defenestrations_of_Prague
John Dilligaf 4 years ago
they threw politicians out of 3rd story windows. A grand old tradition that we should import into the United States
Load More Replies... More Thinking Needed 4 years ago
Love posts that makes me find something new. And according to Wiki, there is debate whether there was 2 or 3 Defenestrations of Prague. So you actually may have 15 cents.
Marie Cadavieco 4 years ago
Moral of this story: don’t go to Prague, or at the very least, keep all the windows locked.
JitkaBlitka 4 years ago
The second one started the 30 years war. But what is funny about it is, that the two defenestrated guys were thrown out of the window on literal pile of trash, leaving them unharmed and they just sorta walked away. But the message was sent.
#22
The Emu-War.
Benjamin Martin 4 years ago
If you want to know more about it (and you should, it's hilarious) Oversimplified did a video on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXpu6tbFCsI
J. F. 4 years ago (edited)
Australian farmers had massive problems with the birds and the government send a few men with a truck and a MG + 10.000ish shots. They underestimated how many bullets an Emu can take and how good they are in dodging - no human got hurt, but the army group simply wasn't able to shoot enough birds and gave up
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buttonpusher 4 years ago (edited)
I'd love to see the Emu war myself. But then my stupid brain imagines emus with guns and sitting in tanks going "attaaaaack!".
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
By "Tank" do you mean "Tractor with corrugated metal on it"?
Load More Replies... #23
Dr. Robert Liston performing a surgery with a 300% mortality rate. Wild if you read the story
LuckyL 4 years ago
His most famous (and possibly apocryphal) mishap was the operation where he was moving so fast that he took off a surgical assistant's fingers as he cut through a leg and, while switching instruments, slashed a spectator's coat. The patient and the assistant both died from infections of their wounds, and the spectator was so scared that he'd been stabbed that he died of shock. The fiasco is said to be the only known surgery in history with a 300 percent mortality rate.
xvslnx 4 years ago
Some people should not be allowed around sharp objects…
Load More Replies... Kanuli 4 years ago
Ok. So summed up: He was nasty and „quick“. So during an operation where he rushed, he accidently killed the assistant, coz he cut 2 of his fingers off, and the infection killed him. Killed the patient, most likely because the saw wasn’t clean. And when he stumbled with a scalpel into a bystanding watching old doctor, that one thought he was cut open, which he wasnt, but went into shock and got a heart attack anyway. So yea, 3 people dead for 1 patient operation.
Scagsy 4 years ago
Thanks for the context. Very interesting. Kinda makes me appreciate modern medicine a bit more.
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Oliver Seitz 4 years ago
At that surgery he killed the patient, injured him and a third person. He and the third person died also by infection caused by this
Guy MacGregor 4 years ago
I will paste @NadjaLambacher comment here: He was amputating so fast he cut his assistant's finger off too. The patient and the assistant died of infection and reportedly a spectator died from shock.
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Jean Thompson 4 years ago
In these times there were no anaesthetics, so a surgeon was valued and respected for the speed at which he could perform an amputation. Some surgeons prided themselves on being to amputate an arm in 12 seconds - to include sawing through the bone as well as cutting through the flesh.
Libstak 4 years ago
How do yet get a 300% mortality rate when 100% already accounts for every surgery?
Nadja Lambacher 4 years ago (edited)
He was amputating so fast he cut his assistant's finger off too. The patient and the assistant died of infection and reportedly a spectator died from shock.
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Napoleon was once attacked by a horde of rabbits. Basically, a rabbit hunt was set up to celebrate the Treaties of Tilsit and they ended up amassing somewhere between hundreds and thousands of rabbits (accounts vary). Anyway, the day of the hunt they set the rabbits in cages surrounding the area that they would be hunting in. They released them once everyone was set, but instead of being scared the bunnies swarmed the hunting party. At first they thought it was funny, but then it got overwhelming and Napoleon and the others had to flee from the bunnies in a coach.
chi-wei shen 4 years ago
This sounds like it came straight out of Monty Python. Napoleon wouldn't have survived an attack by that vicious Monty Python rabbit.
