Before the war Argentina hosted a strong, very-well-organized pro-Nazi element that was controlled by the German ambassador. In the spring of 1938, some 20,000 Nazi supporters attended a "Day of Unity" rally held at the Luna Park stadium in Buenos Aires…
South African mineworkers being x-rayed before leaving the diamond mines. A trained radiologist like the one in the picture can easily identify even the smallest diamond, which a would-be thief might attempt to smuggle out of the mine in his stomach. Ea…
Mary was a five-ton Asian elephant, also known as Murderous Mary, who performed in the Sparks World Famous Shows circus. After killing a trainer in Kingsport, Tennessee, she was hanged in 1916. Her death is sometimes interpreted as a cautionary tale of …
By the late 1970s, it was clear that Russians were no longer particularly liked in Poland. The reverse was also probably true. Władysław Kozakiewicz felt this in person as he ran up to take his jump at the 1980 Summer Olympics. The 1980 Summer Olympic G…
The Austro-Hungarian aircraft gunner in the picture is seen using a Mauser C96 pistol combination, probably just for demonstration. Each pistol held a clip of ten bullets and the device attached to them fired them in unison, giving the gunner the abilit…
In 1933, Lina Medina was born in Ticrapo, Peru. At the age of five years, Lina was brought to the hospital by her parents who complained of abdominal extreme growth. The girl’s parents initially thought their daughter was suffering from a massive abdomi…
The Russian Expeditionary Force was a World War I military force sent to France by the Russian Empire. In 1915 the French requested that Russian troops be sent to fight alongside their own army on the Western Front. Initially, they asked for 300,000 men…
The term Uncle Sam is reputedly derived from Samuel Wilson, a meat packer from Troy, New York, who supplied rations for the soldiers during the War of 1812. There was a requirement at the time for contractors to stamp their name and where the rations ca…
In June and July 1941, detachments of German Einsatzgruppen, together with Lithuanian auxiliaries, began murdering the Jews of Lithuania. Groups of partisans, civil units of nationalist-rightist anti-Soviet affiliation, initiated contact with the German…
In the early 20th century, polio was one of the most feared diseases in industrialized countries, paralyzing hundreds of thousands of children every year. A highly infectious disease, polio attacks the nervous system and can lead to paralysis, disabilit…
A Royal Air Force pilot getting a haircut and reading Greenmantle by John Buchan. There are so many interesting things about this photo, the colors, the apparent calmness of these two gents during wartime, the young pilot smoking a pipe, and also the fact …
These iconic photographs were taken in 1947 at Vienna’s Southern Railway Station, where photographer Ernst Haas witnessed the moving scenes of the return of the first 600 Austrian war prisoners from Eastern Europe. Haas’s images show the anticipation an…
These images are chilling, bordering on surreal: as World War II raged on December 18, 1941, Adolf Hitler presided over a Christmas party in Munich. The color-enhanced images were captured by Hugo Jaeger, one of Adolf Hitler's personal photographers. …
HMS Invincible was launched on 3 May 1977 as the seventh ship to carry the name. She saw action in the Falklands War when she was deployed with HMS Hermes and took over as flagship of the British fleet when Hermes was sold to India. On 25 February 1982,…
Nicolae Ceausescu ruled Romania for 21 years, earning a reputation as a brutal dictator. During his reign, he developed the largest network of spies in Eastern Europe, silenced his opposition with a secret police force known as the Securitate, and eventual…
On 6 October 1889, the Moulin Rouge (English: The Red Mill) opened in the Jardin de Paris, at the foot of the Montmartre hill. Its creator Spaniard Joseph Oller and his manager Charles Zidler were formidable businessmen who understood the public's taste…
Between 1928 and 1932, two enormous wooden ships, which once belonged to Emperor Caligula, and had lain on the bottom of the Lake Nemi for over nineteen hundred years, were salvaged in what was perhaps the greatest underwater archaeological recovery ever a…
It's Friday, the 13th of April, 1945. A few miles northwest of Magdeburg there was a railroad siding in a wooded ravine not far from the Elbe River. Major Clarence L. Benjamin in a jeep was leading a small task force of two light tanks on a routine job …
The Battle of Verdun is considered by many the most blood-stained battlefield in world history. Never before or since has there been such a lengthy battle, involving so many men, situated on such a tiny piece of land. The battle, which lasted from 21 Fe…
This interesting picture, taken in 1919, shows employees of the New York Central Railroad at a celebration in Victory Way, showing off a pyramid of recovered German helmets in front of Grand Central Terminal. There were over 12,000 German Pickelhaubes on t…