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 YES, WE KNOW THE STORY OF THE loving POLISH WWII BEARThank you. ----------------------------------- I love history, I love random facts, I love just sperging through wikipedia. You know what it's like to read stuff on wikipedia though, you start with an interesting topic and a few hours and numerous clicks later you end up at a weird article that you think is totally made up. Take for example the article about the franco-prussian war of 1870, wich brought me to Strasbourg which brought me to this article: Dancing_Plague_of_1518 Yes, you didn't misread that, the dancing plague of 1518. quote:The Dancing Plague (or Dance Epidemic) of 1518 was a case of dancing mania that occurred in Strasbourg, France (then part of the Holy Roman Empire) in July 1518. Numerous people took to dancing for days without rest, and, over the period of about one month, some of the people died from heart attack, stroke, or exhaustion. Now, I don't know about you, but I've never heard of that before and at first I thought this has to be made up, but it looks legit. What other strange but true historical events have you found through wikipedia or whatever that you couldn't believe really happened?
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Jan 18, 2011 21:28
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I'M A MANNNIIACC MAAAANNNIAAAC ON THE FLOOOOR, AND I'M DANCIN LIKE I'VE NEVER DANCED BEFORE edit: i'm sure that's how it started.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:30
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One of my favorites is the molasses flood in Boston. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disaster Can you imagine molasses moving through a major city at 35 MPH? Enough molasses to kill 21 people? I can't even conceive of what that much molasses would look like. That's crazy, and if I hadn't seen it sourced in multiple reputable histories of Boston I'd never have believed it. I haven't used the expression "slow as molasses" in years because of reading about that.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:33
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Huh? Hasn't everyone heard of the boogie woogie fever?
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Jan 18, 2011 21:35
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I always like to remind people of this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655 Just occasionally acknowledging the fact that, yes, the United States did just happen to shoot down a civilian (Iranian) airliner back in the late 80's, but hey, no big deal or anything.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:36
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elwood posted:I love history, I love random facts, I love just sperging through wikipedia. You know what it's like to read stuff on wikipedia though, you start with an interesting topic and a few hours and numerous clicks later you end up at a weird article that you think is totally made up. Take for example the article about the franco-prussian war of 1870, wich brought me to Strasbourg which brought me to this article: That would be the first known case of doping the local well with a half ton of e.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:40
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Great idea for a thread  It doesn't fit in perfectly, but one thing I always found strange and remarkable is the phantom time hypothesis: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_time_hypothesis While some of us are amazed by the Dancing Plague or other events like that, there are a few that claim all that is made up and 300 years of human history actually never occured.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:42
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I Wish I Was posted:One of my favorites is the molasses flood in Boston. quote:The London Beer Flood occurred on October 17, 1814 in the parish of St. Giles, London, England. At the Meux and Company Brewery[1] on Tottenham Court Road,[1][2] a huge vat containing over 135,000 imperial gallons (610,000 L) of beer ruptured, causing other vats in the same building to succumb in a domino effect. As a result, more than 323,000 imperial gallons (1,470,000 L) of beer burst out and gushed into the streets. The wave of beer destroyed two homes and crumbled the wall of the Tavistock Arms Pub, trapping teenaged employee Eleanor Cooper under the rubble.[3]
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Jan 18, 2011 21:42
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Christmas truce of 1914 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_truce During the Great War in the days leading up to and including Christamas troops from both sides on the Western Front started easing hostilities and conversing from the trenches. There were christmas carols being sung, some people started venturing out into "No man's land" and there were joint burials. Gifts were even exchanged and there were rumours that football games even took place. After news broke in the papers the higher-up gave strict order that this sort of behaviour was treason and it was stopped. British and German troops hanging out.  Pretty crazy when you think about it. Must have taken some serious balls or a lot of liquor ration to be the first guy to get out of the trench and say hi.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:43
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I'm currently working through fifteenth-century legal cases in the cantonal archive at Zurich, and today I came across a case in which a man was executed for drowning for (among other things) making GBS threads in streams near the city 
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Jan 18, 2011 21:44
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The US government actually put some Native Alaskans into internment camps, in the 1940's. http://www.ww2f.com/war-pacific/24095-aleut-internment-aleut-restitution.html
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Jan 18, 2011 21:44
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In the same vein as the dancing plague: Tanganyika laughter epidemic The Tanganyika laughter epidemic of 1962 was an outbreak of mass hysteria, or Mass Psychogenic Illness (MPI), rumored to have occurred in or near the village of Kashasha on the western coast of Lake Victoria in the modern nation of Tanzania (formerly Tanganyika) near the border of Kenya. The laughter epidemic began on January 30, 1962, at a mission-run boarding school for girls in Kashasha. The laughter started with three girls and spread haphazardly throughout the school, affecting 95 of the 159 pupils, aged 12–18. Symptoms lasted from a few hours to 16 days in those affected.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:46
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Blistex posted:Christmas truce of 1914 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_truce
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Jan 18, 2011 21:47
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elwood posted:In the same vein as the dancing plague: The Wikipedia Article posted:The teaching staff were not affected but reported that students were unable to concentrate on their lessons. The school was forced to close down on March 18, 1962.