Persephone 4 years ago
The Monty Python Holy Grail is prob based on this! These rabbits were hand raised and used to being fed by humans, so after being purchased for this "canned" hunt, and left to starve in cages for days, they maniacally charged the hunters looking for food.
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buttonpusher 4 years ago
LOL. Stick him in a room full of bunnies and kick him up the a**e.
Load More Replies... NsG 4 years ago
Rabbits can be vicious. Wasn't there also a US president attacked by a swimming rabbit? I want to say Carter...?
Lee Kerr 4 years ago
There’s a song about by Tom Paxton (I think) “I don’t want a bunny-sunny in my widdle row boat etc”
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Sharon Vaughn 4 years ago
Another Mysteries at the Museum episode. Still makes me laugh to think about it.
KombatBunni 4 years ago
Now there is a movie I’d want to see..”Peter’s back, and this time he’s not after your cabbages..”
Load More Replies... Mickie Shea 4 years ago
It happen. And, Napoleon, himself, tis said, remarked, "To many bunnies, that bite".
#25
I am a big fan of the period when there were like three different popes all excommunicating each other and the term anti-pope is valid in Christian theology.
Rob 4 years ago
If a man tells you he's the Pope, chances are he's Avignon... ...I'll get my coat.
Luis Hernandez Dauajare 4 years ago
One of them was anti-Pope Benedict XIII. In Spanish, the saying that someone "sigue en sus trece" ("keeps on his thirteen") to refer to a stubborn person comes from Benedict's refusal to accept the real Pope....
Victor Botha 4 years ago
Really enjoyable and amusing reading. Glad there is someone else out there who enjoys his books.
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The citizens of Holland once ate their prime minister, that's a bizarre case. It was the case of Johan de Witt 1672. You know, your political career is over when your citizens start to eat you...
Patti Vance 4 years ago
i usually don't make political comments on random posts but - forgive me - the first thought that came to me is that we could take our time with trump due to all the processed food he prefers. kind of like a twinkie.
Caro Caro 4 years ago
2 brothers De Witt, sort of government officials. Toes, fingers, thumbs, ears, noses, lips, tongues and hands were cut off. The bodies were beaten with fists by some bystanders. The entrails were removed from the bodies and, according to eyewitness and poet-industrialist Joachim Oudaan, partly eaten by bystanders or given to dogs. The bodies were also castrated. A dead cat was placed between Cornelis' legs. Verhoeff did indeed cut the hearts out of the bodies. They have been exhibited in jars of turpentine oil for years. A tongue and a finger, believed to have come from the De Witt brothers, are in the Hague Historical Museum
Evil Little Thing 4 years ago
Geez, what did they do to deserve all that?
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IlovemydogShilo 4 years ago
To be accurate he was already dead at the time and I suppose you could say that being dead doesn't do much for your political career either.
#27
The Battle of Pelusium the persians straight up attached cats to their shields so the egyptians couldn’t attack the shields or fire arrows at them
Donkey boi 4 years ago
IT DIDN'T HAPPEN!!!!!!!! ONE person wrote that this happened, Polyaenus, and he was more concerned with making great stories of trickery and cunning than with the truth. He was born in the second century and the battle occurred in 525 BC some 600+years. The closest contemporary account came over 100 years after the event and was written by the Greek historian, Herodotus (also considered a bit of a story teller by some), where he said that at the time of his visit there was still a sea of skulls and remain and that he could tell the difference between the Egyptians and Persians from the skulls alone, but strangely no mention of cats? A fact that he would have loved to put into his records! No, there is no evidence what-so-ever to support this!
Judo Flipped By Nobody 4 years ago
And it worked. Cats are considered gods in Egyptian mythology.
#28
Alexander the Great named (or renamed) 70 cities after himself. Some still have the name or derivatives of it - Alexandria in Egypt being the most obvious, but also Iskandariya in Iraq and Kandahar in Afghanistan.
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
He had some justification for the big ego. He was indeed . . . . great.
Evan Singleton 4 years ago
I'm surprised we don't have a few new Donaldias, especially in the deep south.
