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The  voyage of the  James Caird  was a small-boat journey from  Elephant Island  in the  South Shetland Islands  to  South Georgia  in the southern Atlantic Ocean, a distance of 800 miles (1,300 km). Undertaken by Sir  Ernest Shackleton  and five companions, it aimed to obtain rescue for the main body of the  Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition  of 1914–17, stranded on Elephant Island after the lo...

The  Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition  (1914–17), also known as the  Endurance  Expedition , is considered the last major expedition of the  Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration . Conceived by  Sir Ernest Shackleton , the expedition was an attempt to make the first land crossing of the  Antarctic continent. After the  conquest  of the  South Pole  by  Roald Amundsen  in 1911, this crossing remai...

Enrique of Malacca  ( Spanish :  Enrique de Malaca ;  Portuguese :  Henrique de Malaca ), was a native of the  Malay Archipelago  who became a  slave  of the  Portuguese   explorer   Ferdinand Magellan  in the 16th century.  Italian historian  Antonio Pigafetta , who wrote the most comprehensive account of Magellan's voyage, named him "Henrique" (which was  Hispanicised  as  Enrique  in official S...

Heaven's Gate  was an American  UFO religious   millenarian  cult based in  San Diego ,  California , founded in 1974 and led by  Marshall Applewhite (1931–1997) and  Bonnie Nettles  (1927–1985) until their deaths. [1]  On March 26, 1997, police discovered the bodies of 39 members of the group, who had participated in a  mass suicide  in order to reach what they believed was an extraterrestrial  s...

Erik Jan Hanussen , born  Hermann Steinschneider  (2 June 1889, in  Vienna  – 25 March 1933, in  Berlin ), was an  Austrian  Jewish publicist,  charlatan  and  clairvoyant  performer. Acclaimed in his lifetime as a  hypnotist ,  mentalist ,  occultist , and  astrologer , Hanussen was active in  Weimar Republic   Germany  and also at the beginning of  Nazi Germany . He is said to have instructed  A...

Charles Ponzi , (born  Carlo Pietro Giovanni Guglielmo Tebaldo Ponzi ; March 3, 1882 – January 18, 1949), was an  Italian  swindler and  con artist  in the U.S. and Canada. His aliases include  Charles Ponci ,  Carlo , and  Charles P. Bianchi . [1]  Born and raised in Italy, he became known in the early 1920s as a swindler in North America for his money-making scheme. He promised clients a 50% pro...

On January 28, 1986, the  NASA   shuttle orbiter  mission  STS-51-L  and the tenth flight of  Space Shuttle   Challenger  (OV-99) broke apart 73 seconds into its flight, killing all seven crew members, which consisted of five NASA  astronauts  and two  payload specialists . The spacecraft disintegrated over the  Atlantic Ocean , off the coast of  Cape Canaveral ,  Florida , at 11:39  EST (16:39  U...

The  Ryugyong Hotel  ( Chosŏn'gŭl :  류경려관 ; sometimes  anglicised  as  Ryu-Gyong Hotel  or  Yu-Kyung Hotel ) [4]  is an unfinished (although  topped-out ) 105-story, 330 metres (1,080 ft)-tall  pyramid -shaped  skyscraper  in  Pyongyang ,  North Korea . Its name ("capital of  willows ") is also one of the historical names for Pyongyang. [5]  The building is also known as the  105 Building , a...

The  Salem witch trials  were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of  witchcraft  in  colonial Massachusetts  between February 1692 and May 1693. The trials resulted in the  executions of twenty people, fourteen of them women, and all but one by  hanging . Five others (including two infant children) died in prison. Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If yo...

A  hatpin  is a decorative and functional  pin  for holding a  hat  to the head, usually by the hair. In  Western culture , hatpins are almost solely used by women and are often worn in a pair. They are typically around 20 cm in length, with the pinhead being the most decorated part. Hatpins were sometimes used by women to defend themselves against assault by men. Laws were passed in 1908 in Ameri...

The  Taiping Rebellion  or the  Taiping Civil War  was a massive  rebellion  or  civil war  in  China  fought between the established  Manchu -led  Qing dynasty  and the  Christian   millenarian  movement of the  Taiping Heavenly Kingdom  between 1850 to 1864. Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you'd like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreo...

The  Eggnog Riot , sometimes known as the  Grog Mutiny , was a  riot  that took place at the  United States Military Academy  in  West Point, New York , on 24–25 December 1826. It was caused by a drunken  Christmas Day  party in the North Barracks of the academy. Two days prior to the incident, a large quantity of  whiskey  was smuggled into the academy to make  eggnog  for the party, giving the r...

