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“How big your heart must be to do that… to open the door for someone who would remind him of all his pain.” Lea Heitfeld/The Washington Post A 95-year-old Holocaust survivor living in California currently resides with an unlikely roommate: a 31-year-old woman whose grandparents were Nazis. Berkeley resident Ben Stern, who survived the ghettos and concentration camps as a young man, has taken up residence with Lea Heitfeld, a German student whose grandparents were “active and unrepentant members of the Nazi Party,” The Washington Post reports, while the latter completes her studies at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley....

A number of myths surround Victorian-era sanitary engineer Thomas Crapper, namely that he invented the flush toilet and that the word “crap” comes from his name. Wikimedia CommonsThe London showrooms and sanitary equipment of Thomas Crapper helped eradicate the stigma that indoor toilets were unhygienic. When American servicemen were stationed overseas during World War I, they reportedly noticed the word “Crapper” embossed on the cistern of nearly every toilet. Their return to the States made “crapper” a blanket term for toilets in general, with many assuming that sanitary engineer Thomas Crapper was the man who invented the flush toilet — but was he really?...

Smallpox has had a devastating history, from ancient Egypt to its worldwide eradication about 35 years ago, but a mummified child recently found in a Lithuanian crypt is rewriting the virus’ storied past. Teeming with the remains of the virus, the mummified child had been between the ages of two and four, researchers estimate, before dying sometime between 1643 and 1665 from smallpox. A genetic analysis of the child’s remains, published Thursday in Current Biology by researchers from McMaster University Ancient DNA Center, suggests that smallpox is only a couple hundred years old, and not more than a millennia old as conventional theory had assumed....

Cornering the market in heroin and cocaine trafficking, Vito Rizzuto’s mafia family dominated Montreal until his death in December 2013. YouTubeVito Rizzuto inherited his empire from his father, Nicolo, who had married into the mob back in Sicily. Crime ran in Vito Rizzuto’s family. His grandfather on his mother’s side was a Mafia boss in Cattolica Eraclea, the small Sicilian village where Vito was born. In 1954, Vito’s father Nicolo moved the family to Montreal where he started his own crime syndicate after seizing control from the Cotroni crime family....

Ever since the end of World War II, allegations of Adolf Hitler’s Jewish ancestry via his paternal grandfather have been the subject of intense debate. Here’s what the actual evidence says. Wikimedia CommonsRumors of Adolf Hitler’s alleged Jewish ancestry have circulated since the end of World War II. As the dictator of Nazi Germany, Adolf Hitler led a murderous regime that massacred millions in Europe, including some six million Jews. As such, it came as a shock when Hitler’s own lawyer, Hans Frank, claimed before his execution in 1946 that the Nazi leader was secretly part Jewish....

By studying a pair of genetically identical twins, NASA discovered some of the strange things that happen when bodies experience zero-gravity. When Japanese astronaut Norishige Kanai sent his Twitter report back down to Earth after just three weeks in orbit, his tweet contained a lofty claim. “Today there is a serious report…” he said, sending his tweet from the International Space Station. “I had physical measurements since I got to space… [with] heights up to 9 centimeters!...

In her series I Fought The Law, Olivia Locher casts a humorous glance at the American legal system and its eccentricities. While the law is often equated with all things rational, every state has a couple laws on the books that belie just about any sort of logic. Photographer Olivia Locher has taken advantage of these odd pieces of legislation, imagining through film what criminals and illegal acts would look like if these laws were actually enforced....

Anthropologists initially declared that the skull, called ‘Greta,’ was 10,000 years old, but radiocarbon dating shows that it actually came from a woman who died between 1041 and 1163. David Adkins“Greta” was long assumed to be prehistoric but she’s actually medieval. For decades, “Greta” the skull has reigned as the “Eve of England.” Since her discovery in 1943, anthropologists have believed that she was at least 10,000 years old and one of the world’s oldest human female remains....

Made up of two stunningly intricate panels, this mosaic is the largest one found in London in half a century. Museum of London Archeology Archeologists work to uncover the newly-unearthed mosaic in central London. In the shadow of the iconic Shard in London, archeologists have come across an echo of the city’s ancient past. Right there in the heart of the city, they’ve unearthed a striking Roman mosaic which dates back to the late second or early third century....

