Does the following sound familiar to you? “Dear Sir, Although I know you only from good references of your honesty, my sad situation compels me to reveal you an important affair in which you can procure a modest fortune saving at the same time that of my darling daughter. Before being imprisoned here, I was established as a banker in […]
Read more
Depending on the country you live in, political opinion may be varied, or biased in one direction. In democratic countries, you obviously have the option to actually decide what direction your state should move towards via voting. And while a lot of political parties may opt for a safer middle ground usually more relatable for a wider demographic, there will […]
Read more
On 3 December 1967, South African surgeon Christiaan Barnard made medical history by performing the first successful human heart transplant, transferring the heart of accident victim Denise Darvall into 65-year-old Louis Washkansky. While Washkansky died 18 days later of pneumonia, the pioneering surgery heralded a new era of medicine, giving thousands of people a new chance at life. Today over […]
Read more
The Hope Diamond’s story begins over a billion years ago, when carbon under immense pressure formed the larger diamond from which the Hope Diamond would spring. Not only was the mother stone large, but it was given a rare blue color due to the presence of high amounts of the element boron within the carbon. The diamond’s story in human […]
Read more
In 1814, some 20,000 troops of the British East India Company launched an assault on the Kingdom of Ghorka in what is today Nepal, seeking to expand their influence into the Indian subcontinent’s mountainous northern territories. To their surprise, the British encountered unexpectedly fierce resistance from local mountain warriors known as Ghorkalis, and the conflict quickly degenerated into a bloody […]
Read more
They came in their thousands: young women from across rural Tennessee, fresh out of high school, drawn by the promise of good pay, cheap rent, and a chance to do their part for the war effort – women like 19-year-old Gladys Owens and Ruth Huddleston. One by one they stepped off trains and buses and entered the mysterious town of […]
Read more
The Boeing 747 is among the most iconic and celebrated aircraft in history. Since first taking to the skies in 1969, the world’s first “Jumbo Jet” has become synonymous with luxury and reliability in air travel, the more than 1,500 aircraft produced having carried over 4 billion passengers over the last 50 years. But sadly the reign of the venerable […]
Read more
One day in the summer of 1963, Spanish neurologist José Delgado stepped into a bullring outside Córdoba and prepared to perform an audacious experiment. Armed only with an experimental radio transmitter, he prepared to face off with an angry Spanish fighting bull, bred specifically for strength and aggression. Delgado waved a flag to set the bull charging, but before the […]
Read more
The town of Pont-Saint-Esprit lies 30 kilometres northwest of Avignon, in the Gard department of Southern France. Founded in the fifth century, the town, site of a famous famous bridge over the Rhône river built in 1309, has had a long and eventful history. In the 9th Century legendary Frankish ruler Charles Martel defeated an army of Moors nearby, while […]
Read more
In 1972, eight people presented themselves to 12 psychiatric hospitals across the United States. They had seemingly nothing in common save for a very specific set of symptoms, with all eight reporting hearing voices saying a single word: “thud,” “empty,” or “hollow.” They were all immediately admitted, seven being diagnosed with schizophrenia and one with manic depression. Following admission, all […]
Read more
After the Second World War, a common joke was that Adolf Hitler was the best general the Allies ever had. His string of disastrous decisions, from halting his forces around Dunkirk, delaying his invasion of Russia, and refusing to pull the 6th Army out of Stalingrad, handed the advantage to his enemies time and time again – to the point […]
Read more
The Tour de France bicycle race is one of Europe’s most beloved and popular sporting contests. Held every year since 1903 except during the two World Wars, the race pits 20-22 international teams against a gruelling 21-stage course winding through some of the roughest terrain in France and neighbouring countries. A major event on both the European and global sporting […]
Read more
When we talk about famous heists, maybe our minds go to the Antwerp diamond robbery of 2003, or the brazen Lufthansa heist at JFK in 1978. We may even remember the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft of 1990. Not only did these heists garner headline news, but some of them were adapted into movies or sub-plots. Think Goodfellas, which was […]
Read more
We’ve all heard of him. Alexander the Great has been for many centuries a household name in much of the world- an impressive feat for a king who’s been dead for two millenia and reigned only for a little over a decade. In western countries, his defeat of the Persian Empire in the 320s BC has often been depicted as […]
Read more
When we think of Germany and genocide, we typically think of the Holocaust, wherein some 15 million Jews, Roma, homosexuals and others deemed “undesirable” by the Third Reich were systematically exterminated between 1941 and 1945. But policies of mass murder go back much further in German history than many dare admit. For some 30 years before the Nazis came to […]
Read more
Inheriting is rarely as fun as films and books would have you believe. Instead of a previously unknown great-aunt who just so happens to deem you the sole heir to her surprisingly large fortune, it usually comes with the death of a close relative and more often than not, strife among the surviving parties. The age-old ‘motive for murder’ trope […]
Read more
There’s an old joke told in natural history museums about a new tour guide showing around a group of visitors. Stopping before a dinosaur skeleton, he informs the group that the fossil remains are 80 million years and three weeks old. “How do you know that?” asks one of the visitors. “Because it was 80 million when I started,” says […]
Read more
In the winter of 1944-45, the people of the Netherlands teetered on the brink of starvation. As the Allied advance through the south stalled in wake the ill-conceived Operation Market Garden, the Dutch Government in Exile ordered a nationwide railway strike in an attempt to cripple the occupying German Army. In retaliation, the Nazis cut off food shipments to the […]
Read more