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The 50 salvaged cases of cognac brandy and 15 cases of herbal liqueur were originally intended for the aristocracy of Russia. Ocean XThe cargo was retrieved from the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Finland. The Swedish dive team Ocean X just recovered 900 bottles of century-old cognac and liqueur from the bottom of the Baltic Sea. The ship carrying this luxurious cargo was sunk by a German U-boat in 1917, leaving its contents lost in the ocean for more than 100 years....

The finding has led scientists to rethink the entire evolution of millipedes which dates back 100 million years. Leif Moritz99-million-year-old millipede fossilized in Burmese amber. The examination of a 99 million-year-old fossilized millipede trapped in amber is bringing scientists to utterly rethink the evolution of the entire millipede species. According to a study published in the journal ZooKeys, researchers realized that the perfectly preserved 8.2mm specimen, which was found in Myanmar, was an entirely new species of its own, given its peculiar morphology that differed greatly from existing millipede classifications....

Susan Kuhnhausen was not about to allow herself to be victimized. “Does she need an ambulance?” asked a 9-1-1 dispatcher during an emergency phone call on September 6, 2006. “No, she’s a nurse,” came the reply. “She says to call an ambulance for the guy. He may be dead.” YoutubeSusan and Mike Kuhnhausen in happier times. The voice on the end of that phone call was Susan Kuhnhausen’s neighbor. Susan Kuhnhausen had been an emergency room nurse for 30 years at Providence Portland Medical Center in Portland, Oregon, where nurses are trained regularly in self-defense....

Workers at the church found clay pots containing bone fragments with the names of three popes and four early Christian martyrs inscribed on their lids. Workers at the Church of Santa Maria must have been shocked when they lifted a large marble slab only to find a cache of previously undiscovered bones underneath. The Telegraph reports that earlier this week, workers were carrying out a routine restoration on the 1,000-year-old Church of Santa Maria in Cappella in the district of Trastevere, a medieval town on the banks of the Tiber River, when they discovered a number of clay pots with Latin inscriptions and bone fragments within....

From torture to witches to dismemberment, “Cat got your tongue” has origins more sinister than you ever imagined. Wikimedia Commons We hear the question “Cat got your tongue?” all the time when someone teases another person about being at a loss for words. As the surprising story behind this common phrase reveals, it turns out that rendering someone literally speechless is precisely where the question “Cat got your tongue?” comes from....

During World War I, STDs put 18,000 servicemen in the hospital every single day. Indeed, as lonely servicemen sent overseas often filled their spare time with female companionship, the likes of syphilis and gonorrhea ran wild thanks to poor sexual hygiene and almost no sexual education. Share Flipboard Email In the years that followed, as the Great Depression wore on and especially as World War II approached, the U.S. government sought to address this problem, which is why we have the propagandistic STD warning posters above....

In March 2011, the Los Zetas drug cartel brutally murdered 193 bus passengers — mostly Central American migrants — on Mexico’s “Highway of Death” in an event now known as the San Fernando Massacre. Jesus Gonzalez/AFP/Getty ImagesFollowing the 2011 San Fernando Massacre, Federal Highway 101 was colloquially dubbed “the highway of death” or “the devil’s road.” The 2011 San Fernando Massacre was both disturbing and, tragically, far from a one-off occurrence....

The mysterious band of Catholic warriors was said to be keepers of the Holy Grail — the cup of Christ that they purportedly found during the Crusades. Wikimedia CommonsInside the chapel of St. Stanislaus. Archaeologists have uncovered a hidden crypt beneath a Polish church that not only yielded secret tunnels and the remains of numerous Knights Templar — but might also be the resting place of the Holy Grail itself. As one of the most sought after historical items of all time, the discovery is unimaginable....

Bruce’s Beach was originally owned by Willa and Charles Bruce, who made the property into an oasis for Black residents, but local officials used a loophole to wrest the land away from them in 1924. Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times via Getty ImagesThis stretch of Manhattan Beach, called Bruce’s Beach, belonged to a Black family before the city took it. In the 1910s and 1920s, Black families in Los Angeles County frequently flocked to Bruce’s Beach, a chunk of Manhattan Beach owned by a Black couple named Willa and Charles Bruce....

Most beheadings in England were done without incident. Unfortunately for Mary, Queen of Scots, hers was not most. Wikimedia CommonsA 19th century illustration of Mary being led to her execution. Elizabethan England was a treacherous place. Although the nation experienced a golden age under the eponymous queen of the era, she was constantly faced with threats from France, Spain, and within her own borders. One of these threats was her first cousin once removed Mary, Queen of Scots....