James Hunter 4 years ago
Flat Earthers will always ruin your plans for world domination, OSP touched on Alexander the "Protagonist" in a few videos.
#29
Battle of Tsushima in 1905.
Russian Baltic fleet sails the long way (16k miles and 7 months) started by them opening fire on British fishing boats mistaken for Japanese vessels in the North sea.... sank their own ships while conducting target practice, then were destroyed by the Japanese fleet upon arrival (they mistook the Japanese ships for Russian and signaled them instead of firing).
A B C 4 years ago (edited)
Were the commanding officers/captains drunk the whole time? That's a lot of whoopsies.
Allan Breum 4 years ago
Another thing to remember; this was during the Russian Empire days, so it wasn't a meritocracy. Most of the officers were probably idiot sons of nobles.
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Eglė Bukauskaitė 3 years ago
looks a lot like the collective intelligence of current putinstan 🤷♀️
Mathew Aaberg 3 years ago
Good to see Russia's military prowess hasn't changed in the last 120 years.
#30
Austro-Hungarian army started shooting at itself while fighting Ottomans. The German speaking troops apparently yelled "Halt" when they encountered the Slavic troops of the same army, which then the Slavic troops who spoke s**t German (if any) mistook for "Alah" and started shooting. I believe the Slavic troop was also severely drunk at that point
Actually... I can totally see this happening
Walking On Sunshine 4 years ago
Nothing worse than drunk people with weapons. LOL I am from the United States.
Randolph Croft 4 years ago
I remember my very first New Years' Eve in Santa Barbara. Pistol shots I expected. SMG - not so much. Wife and I ended up sleeping in the bathtub.
Load More Replies... Allan Breum 4 years ago
Honestly, I think the Slavs just used that as an excuse to shoot some Germans... The empire was not exactly homogenous.
chi-wei shen 4 years ago
A part of the Austrian-Hungarian army could celebrate a glorious victory.
Rena Leigh 4 years ago
The Great Molasses Flood of 1919 always comes to mind. 21 people died when a molasses tank exploded in Boston and released a 40 foot wave of 2.3 million gallons of molasses, injuring 150 people. Also known as the Boston Molassacre.
#31
The Great Molasses Flood, Jan.15, 1919. Massive wave of molasses from a broken tank flooded the area. It killed 51 people and injured 150. 2.3 million US gallons.
chi-wei shen 4 years ago
The sweet smell of molasses lingered in parts of the North End for years after the tragedy. Legend has it that on hot summer days you still can smell it a century later, but this might be an urban legend.
#32
Carausius. Everything about him is boss. A Gallo-Belgic peasant who rose up the military ranks to become a Roman general. Successfully fought actual pirates after waiting for them to raid their targets and so became insanely wealthy. When he found out Emperor Maximian had caught wind of this and had ordered his execution he flipped him the bird, sailed into what is now Great Britain, bribed around four entire legions to join him with the money he'd nabbed, and set himself up in London as the Real Legitimate Emperor, Yo! Why has nobody made a film about the man, yet?
#33
Tsutomu Yamaguchi survived two atomic bombs in Japan. His story is amazing.
buttonpusher 4 years ago
That and the woman who survived the sinking ships.
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Karin Gibson 4 years ago
Yes he was in Hiroshima on business and survived went home to Nagasaki..... oops bomb two
Barry Patterson 4 years ago
Not a very good angel.One atomic bomb is an accident but two seems just kind of mean.
#34
The only two cars in Ohio at the time, somehow managed to run into each other and crashed.
#35
In 1802, Napoleon added a Polish legion of around 5,200 to the forces sent to Saint-Domingue to fight off the slave rebellion. Upon arrival and the first combat actions, discovering that the slaves fought off their French masters for their freedom, vast majority of Poles eventually joined the slaves against the French.. >Haiti's first president Jean-Jacques Dessalines called Polish people "the White Negroes of Europe", which was then regarded a great honour, as it meant brotherhood between Poles and Haitians.
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
Polish people also brought great honour to themselves and their country during the War of Independence and the Civil War. Too few know of their bravery and honour.
