Among the Kwakwaka'wakw people of the Pacific Northwest, the Hamatsa were a secret society. This society exercised a ritual often called a "cannibal" ritual, and some debate has arisen as to whether the Kwakwaka'wakw do or do not practice ritual canniba…
In June of 1963, Vietnamese Mahayana Buddhist monk Thích Quang Duc burned himself to death at a busy intersection in Saigon. He was attempting to show that to fight all forms of oppression on equal terms, Buddhism too, needed to have its martyrs. …
The Solvay Conference, founded by the Belgian industrialist Ernest Solvay in 1912, was considered a turning point in the world of physics. Located in Brussels, the conferences were devoted to outstanding preeminent open problems in both physics and chem…
A nineteen-year-old and her two-year-old niece and goddaughter are hurled off a collapsing fire escape during an apartment fire on Marlborough Street. The two waited with firefighter Robert O’Neil for a rescue ladder to reach them. As the firefighter cl…
The picture/poster shows five men representing five different cultural spheres: an American Indian, an Australian Aborigine, an African, an Asian, and a European. The European, standing in the center, dominates the scene and thus shows the Eurocentric w…
Mankind's road to the stars had its unsung heroes. One of them was the Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov. His spaceflight on Soyuz 1 made him the first Soviet cosmonaut to fly into outer space more than once, and he became the first human to die on a sp…
This photo is taken during the Bangladesh Liberation War. The atrocities of this war are little known to the Western. It lasted over a duration of nine months and witnessed large-scale atrocities. Also during the time cholera was rampant. This war resul…
Pictured here in September 1939, Einstein relaxes on the beach near his Long Island summer home with friend and local department store owner David Rothman. After some initial confusion in the store resulting from Einstein’s thickly accented request for …
On February 14, 1884, Theodore Roosevelt received a terrible news, his wife and mother died within hours of one another in Roosevelt's house in New York City. His mother, age 50, succumbed to typhus, and his wife Alice died at the age of 22 giving birth…
Photo was taken during a routine military expedition in Chukchi Peninsula, Soviet Union. It isn’t sure if the Chukchi Peninsula has more people or white bears. The climate is very severe and sometimes weather can be so fierce in winter that the temperat…
During the Great Depression, millions of people were out of work across the United States. Unable to find another job locally, many unemployed people hit the road, traveling from place to place, hoping to find some work. A few of these people had cars, …
They are all wearing dance shoes so they are probably performers for a variety show. Since no one had decent air conditioning back then, practicing their acts outside on the roof was better than in a stuffy theater. Someone must have thought it'd make a…
Rat-catchers were employed in Europe to control rat populations. Keeping the rat population under control was practiced in Europe to prevent the spread of diseases to man, most notoriously the Black Plague and to prevent damage to food supplies. Today this…
This puts to rest that urban legend that Einstein was a “bad student”, although he received a three in French. He did, apparently, receive straight sixes in algebra, geometry, physics, and - history! Young Einstein knew what was important, it seems. Per…
"Toffs and Toughs" is a 1937 photograph of five boys: two dressed in the Harrow School uniform including waistcoat, top hat, boutonnière, and cane; and three nearby wearing the plainclothes of pre-war working-class youths. The picture was taken by Jimmy…
Taken in 1967 by Rocco Morabito, this photo called "The Kiss of Life" shows a utility worker named J.D. Thompson giving mouth-to-mouth to co-worker Randall G. Champion after he went unconscious following contact with a low voltage line. They h…
During the alcohol prohibition (1919-1933), the transportation and brewing/cultivation of alcohol was prohibited. Some people who brewed Moonshine (a type of whiskey) did it in the middle of a forest or meadow. Moonshiners were often sought after by law…
Just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the ocean liner Titanic struck an iceberg. Less than three hours later, she lay at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, having taken with her more than 1,500 of the roughly 2,200 people on board. The exact size of th…
This sign was posted at the 363rd Station Hospital during World War II, in Papua, New Guinea. It effectively (if morbidly) promoted the use of Atabrine, an anti-malaria drug. Also, it's an example of persuasive advertising where the skulls and the langu…
This seal was actually a seal to King Tut’s fifth shrine. The king was buried in a series of four sarcophagi, which were in turn kept inside a series of five shrines. This unbroken seal stayed 3,245 years untouched. The late discovery of Tut’s tomb resu…