Secret war on malaria
As part of a secret government project begun in 1967, the Chinese scientist Tu Youyou discovered an ancient herbal remedy that would end up saving millions of lives.
Category: History
Human letters
In 1909 two suffragettes mailed themselves to the the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
Pope vs. khan
In 1245 CE a letter from Pope Innocent IV travelled 7000km to Güyük Khan (Genghis’ grandson) demanding peace. The letter back from the Great Khan was… not friendly.
Second human in orbit
Yuri Gagarin may have been the first person to orbit the Earth in space, but Gherman Titov was the first to orbit the Earth more than once, the first to pilot a spacecraft, and the first to throw up in space.
Binational island
Île des Faisans is part of France from February to July only. Isla de los Faisanes is part of Spain from August to January only. They’re the same island.
Law vs. tenement
The latter half of the 19th century saw an arms race between New York City legislators and the builders of slum-like tenements. The battleground: windows and fresh air.
Undisputed dog
Dogs diverged genetically from wolves between 20 and 40 millennia ago. But the first specimen that is indisputably a dog was found in a German quarry and dates back 14,200 years.
Phantom killer
From 2007 to 2009, German authorities searched for a female serial killer whose DNA had been found at six separate murder scenes. Just one problem: she didn’t exist.
The endless break
At a dance party in 1972 Bronx New York, DJ Kool Herc mixed the breaks from James Brown, British rock music, and a bongo band – and in doing so, laid the foundations of hip hop.
The Apostles of Linnaeus
Between 1746 and 1792, seventeen students of Carl Linnaeus set out across the globe to collect plant and animal samples for his new taxonomy. Seven of these apostles died on the trip, and one would betray Linnaeus.
Exploding lake
On August 21, 1986, seventeen hundred people who lived around Lake Nyos in Cameroon suffocated overnight – victims of an extremely rare and silent natural disaster.
There be dragons
The phrase “Here Be Dragons” actually appears only once on a historical map, on the early 16th century Hunt-Lenox Globe. And actual dragons live there.
Fascist jazz
Between 1941 and 1943 Germany broadcast propaganda jazz music with altered lyrics into Britain.
Locust extinction
In 1875, trillions (yes, trillions) of Rocky Mountain locusts swarmed over the western United States. Thirty years later, they were extinct.
Walking the Imperial Andes
The 40,000km-long Incan road system connected 12 million people, but it also supplied the Incan army with food from thousands of storage depots spread across the whole network.
First author
The first author whose name we know was Enheduanna. Daughter of Sargon the Great, she wrote religious hymns, so she can also lay claim to being the first named poet in history.
The Generalist Academy 