#36
In ww2 (maybe 1 I can't remember) Germany was making a fake aircraft base out of wood as a decoy but the Brits knew of it and, after completion, dropped a wooden carving of a bomb Us memers found our ways even in war
#37
No Kum-sok's defection of North Korea is actually one if the most badass, real life movie things to ever happen. Dude got sick of North Korea and flew to the South Korean border at almost mach-1, too far to be seen by North Korean or American radar. He landed at the closest American military base on the wrong side of the runway with another jet landing at the same time on the other side, barely missing it. When he got out of the plane, he took an image of Kim-Il-Sung that was in the cockpit, tore it to shreds, and threw up his arms in surrender. He unknowingly got $100k (which is almost $1 million today) by fulfilling "Operation Moolah" and lives as an American citizen to this day.
#38
The astronomer Tycho Brahe had a pet moose that he used to get drunk with. One time he brought it to a dinner party at a friend's house. But sadly the moose did not survive the night. Once again the poor moose got drunk on beer and died from a nasty fall down a set of stairs. Tyco Brahe also lost his nose in a duel, so he wore a prosthetic nose made out of metal. Some sources say brass, others say it was a gold/silver alloy. He was also employing a small court jester named Jepp that he believed to be clairvoyant.
Giovanna 4 years ago
Fun fact two: Tycho Brahe died from holding his pee. He was at a very important reception with a king, and it would be impolite to get up from the table to go pee, so he held it, his bladder exploded and he died.
Bobby 4 years ago
I was told this was Galileo, but just double checked and turns out I've been wrong for like 20 years
Load More Replies... buttonpusher 4 years ago (edited)
Ohh I recently learned about this. The poor drunk moose. But I also heard when his, Brahe's, body was exhumed they didn't find a nose. He apparently used to keep glue in his pocket and glue his nose back on at the dinner table.
Mark Fuller 4 years ago
In fairness, if I had a pet moose, I would probably use it as a drinking buddy too. Albeit with a full and proper risk assessment so the poor devil doesn't trip and fall. Alas, moose are few and far between in the U.K.
#39
The Cadaver Synod - In AD 897, Pope Stephen VI had his dead rival Pope Formosus exhumed and put on trial. Stephen had a deacon speak on the dead pope's behalf. Naturally, Formosus was found guilty. Stephen ordered that two fingers Formosus used for blessing people cut off and his corpse thrown in the Tiber river.
A B C 4 years ago
I guess Stephen still had to make sure everyone knew he was, uh, I mean, had the bigger díck.
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Keerthi Vardhan 4 years ago
Sounds like the new pope had unfinished business. Not letting even the dead go. I pity his mental health or his own preachings.
Patti Vance 4 years ago
and it is things like this that make me an R.C....recovering catholic. the catholics do/did a lot of strange things. however, i will say that this current pope gives me a bit of hope when comparing to the previous ones.
Emily Graves 4 years ago
The remains were dug up out of the river and re buried after the new pope had been thrown out.
Marco Conti 4 years ago
I seem to remember they fished him out later, or something. Weird dudes.
#40
Blackbeard the infamous pirate laying siege to Charleston, South Carolina for a week to get medicine for his syphilis
#41
Football war between Honduras and el salvador. A war that lasted 4 days because of a football match...
DennyS (denzoren) 4 years ago
Oh yes, footall is very serious in Latin America...especially the further south you go, Brazil vs Argentina is always feisty.
#42
The time when Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte escaped from the island where he was imprisoned on after his army was defeated, he snuck back into France under the nose of King Louis XVIII and literally every royal guard and roadblock from Marseille to Paris, and when he was actually caught just outside Paris, he managed to persuade the soldiers (who just so happened to be former Bonapartists) to escort him into Paris where he managed to successfully cause the king to flee, on top of raising a FULL ARMY to wage war against Europe AGAIN. The only time in history an emperor took back an entire country just by waving his hat.
Ryan Deschanel 4 years ago
Why didn't the People kill this traitor / dictator? It is still a mystery.
