The Phenol conspiracy
In World War I, phenol was a key ingredient in aspirin, explosives, and phonograph records. German agents secretly redirected Thomas Edison’s excess phenol supply to prevent it being used for British bombs.
Category: Places
Gaelic Australian football
Gaelic football and Australian Rules football teams don’t have much international competition. So they decided to play each other instead.
Alligator centaur
El Hombre Caimán is a popular Colombian myth about a man who is half man, half alligator – the result of an accident while peeping on bathing women.
Secret volcano
In 1943 a new volcano arose in Hokkaido. The Japanese government managed to keep it a secret for several years.
First postcard
The oldest known postcard was sent by a practical joker to himself to embarrass the postal service.
Korean black ops
In 1968 a North Korean black ops assassination team got within 100 metres of the South Korean president’s house. South Korea formed a team of petty criminals and teenagers to return the favour, but after three years of training they mutinied.
The Library Cave
On June 25, 1900, tens of thousands of important historical manuscripts were found in a secret room within the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas in Dunhuang, China, where they had been hidden for nearly a millennium.
African free trade
At the start of this year the largest free trade agreement in the world came into effect, with the goal of connecting the entire African continent.
First vanishing point
Masaccio’s Holy Trinity is possibly the earliest surviving work of art to use a single vanishing point. His work and that of Brunelleschi triggered a Renaissance explosion of mathematical perspective in art.
First vanishing point
Masaccio’s Holy Trinity is possibly the earliest surviving work of art to use a single vanishing point. His work and that of Brunelleschi triggered a Renaissance explosion of mathematical perspective in art.
Under Beijing
Underneath Beijing is a vast network of tunnels built during the Cold War to shelter three million people during a nuclear attack.
Tank vs. Toyota
In 1987 the army of Chad won a war against a more powerful Libyan force. The Libyans had tanks and aircraft; Chad had a fleet of Toyota pickup trucks.
Reconstructed ancestor language
Proto-Indo-European is thought to be the ancestor language of English, Latin, Greek, French, Russian, Urdu, Sanskrit, Farsi, and dozens of others. But what did it sound like?
The thousand names of Vishnu
The Hindu hymn Vishnu Sahasranāma lists one thousand different names for the god Vishnu. A surprising amount are about his bellybutton.
Swimming across North America
It’s theoretically possible to swim across North America from the Pacific to the Atlantic, thanks to a strange creek in north-west Wyoming.
The same procedure as every year
Tonight millions of people in Germany, Sweden, Denmark, and Norway will watch an obscure British comedy routine from 1963. Dinner for One has inexplicably become perhaps the most repeated TV broadcast in history.
The Generalist Academy 