George Everest was a British surveyor and geographer, he is most famous for having the highest mountain in the world, Mount Everest, named after him, despite the fact he never really had anything to do with the discovery.
Like a dripping tap that becomes the mind’s only focus while attempting to sleep, water torture has gone down in history as something terrifying, made exhilarating by Harry Houdini’s later interpretation.
It was an incident involving Charles Dickens that led to a step forward in female emancipation and the formation of Sorosis, the first women’s club, at the famous Delmonico’s restaurant in New York.
James Jameson, grandson and heir of Jameson Irish whiskey magnate John Jameson, was an esteemed nineteenth-century naturalist. He would become infamous for his alleged role in the murder and cannibalization of a young African girl.
The gap in our knowledge of medieval underwear is due partly to the poor preservation of organic materials and the lack of visual evidence. Clearly, there’s still a lot to uncover.
A tale of six Sultans and suspicious successions led to what’s become known as the shortest war in history, the Anglo-Zanzibar War, which lasted approximately 38 minutes.
Controversy still surrounds the explosion and sinking of the USS Maine in 1898, which signalled US intervention in the Cuban War of Independence with the rallying cry “Remember The Maine!”
Evidence suggest the CIA’s “heart attack gun” was inspired by the KGB’s spray gun: both weapons caused heart attacks in their victims.
The bloodcurdling scream the Aztec death whistle makes explains why the Aztecs may have used it as an intimidation tactic in battle — or in human sacrifice.
The origins of the idiom “happy as Larry” date back to the 19th century—but whether it’s attributed to a New Zealand writer, Australian boxer, or Cornish slang word is anyone’s guess.