Mosheh Wolf 4 years ago
Because he made France into a superpower. He was no different than any other king, and actually enacted many laws that were far better than what other countries had.
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#43
Mexico and France went to war over a pastry shop.
Walking On Sunshine 4 years ago
I'm going to have to learn the rest of this story. I, too, I would go to war over a pastry shop.
Ryan Deschanel 4 years ago
Mexican rioters, French business owners, asking for compensation...
Karis Ravenhill 4 years ago
The French are deathly serious about their pastries. But who wouldn't be when your people spend hundreds of years perfecting something like the croissant, and Americans turn it into a croissantwich without even bothering to pronounce it properly? I understand their uppity hostility.
#44
The time that Olga of Kiev burned an entire town to the ground with pigeons! She’s a badass! Oh, and she’s a saint now too.
M O'Connell 4 years ago
Not only did she use pigeons, but she used the townspeople's own pigeons to do it!
Karis Ravenhill 4 years ago
Just read her Wiki page....never heard of her, why don't we have a movie about her yet? She was a savvy bada**!
J. F. 4 years ago
The US Air Force developed bat bombs against Japan, which weren't used because the nuke was finished before those could be deployed
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
Also they kind of burned down the warehouse they were in.
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#45
The Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (catalyst for WWI). Conspirators throw bombs at motorcade which miss but injury others. An hour later, Ferdinand was going to visit the injured at a hospital and his driver made a wrong turn and stalled the engine right in front of a deli. A deli one of the conspirators had gone to eat and lay low. He came out and shot the Archduke and his wife, sparking an international crisis and WWI.
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
WWI was going to happen anyway. The Germans were anxious for a fight. Their expansionist nationalism would/could not have been contained. Those who think WWI was a pointless war should consider the thinking/reasoning of Germany and its Kaiser prior to the onset of hostilities.
CP 4 years ago
It is much more complex than that. It wasn't just Germany.
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#46
Hannibal marching elephants over the Alps to attack Italy.
Mosheh Wolf 4 years ago
They didn't survive. Ironically, Hannibal did better when he didn't rely on elephants.
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Nicolas Schirvel 4 years ago
Rome ! To attack Rome... Italy wasn't even an existing word by the time...
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
He was quite successful for a while . . . . . . but the Romans got him eventually.
J. F. 4 years ago
Too many small skirmishes instead of attacking the city of Rome right away
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#48
The ratification of the 19th Amendment: Tennessee was the last state needed to ratify. Came down to a tied vote in the Tennessee legislature which meant the amendment would fail. Harry T. Burn changed his vote at the last minute bc his mom basically told him to, thereby getting the amendment fully ratified!
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
For everyone that isn't from the USA: the 19th Amendment guarantees women the right to vote. It was ratified in 1920, but is was already drafted in 1878.
#49
The fact that Cleopatra rolled out of a rug naked/half-naked to meet Julius Caesar.
LuckyL 4 years ago
Any foreign language is fairly difficult to translate to English as some words simply did not exist in isolation, and depended on context. The word strōmatódesmon (στρωματόδεσμον) was mistranslated as carpet. Due to lack of clarity of the context in the passage, there are many English words that strōmatódesmon can be attributed to, such as sack, bag, roll, blanket, heap of cloth, and so on. It’s clear that the word was in referrence to anything cloth like, and its understanding depended on the situation of the conversation. How historians assumed it was a carpet is beyond most of us, but it’s possible that it appealed more to the imagination. Plutarch was quite and imaginative man himself, and we can’t be sure if what he wrote was truly accurate either, seeing as how he penned the story down centuries after Cleopatra and Caesar had passed.
LuckyL 4 years ago
Perhaps it seemed more logical in a technical sense. Carrying a thick carpet over one’s shoulder in quite easy as it does not bed much across the length and weighs a considerable amount, just enough to cover her own weight. It would be plausible enough a route for Cleopatra to take without rousing any suspicion. The situation was that Cleopatra was on the run from assassins and needed to find a way into the palace for a mission, hence she needed a way in without being seen. The truth, according to Spencer MacDaniel, is that Cleopatra was in a sack. The kind where it was like a bed spread, large and square, into which women would put clothes and tie the corners around. She had to climb out of it rather unceremoniously. Also, she did not introduce herself as the queen of Egypt at all.
