On July 9, 1594 on their first expedition to find a Northeast passage, Dutch navigator Willem Barentsz and his crew came across their first polar bear. Unfortunately for the crew, this bear encounter was the first of their many polar bear problems.
On this day, June 22, in 1884, the surviving men of the Greely Expedition were rescued from Cape Sabine. The USS Proteus in Lady Franklin Bay. In 1881 Adolphus Greely…
On this day, June 14, 1846, The Republic of California was established in the Bear Flag Revolt The Bear Flag Revolt Monument in Sonoma, California In the spring of 1846,…
On this day in 1876, the recently re-discovered and insanely valuable portrait of Lady Georgiana, duchess of Devonshire disappeared without a trace from a gallery in London. It would…
On this day in 1515 a magnificent beast arrived in Portugal from the far east, a nearly mythical creature unseen in Europe for a thousand years. This one rhinoceros lived a short life, but his…
On this day in 1671, a bold and daring attempt to steal the British crown jewels was narrowly thwarted, adding to a long list of bold, daring, and thwarted crimes perpetrated by one “Colonel” Thomas Blood.
In February 1928 Weird Tales magazine publishes "The Call of Cthulhu" and Lovecraft's most celebrated story narrowly escaped the scrap heap.
On this day in 1837 in Philadelphia, a mechanical marvel was revealed to conceal a hidden master.
On February 4, 1912, the “Flying Tailor” was killed after testing his parachute suit by leaping off the top of the Eiffel Tower.
On January 28, 1928: Forty-five years after the catastrophic eruption of Krakatoa that destroyed nearly two-thirds of the volcanic island and killed over 36,000 people, a new volcano rose from the sea to take its place. Locals called it Anak Krakatau – “Child of Krakatoa.”