The  Battle of the Alamo  (February 23 – March 6, 1836) was a pivotal event in the  Texas Revolution . Following a  13-day siege , Mexican troops under  President   General Antonio López de Santa Anna  launched an assault on the  Alamo Mission  near San Antonio de Béxar (modern-day  San Antonio ,  Texas , United States), killing all of the  Texian  defenders. Santa Anna's cruelty during the battle...

The most accurate measurement of the size of a  human penis  can be derived from several readings at different times since there is natural minor variability in size depending upon arousal level, time of day, room temperature, frequency of sexual activity, and reliability of measurement. When compared to other primates, including large examples such as the gorilla, the human penis is thickest, bot...

The  Dreadnought  hoax  was a  practical joke  pulled by  Horace de Vere Cole  in 1910. Cole tricked the  Royal Navy  into showing their  flagship , the  battleship   HMS  Dreadnought , to a fake delegation of  Abyssinian  royals. The hoax drew attention in Britain to the emergence of the  Bloomsbury Group , among whom some of Cole's collaborators numbered. The hoax was a repeat of a similar imper...

Edward "Ned" Kelly  (December 1854 [a]  – 11 November 1880) was an Australian  bushranger , outlaw, gang leader and convicted police murderer. Recognised as the last and most famous of the bushrangers, he is best-known for wearing a suit of bulletproof armour during his final shootout with the police.   Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you'd like to support the show on...

Action Park  is an  amusement park  located in  Vernon, New Jersey , United States, on the grounds of the  Mountain Creek  ski resort. The park consists primarily of water-based attractions and originally opened to the public in 1978 under the ownership of Great American Recreation, who also owned the ski resort which at the time operated under the name Vernon Valley/Great Gorge. [2] Our theme son...

Boudica  or  Boudicca  ( / ˈ b uː d ɪ k ə / ,  Latinised  as  Boadicea  or  Boudicea / b oʊ d ɪ ˈ s iː ə / , and known in  Welsh  as  Buddug   [ˈbɨ̞ðɨ̞ɡ] ) [1] [2]  was a queen of the  British   Celtic   Iceni  tribe who led an uprising against the occupying forces of the  Roman Empire  in AD 60 or 61, and died shortly after its failure. She is sometimes considered a British folk hero.   Our theme...

The  Cold War  was a state of geopolitical tension after  World War II  between powers in the  Eastern Bloc  (the  Soviet Union  and its  satellite states ) and powers in the  Western Bloc  (the  United States , its  NATO  allies and others). Historians do not fully agree on the dates, but a common timeframe is the period between 1947, the year the  Truman Doctrine  (a  U.S. foreign policy  pledgi...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarrare   Tarrare (c. 1772 – 1798), sometimes spelled Tarare, was a French showman and soldier, noted for his unusual eating habits. Able to eat vast amounts of meat, he was constantly hungry; his parents could not provide for him, and he was turned out of the family home as a teenager. He traveled France in the company of a band of thieves and prostitutes, before bec...

John Romulus Brinkley  (later  John Richard Brinkley ; July 8, 1885 – May 26, 1942) was an American who fraudulently claimed to be a  medical doctor  (he had no legitimate medical education and bought his medical degree from a " diploma mill ") who became known as the "goat-gland doctor" after he achieved national fame, international notoriety and great wealth through the  xenotransplantation  of ...

Elizabeth Cochran Seaman [1]  (May 5, 1864 [2]  – January 27, 1922), better known by her pen name  Nellie Bly , was an American journalist who was widely known for her record-breaking  trip around the world  in 72 days, in emulation of  Jules Verne 's fictional character  Phileas Fogg , and an  exposé  in which she worked undercover to report on a mental institution from within. [3]  She was a pio...

The  cobra effect  occurs when an attempted solution to a problem makes the problem worse, [1] [2]  as a type of  unintended consequence . The term is used to illustrate the causes of incorrect stimulation in economy and politics. [2] --- Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you'd like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreon page here .  Be sure...

The  Oak Island mystery  refers to various stories of buried treasure and unexplained objects on  Oak Island ,  Nova Scotia , Canada. --- Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you'd like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreon page here .  Be sure to check our website for more details.

Marie Skłodowska Curie  ( / ˈ k j ʊr i ,  k j ʊ ˈ r iː / ; [2]   French:  [kyʁi] ;  Polish:  [kʲiˈri] ; 7 November 1867 – 4 July 1934; born  Maria Salomea Skłodowska ;  [ˈmarja salɔˈmɛa skwɔˈdɔfska] ) was a  Polish and naturalized-French   physicist  and  chemist  who conducted pioneering research on  radioactivity . She was the  first woman to win a Nobel Prize , the first person and only woman t...