Load More Replies... #50
Todd Lincoln (Abe Lincoln’s son) being saved by Edwin Booth (John’s Brother) at a train station
LuckyL 4 years ago
Edwin Booth saved Abraham Lincoln's son,[12] Robert, from serious injury or even death. The incident occurred on a train platform in Jersey City, New Jersey. The exact date of the incident is uncertain, but it is believed to have taken place in late 1864 or early 1865. Robert Lincoln recalled the incident in a 1909 letter to Richard Watson Gilder, editor of The Century Magazine. The incident occurred while a group of passengers were late at night purchasing their sleeping car places from the conductor who stood on the station platform at the entrance of the car. The platform was about the height of the car floor, and there was of course a narrow space between the platform and the car body. There was some crowding, and I happened to be pressed by it against the car body while waiting my turn. In this situation the train began to move, and by the motion I was twisted off my feet, and had dropped somewhat, with feet downward, into the open space, and was personally helpless, when my
LuckyL 4 years ago
coat collar was vigorously seized and I was quickly pulled up and out to a secure footing on the platform. Upon turning to thank my rescuer I saw it was Edwin Booth, whose face was of course well known to me, and I expressed my gratitude to him, and in doing so, called him by name. Booth did not know the identity of the man whose life he had saved until some months later, when he received a letter from a friend, Colonel Adam Badeau, who was an officer on the staff of General Ulysses S. Grant. Badeau had heard the story from Robert Lincoln, who had since joined the Union Army and was also serving on Grant's staff. In the letter, Badeau gave his compliments to Booth for the heroic deed. The fact that he had saved the life of Abraham Lincoln's son was said to have been of some comfort to Edwin Booth following his brother's assassination of the president.
Load More Replies... Brandy Grote 4 years ago
Todd Lincoln died of illness in the White House. ROBERT had it rough despite living. Brother and dad dead, and he later had to deal with his mother, who was spendthrift and gradually going insane. Very sad family.
#51
The fact that during the War of 1812, a freak tornado ripped through D.C. which ended up killing more British than the Americans did while also putting out the White House fire and helping to lead to the war's end.
#52
Singapore Otter Wars. As in cute and fuzzy otters.
t-Grex 4 years ago
Otters are my favorite animals! Giant river otters, which are common in India, have families, and gangs. These wars are known as gang wars where they fight for territory or revenge. These are more interesting than I'm probably able to explain but these otters are not photogenic at all so these pictures of otters are crazy weird.
Donkey boi 4 years ago
Otter gang wars, I can't think on anything more interesting!!!! That my plans for the weekend all set!
Load More Replies... #53
Smoky served in the South Pacific, flew recon missions, parachuted, ran telegraph wire and became the first official therapy dog, entertaining and helping shell-shocked soldiers cope with the horrors of war. When she finally died, she was buried in a .30 caliber ammunition box in Ohio. Any day now, I expect to find out that Smoky somehow has a confirmed kill in the war.
#54
The hanging of a monkey in Hartlepool, UK who the townsfolk believed to be a French spy
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
Even the United State's Official Seal can be a spy.
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Karin Gibson 4 years ago
There is statue to that monkey and now the so called enlightened are saying that the statue is racist.
#55
When the Praetorian Guard killed the Emperor and then auctioned off the position to the highest bidder.
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
My favourite being . . . . . . "and then appointed Claudius as his successor".
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#56
Andrew Jackson was such a cranky old bastard that when an assassin failed at killing him, he beat him half to death.
Walking On Sunshine 4 years ago
Here's a fun fact: I am from a large native American family, the elders will not carry a $20 bill because it has Andrew Jackson's face on it. True story.
NOLAHusker 4 years ago
I don't know if it's a fun fact as much as a depressing fact that is a commentary on how effed up so much of American history is.