Growing up in the White House, Tad Lincoln was a “notorious hellion,” a wide-eyed observer of the catastrophe of the Civil War, and the apple of his father’s eye. Library of CongressTad Lincoln was Abraham Lincoln’s youngest son. In the fall of 1860, seven-year-old Tad Lincoln learned that his father had been elected president. He would, alongside his parents and older brother, soon move from Springfield, Illinois to the White House in Washington D....

“I was really concerned there wasn’t a lot of media coverage and not a lot of people donating,” said Kaylen Ward of her bold campaign that raised a huge sum in mere days. Kaylen WardCalifornia-based model Kaylen Ward claims to have raised more than $700,000 to fight Australia’s fires. The bush fires that have continued to ravage Australia since October have become a global concern. At least 136 fires still burn across the country’s New South Wales territory and have spread to every state....

A team of researchers put forward a theory of “sudden body fluid vaporization” for the victims’ cause of death, and it is just as horrific as it sounds. Petrone et al/PLOS OneA child (left) and a young adult male (right) discovered in the chambers. It’s hard to imagine a more horrendous way to go than death by volcano, but a new study might have done just that. A group of researchers from the Frederico II University Hospital in Naples published in PLOS One last month the theory that some victims of the Mount Vesuvius eruption died after the extreme heat of the explosion caused their blood to boil and their skulls to consequently explode....

NASA’s Kepler space telescope captured the wild explosion of a unique kind of dying star, gaining insight into this mysterious sort of supernova. The death of an enormous star in the form of a supernova is one thing. It’s already the largest kind of explosion that takes place in all the cosmos. But sometimes, these interstellar explosions occur with so much power and pent-up kinetic energy that the whole process takes place in just a tenth of the normal time....

San Francisco has deployed a “poop patrol” to clean up the growing amount of feces on its sidewalks thanks to the homelessness epidemic. David McNew/Getty ImagesSan Francisco’s growing number of homeless people has caused a problem with public defectation. Number two is becoming San Francisco’s number one problem. The city has been experiencing a growing problem of public pooping on its streets by the local homeless population and it’s now becoming a major public health concern....

“To find copies of the Divan of great quality…is rare enough, but this is also signed by a famous calligrapher with beautiful quality illumination, and dedicated to a key figure in the Persian and Islamic arts of the book.” Sotheby’sThe philosophical and mystical work is filled with beautifully elaborate designs and in “magnificent” condition. One of the earliest copies of Divan — a historic work of poetry by world-renowned 14th-century Persian author Hafez — is officially set to be auctioned in April 2020....

Some scholars believe that the English nursery rhyme tells the story of a Viking attack, while others think it’s about human sacrifice. Library of CongressA group of school girls play the London Bridge game in 1898. Many of us are so familiar with the nursery rhyme “London Bridge is Falling Down” that we could sing it in our sleep. We remember playing the London Bridge game in the schoolyard with our friends, chanting the tune, and trying not to get caught as the “arch” fell down....

Kwame Ajamu spent 27 years locked away in a prison for a crime he didn’t commit. His expression following his exoneration is wrenching. Kwame Ajamu, right, formerly known as Ronnie Bridgeman, is comforted by attorney Terry Gilbert. At age 17, Ohio native Kwame Ajamu saw much of his future vanish. Ajamu, along with his brother and a friend, was convicted of murdering a money-order salesman in Cleveland. The boys, all of whom were under 21 at the time, were sentenced to death but later had their sentences commuted....

Viking grave uncovered under Norwegian house, stolen ancient tablet headed back to Iraq, cause of ancient megafauna extinction in Australia revealed. 1,000-Year-Old Viking Burial Ground Just Found Under Norwegian Couple’s Home Nordland CountyMariann Kristiansen stands near her torn-up floor under which the Viking artifacts were found. When tearing up their floor to install insulation, a couple in Norway started finding what they thought were bits of an old toy underneath. But soon enough, they realized that what they’d uncovered was actually much older than they ever could have imagined....

In 1983, Virginia Vallejo featured Pablo Escobar on her TV show and painted him as a man of the people. And for the next five years, she briefly enjoyed the spoils of life in the cartel. Wikimedia CommonsVirginia Vallejo as photographed in 1987, the year her affair with Pablo Escobar ended. In 1982, Virginia Vallejo was a national sensation in her home country of Colombia. The 33-year old socialite, journalist, and TV personality had just scored her own TV show after starring in a series of ads for Medias Di Lido pantyhose — which captivated the nation and brought her to the attention of none other than Pablo Escobar....