These photos prove that Japanese cherry blossoms are one of the simplest and most beautiful blooms in the world. Nothing beats the simple beauty of a cherry blossom in full bloom. While most varieties of the tree do not produce fruit, their pinkish-white flowers are admired by people all across the world. In Japan, cherry blossoms represent the beauty and fragility of life, a symbolic notion that has existed for centuries, as seen in ancient Japanese paintings and mythology....

Rarely-seen photos of African kingdoms taken just before and after European colonialists launched a wave of terror that would change the continent forever. Like this gallery?Share it: Share Flipboard Email And if you liked this post, be sure to check out these popular posts: How The Ashanti Empire Became One Of The Most Powerful Kingdoms In Pre-Colonial Africa 24 Startling Photos That Explain Apartheid In South Africa 40 Photos Of The Million-Plus Forgotten Africans Forced To Fight In World War II...

Likely inspired by the now-extinct giant vampire bats that once flew over Central America, it’s no surprise that Camazotz was one of the most fearsome Maya deities. Wikimedia CommonsA sculpture of Camazotz in Museo Popol Vuh in Guatemala City. The ancient Maya had hundreds of deities that they believed oversaw humanity, established order, and even controlled life after death. Many of these gods were rather terrifying, but one of the scariest of them all was Camazotz....

These seven shocking FDA mistakes include dangerous prescription drugs that cost thousands upon thousands of lives. Image Source: Pinterest It is the job of our good friends at the US Food and Drug Administration to give the OK — or not — on what we put into our bodies. Unfortunately, their decision-making process has proven to be not as much of an exact science it should be. In fact, the FDA has made some pretty huge blunders that have ended in irreparable damage and even death....

Challenging our perceptions of art and space, Felice Varini’s anamorphic art is truly one of a kind. Source: Varini Art’s subjective nature grants it power, and Felice Varini’s unique perspective packs his work with a major punch. The Swiss artist who swapped the Alps for the Eiffel Tower has dedicated the last thirty years to inventing impressive illusions that challenge our perception of the space around us. Moving beyond the simplicity of two-dimensional shapes, Varini’s canvases are a little out of the ordinary, as he turns entire buildings into works of abstract architectural art....

Though rare, foreign accent syndrome can cause individuals to speak their native dialect one morning and one from across the globe the next day. Pixabay Living in occupied Norway during World War II was a tough situation for all of the country’s residents. It was particularly difficult for 30-year-old Astrid. When she tried to do something as simple as go shopping, people would hear her heavy German accent and refuse her service....

In these fifty macro photographs, insects become menacing monsters and snowflakes can be viewed in all their natural beauty. Source: Smashing Tips Much ado is made about portraiture of the world’s most glamorous, but some of the best photography out there captures the lives of those whose existence we can barely perceive. Macro photography captures ordinary objects — often insects and plants — with extraordinary detail. The resulting photographs reveal aspects that aren’t obvious upon first glance, transforming something as simple as a drop of water into a colorful kaleidoscope of color and depth....

“There is a frantic race to merchandise tinsel and trash under the guise of ‘modernism,’” Loewy once said. “I can claim to have made the daily life of the 20th Century more beautiful.” Like this gallery?Share it: Share Flipboard Email And if you liked this post, be sure to check out these popular posts: 1 of 41 2 of 41 3 of 41 4 of 41 5 of 41Subject: Plaster painted model of the Studebaker, South Bend Indiana....

Giant oarfish can grow to lengths of over 50 feet, but these sea-serpent-like creatures have only been seen alive a handful of times. You’d be forgiven for thinking oarfish are made up — the fever dream of an ambitious filmmaker or science-fiction author. With humongous eyes allowing them to navigate the deepest parts of the ocean and bodies that grow longer than a school bus, disbelief is a rather natural response....

When humans are under attack, our fight-or-flight reaction is triggered — and it turns out the same is true for plants too. UW-Madison/YouTubeThe fluorescent calcium wave shown in a plant after injury. New videos captured by researchers are changing the way that people look at plants. A study from the University of Wisconsin-Madison published on September 14 in Science revealed that when a plant is injured, they release a nervous system-like signal throughout their body, similar to the pain response found in humans and other animals....

Scientists discovered the new species while studying the lineage of giant tortoises on Madagascar. Artwork by Michal Roesser, photo by Massimo DelfinoIllustration depicting native tortoise species of the western Indian Ocean. Living species are those in color; extinct species are grayscale. The newly discovered species is on top, the third, in gray, from the right. Once upon a time, Madagascar was a hub for giant tortoises. Many species of these massive reptiles roamed the land, but in the modern world only a few of them remain....