Load More Replies... Otter 4 years ago
That sort of thing stopped, when they started making guns that could shoot several times.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
Or at least didn't take three minutes to reload.
Load More Replies... #57
That time the US house of representatives had an all out fist fight. I think the most fascinating part is that they all just kind of laughed it off
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
And this time there won't be anyone laughing.
Load More Replies... lara 4 years ago
The inspiration for this clash came three days earlier when Senator Charles Sumner, a Massachusetts antislavery Republican, addressed the Senate on the explosive issue of whether Kansas should be admitted to the Union as a slave state or a free state. In his "Crime Against Kansas" speech, Sumner identified two Democratic senators as the principal culprits in this crime—Stephen Douglas of Illinois and Andrew Butler of South Carolina. He characterized Douglas to his face as a "noise-some, squat, and nameless animal . . . not a proper model for an American senator." Andrew Butler, who was not present, received more elaborate treatment. Mocking the South Carolina senator's stance as a man of chivalry, the Massachusetts senator charged him with taking "a mistress . . . who, though ugly to others, is always lovely to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, is chaste in his sight—I mean," added Sumner, "the harlot, Slavery." Representative Preston Brooks was Butler's South Carolina
lara 4 years ago
Cousin. Moving quickly, Brooks slammed his metal-topped cane onto the unsuspecting Sumner's head. As Brooks struck again and again, Sumner rose and lurched blindly about the chamber, futilely attempting to protect himself. After a very long minute, it ended.
Load More Replies... #58
Remember the time a bunch of protesters took over an entire city bock in Seattle and became the Capitol Hill autonomous zone (CHAZ) for like a month.
Truth Monster 4 years ago
And this dude was shot in there and they wouldn't let the ambulance in? Yep.
Yort 4 years ago
There’s always violence happening there. Basically it was business as usual except people were also selling home goods in booths.
Load More Replies... WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
They peacefully protested against the ongoing racist murders by the police after the killing of George Floyd by the now convicted murderer Chauvin. Police retaliated with brute force and violence. One thing led to another. Wouldn't be surprised if it happened again on an ever bigger scale.
Walking On Sunshine 4 years ago
Justice for our brothers and sisters. We will all be equal or die trying!
#59
Sometime in 1943(WW2) a German tiger 1 tank was hit over 230 times by other tanks and anti tank weapons in 7 hours. The tank crew of the tiger only lost 1 out of its 5 members and the tiger was horrifically damaged yet it still managed to drive over 10 km back to a German outpost. Once they got to the outpost they had to cut the crew out of the tank because all of the hatches were destroyed/stuck. Total damage of the tank: Transmission was destroyed and only would work in 2nd gear. All gm ports were destroyed. The commanders cupala was destroyed. The fuel was leaking. 1 track on the right side was basically falling off. The front left drive wheel broke and was spinning freely. In the end the tiger was a monument for the Germans for a while then it was scrapped.
Hugh Willie Mungous 4 years ago
An amazing vehicle of war, no doubt, but ill conceived due to its complication and the fact that it was severely outproduced by the T-34 and the Sherman.
chi-wei shen 4 years ago
Ther was a saying among German troops that "a Tiger is worth 5 Shermans, but there are always 6 Shermans". The Tiger was the more powerful tank but hopelessly outproduced by allied tanks.
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#60
Ohio going to war with Michigan, over Toledo. One person wounded. Ohio got Toledo, while Michigan got the entire upper peninsula and all of it's copper, iron, and forests. I think Michigan won this one.
Bobby 4 years ago
I live near there. I joked when the teacher taught us about it that they were fighting over who had to keep toledo and ohio lost
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Mosheh Wolf 4 years ago
And the rivalry continues until today, as anybody who has been to U Michigan/OSU football game will testify...
#61
Oda Nobunaga, early in his career, rallied 2,000 men to defeat Imagawa Yoshimoto's 25,000. He won that fight hard.
#62
Mark Twain was born and died when Halley’s Comet passed over
Kate 4 years ago
Yep. And he predicted his own death too, saying, "It is coming again next year. The Almighty has said, no doubt, 'Now there are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together."
