Batista was once seen as the perfect example of Brazil's status as a booming, successful country "that had seemed to successfully combine private enterprise with social justice and was riding high on surging commodities prices." How did Batista lose his entire $35 billion fortune in one year?
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"Ouija" is actually a brand name for a type of game called a "talking board" that grew in popularity, along with a rise in interest in spiritualism, after the Civil War. In the years following a conflict full of death, strife, and acrimony, it's understandable that people wanted resolution.
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When Wisconsin University researchers examined a Stone-Age butchery site in Tanzania, they found that the site's animal remains indicated that those animals had been specifically targeted and killed by human hunters. Hunting is apparently far older than we realized.
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In 1914, an informal ceasefire between German and Allied soldiers during World War I would later come to be known as the Christmas Truce of 1914.
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The Roaring Twenties roared in part because of the proliferation of organized crime, and Capone had his rivals back in the day, in more ways than one. We're talking about the crime boss George "Bugs" Moran, born Adelard Cunin, whose life intertwined with Capone's in dangerous ways.
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Herman Melville's classic novel Moby Dick is an essential part of American literature and popular culture. One of the most riveting things about the novel is that it's based on a lot of true events. Here are some true events that inspired Melville's Moby Dick.
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The pickle may have once been just some parents' clever scheme to keep kids from rushing the tree on Christmas morning.
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While the atomic bomb is the most notable advancement to come out of World War II, there are a number of technologies that got their start during the war years.
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These days, as long as the bank thinks you can pay off your debts, you can get a credit card. But it was a hard-fought battle to get to this point. And it wasn't just unmarried women who couldn't get credit cards; married women had to bring along a man when applying for one.
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Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky's real life and worldview fed into his fictional works significantly. This is the crazy real-life story of Fyodor Dostoevsky.
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Innumerable alternate histories have been written about World War II. These are some ways people think World War II could have ended differently.
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The first Black presidential candidate that almost no one remembers was George Edwin Taylor, back in 1904. Though George Edwin Taylor lost, he made his mark.
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Silicon Valley may be peddled as the place where dreams come true and young people get rich, but the reality can be far different. Here's the messed up truth of what goes on in Silicon Valley.
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In the Victorian era, taking pictures of dead loved ones became popular almost as soon as rudimentary photography was invented and stayed popular for decades.
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In the Wild West, barbers were an important hub for news, trusted advice, and cleanliness. Here's why barbers were some of the most important people.
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Known in the automotive industry as an innovator, John DeLorean's life was one of rebellion, struggle, and peerless invention. We now know John DeLorean's car from the Back to the Future franchise, but his tragic life included many divorces and an FBI sting for smuggling cocaine.
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In school, we never seemed to hear about groundbreaking women, and that's a shame. Here are some groundbreaking women they didn't teach you about in school.
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Depending on who you believe, no one has ever found the Ark. Not only is the Ark a piece of religious history, it's believed to hold wondrous powers that could wipe out whole nations, part seas, and probably do some other miraculous biblical stuff.
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The Miami Marlins made baseball history on November 13, 2020, when they hired Kim Ng (pronounced Ang) as the team's new general manager. She is now believed to be the first woman to hold the position in Major League Baseball. Ng is now the highest-ranking woman in any MLB team's baseball operations
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North Korea's people sometimes turn to drugs, and users include workers in factories, who use it as a pick-me up during shifts, along with businessmen and local celebrities. They even exchange methamphetamine on all sorts of holidays, including Chuseok, a harvest festival, and New Year's.
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Those with a strong religious nature tend to believe Ouija boards can contact the dead and serve as portals that allow evil to enter our world.
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A Swanson salesman named Gerry Thomas came up with the idea of marketing meals as TV dinners. Thomas realized in 1953 that Swanson had a surplus of frozen turkey -- 260 tons of it, in fact, sitting inside refrigerated train cars. The company had no idea what to do with it.
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According to the Abide in Christ website, the Ark wasn't just a box holding the Ten Commandments; it was also the Mercy Seat, where God would meet and judge souls. That's two holy objects smashed into one. It's holy enough to grant men power if they ever get their hands on it. Terrifying power.
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Although the Plan of San Diego didn't itself come to fruition, its consequences reverberate over 100 years later in America.
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But wait. The United States has adopted the metric system, you say? Back in 1866, via the Metric Act, as Smithsonian Magazine relates. It remains unenforceable, however, and now people are confused because they can drink half-liter bottles of water while running a 5k, and then travel 2.3 miles home.
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Jerusalem is one of the holiest cities in the world and it has been a site of terrible violence and great tragedy in its millennia-long history.
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Joseph is just kind of hanging out there, being a pretty good dude. Nothing super special about him in the common mythos, except that he stuck around to raise Mary's child, knowing it wasn't his own. No, this was God's baby. The Holy Spirit had blessed Mary with a serious honor.
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