Hitler, Freud, Stalin, and the Rothschilds all walk into a bar. This isn’t the setup for a joke; this was the reality of 1913 in Vienna. That year the Austro-Hungarian Empire was one of the largest states in Europe. It was made up of many smaller ethnic groups that are now their own countries. In…
Author: Jon Lucas
Thousands of years ago, cave-dwelling humans huddled in fear around their fires not knowing what deadly animal lurked in the darkness. To our most ancient of ancestors, animals were things to eat or things that ate man. Thousands of years ago this law was broken when the first wolf was tamed and over the generations…
Depending on who is looking, the mysterious jungles of the Amazon inspire many different urges. The wise fear and respect the incredibly diverse biosphere. The curious enter its jungles with a sense of wonder and harbor hopes of discovery, while the greedy view the green tangle of dense forest as something to be destroyed and…
Cryptocurrencies are an emerging technology that seeks to replace our current financial system (as in, money that is backed by a nation-state). In the modern financial system of credit cards and online shopping, transactions involving money needs the approval of a bank or credit card to prove that the exchange of money has taken place.…
On November 11, 1918 — “the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” — an armistice took effect that ended the fighting of World War I in the air, land, and sea. Finally, the war was over. It had taken the lives of millions, and maimed millions more.…
During World War I, 20,000 dogs served for the British Army alone. They did so at great risk, working right on the front lines alongside their human counterparts. Thousands more were recruited by all the armies that took part in the great bloodbath of what eventually became known as the war to end all wars. They took…
Awhile ago, we told you about 10 Devastating Nuclear Events and Accidents. Included was the story of Stanislav Petrov, the man who single-handedly saved humanity from nuclear annihilation on September 26, 1983. In a very short time frame, the fate of the world was saved by Petrov’s quick thinking. History is littered with these singular world-changing events.…
Commemorative plaques, in some form or another, have existed for hundreds of years. In Europe the earliest form of plaques were thin pieces of brass mounted on walls called Monumental brass. They usually depicted a scene or person of historical significance. They started to emerge in the early 13th century, as they took up less…
A new annual tradition will start at the end of 2018. On New Year’s Day 2019, hundreds of thousands of movies, books, paintings, drawings, and musical scores will be stripped of their copyright and enter the public domain. For decades, American copyright laws have kept Intellectual Property (IP) from 1923 on under copyrighted, but starting…
World War I was a global battle that lasted from July 28, 1914, to November 11, 1918. Tens of millions of servicemen from over 30 countries fought on battlegrounds all over the world. Many methods of combat were pioneered in this bloodbath, which ended up killing 16 million people. Technology-wise, it was the first war…
When the world calendars turned over to the year 1800, most of Earth’s goods were taken to market by beasts of burden and the ocean’s shipping lines. In just a few decades, steam-powered trains crisscrossed the world with their metal rails. Until well after World War II, steam trains moved goods over land. From there,…
Humans think about having the potential to live forever, while at the same time thinking of most animal life as short and sweet. We’re pet owners, after all. Pets don’t live particularly long. In nature, every winter sees many animals die after mating, and continuing on their next generation. On the farms, our food is…
The need to breed and reproduce is hardwired into life’s DNA. Only those species that ensure the birth of the next generation continue on this Earth. Man’s technology has largely negated the need for large families, but some still strive to push the limits of human fertility, as you’ll soon see… 10. Secret Insemination of…
The very nature of our capitalist society is that, for our labors, we receive monetary compensation. However, some work is unpaid. A breakdown of this unpaid labor might show that most are in the form of internships, where a person provides their services for free with the understanding that they will get paid later. The…
World War I was a true world war. It was fought around the globe from German colonies in Africa to the disintegrating Ottoman Empire in the Middle East and throughout the oceans of the world. On the Eastern Front, a crumbling Russian Empire in the throes of revolution took huge numbers of losses. In just…
On December 17, 1903 the Wright Brothers made history with the first powered, controlled, and sustained heavier than air flight. Since then flying has gotten safer, but following Murphy’s Law, if something can go wrong, it will go wrong. Thousands of feet above the ground, when that something takes a turn for the worse it’s…
Traveling in Asia is out of this world. The culture is alien, and the food is far removed from what people eat in the west. And no, we’re not talking about fortune cookies (which were actually invented in San Francisco). And of course, there is so much more to Asia that’s incredible to explore. When you’re…
Language is always evolving, changing as our civilization changes. As populations move, local dialects mix, vocabularies blend, die off, or go viral and infect the mainstream. Before the Internet brought everyone online the biggest events to bring large numbers of different dialects styles to together was war. One hundred years ago the First World War…