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#63
1859 border dispute between the US and Britain over San Juan island. Only casualty was a pig so it is referenced as the Pig War.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
The assassin of the pig was a farmer who was upset it was eating his potatoes.
#64
Watching as a cultural and architectural icon such as the Notre Dame cathedral went up in flames
Yort 4 years ago
What was super gross is the amount of people complaining about all the money going just to fix up a church. How petty and shitty do you have to be to call NOTRE DAME CATHEDRAL “just a church”?
Lori Ballard 4 years ago (edited)
and it happening during Holy Week also! Sept 11th was even harder for me as I had just had lunch at the towers on Sept 4th.
#65
The 2016 clown attacks. I lived through that and I still can't believe it happened.
Walking On Sunshine 4 years ago
Those clowns are fixing to learn their lesson, real hard.
Load More Replies... Pumpkin Spice 4 years ago
I lived through it too....I had to beat a clown half to death. Fifth-grade me was just.....insane.
#66
Well, the Prostestant reformation was kicked off by Martin Luther. A guy so obsessed by sin that he was hallucinating demons ... in the bathroom. There was a children's crusade in which people fought a war being lead ... by a duck. The antipopes were a kinda weird thing. For centuries there were essentially two popes each claiming to be the one true pope. Medieval Europe was something else.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
Martin Luther wrote a callout post on his Twitter.com and the church split in half.
#67
Prohibition in the US. Of all the places it could happend it was there.
Erik Lawrence 4 years ago
I love the fact that the war on drugs was a dismal failure, and drugs won.
Bacony Cakes 4 years ago
The main problem was that most of the US's spies were double agents for drugs.
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Erik Lawrence 4 years ago
oddly enough, prohibition led to the fortune of future government leaders. its like it was done to create money and help themselves and others like them.
WilvanderHeijden 4 years ago
And it showed that banning drugs is the best way to make criminals wealthy and powerful. They earn more per year than the US spends on fighting them.
lara 4 years ago
Obviously downvoters are unaware of the history of Prohibition.
Load More Replies... #68
Weird cookery. Edison fried an elephant in the street to prove something about electricity…
Janos Schumacher 4 years ago
Edison was invested in DC current which required a generator every couple of blocks. Westinghouse and Tesla were invested in AC which allows for longer transmission lines. Edison used to kill cats to show how bad AC was. He also killed an elephant with DC just for kicks. He lost. Thus, we run on AC. The fun thing, is that long transmission lines run on DC now at very high voltage which is converted to AC at the substations. Either way, Edison was a douche that paid kids to collect stray cats so he could electrocute them. He was not a good man. Tesla was a good man, though bat s**t insane, he was a good man and never killed cats for his own folly.
The Scout 4 years ago
Incomplete. Edison DID use electricity to execute the elephant. But the animal in question was already marked for execution before, as it had attacked and killed someone.
Linda Roy 4 years ago
Her trainer because he was abusing her and she had had enough.
Load More Replies... What do you think ?
Jo Choto 4 years ago
What I learned from this is that war is stupid, it's never-ending, it's destructive to everyone involved and it is always 100 percent because of testosterone.
memyselfandI 4 years ago
Maybe not 100%, it’s usually like 90% because of egos though.
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Izzy Curer 4 years ago (edited)
These remind me of a story I read once about a mutiny where some of a ship's crew sliced open the captain's jugular. The ship's doctor was able to grab a needle and thread and sew the vein back together with six stitches, all during a mutiny on a moving vessel in the middle of the ocean. The captain lived.
Jo Choto 4 years ago
What I learned from this is that war is stupid, it's never-ending, it's destructive to everyone involved and it is always 100 percent because of testosterone.
memyselfandI 4 years ago
Maybe not 100%, it’s usually like 90% because of egos though.
Load More Replies... Izzy Curer 4 years ago (edited)
These remind me of a story I read once about a mutiny where some of a ship's crew sliced open the captain's jugular. The ship's doctor was able to grab a needle and thread and sew the vein back together with six stitches, all during a mutiny on a moving vessel in the middle of the ocean. The captain lived.
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