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Jan 18, 2011 21:50
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod The Cadaver Synod is the name commonly given to the posthumous ecclesiastical trial of Catholic Pope Formosus, held in the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome during January of 897. Before the proceedings the body of Formosus was exhumed and, according to some sources, seated on a throne while his successor, Pope Stephen (VI) VII, read the charges against him (of which Formosus was found guilty) and conducted the trial.  Click here for the full 702x531 image.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:06
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elwood posted:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oliver_cromwell#Death_and_posthumous_execution Similar thing happened to Oliver Cromwell - after he died and his son failed utterly to continue his legacy he was dug up, hung in chains, decapitated and thrown into a pit. Apparently this was the best way of saying "Do not gently caress with the King" back then.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:14
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elwood posted:[url]Before the proceedings the body of Formosus was exhumed and, according to some sources, seated on a throne while his successor, Pope Stephen (VI) VII, read the charges against him (of which Formosus was found guilty) and conducted the trial. That was a close call, they only cut off his fingers. I was afraid he would get the death sentence 
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Jan 18, 2011 22:18
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I really love Byzantine history and I think it's a shame that so few people in the West know about it. When I first saw images of the Paris Psalter, it blew my mind that this sort of art was being made in the 10th century. Also the Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602-628 has the awesome appellation "The Last War of Antiquity".
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Jan 18, 2011 22:19
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quote:On November 27, 1941, a group of young men gained national media attention when, brandishing hunting rifles for dramatic effect, they stopped traffic on U.S. Route 99 south of Yreka, and handed out copies of a Proclamation of Independence, stating that the state of Jefferson was in "patriotic rebellion against the States of California and Oregon" and would continue to "secede every Thursday until further notice." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_of_Jefferson quote:Downieville was vying to become the state capital of California along with fifteen other California communities in 1853 before the capital was moved to Benicia, and then shortly thereafter its current location in Sacramento. In July 1851 Downieville gained a distinction it may not have wanted when a mob lynched a Mexican woman, known as Juanita, for the murder of a white miner. It remains the only lynching of a female in California history. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downieville,_California Rumor has it, she wasn't "Mexican" but from Spain. Then again, there are so many rumors, myth and folklore in Downieville, it's hard to figure out what was what. My family only goes back 100 years in the area, so we don't know the real truth.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:25
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The mortgage crisis? The Internet bubble? The 1929 Wall Street crash? Pfff, that's nothing compared to TULIP MANIA.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:33
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Thomas Granger - hanged for " "buggery with a mare, a cowe, two goats, divers sheepe, two calves, and a turkey". First person hanged by the Pilgrims <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Granger>
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Jan 18, 2011 22:36
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Operation Paul Bunyan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axe_murder_incident Tensions rise between the two Koreas after a NK lieutenant flips the gently caress out over the trimming of one of Kim Il-Sung's trees; killing two American soldiers. America and South Korea decide to calm things down a bit with a massive show of force. quote:Pak again demanded that the tree trimming stop, and when Capt. Bonifas again turned his back on him, Pak removed his watch, carefully wrapped it in a handkerchief, placed it in his pocket, and then shouted "Kill them!" as he swung a karate chop to the back of Capt. Bonifas' neck. quote:In addition, a 64-man ROK special forces company accompanied them, armed with clubs and trained in Tae Kwon Do, supposedly without firearms. However, once they parked their trucks near the Bridge of No Return, they started throwing out the sandbags that lined the truck bottoms, and handing out M-16 rifles and M-79 grenade launchers that had been concealed below. Several of the special forces men also had Claymore mines strapped to their chests with the firing mechanism in their hands, and were shouting at the North Koreans to cross the bridge.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:36
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elwood posted:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod While on the case of weird papal stuff, the Banquet of Chestnuts is really pretty cool in the old Roman time orgy kind of way. Wikipedia posted:
Bolding mine for effect.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:38
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Battle of Karánsebes http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kar%C3%A1nsebes An Austrian army lost a battle against itself all because of an argument over alcohol and language barriers.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:38
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Dolphin posted:Similarly: I didn't know such delicious things were so dangerous in such a strange way. Imagine drowning in beer. "I said I wanted a cold one, but this is ridiculous!" Also, I thought it was Bear flood for a moment. I pictured a flood of bears roaring and mauling it's way through London.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:40
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A Dance Epidemic, you say?
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Jan 18, 2011 22:42
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Mr.Pibbleton posted:The US government actually put some Native Alaskans into internment camps, in the 1940's. http://www.ww2f.com/war-pacific/24095-aleut-internment-aleut-restitution.html Along the same lines, Japanese Canadians were rounded up and put into internment camps during WWII as well http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_Canadian_internment
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Jan 18, 2011 22:44
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This whole thread should be full of "I know I said I wanted [X], but this is ridiculous!"
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Jan 18, 2011 22:45
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I've always been a fan of the War of Jenkins' Ear. Dude comes into Parliament with his severed ear (well that's not 100%) saying that the Spanish cut it off and Britain goes to war with Spain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_Jenkins%27_Ear
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Jan 18, 2011 22:47
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drat, one of those threads where I'm gutted that it ends here.
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Jan 18, 2011 22:53
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_War The Pig War was a confrontation in 1859 between the United States and the British Empire over the boundary between the US and British North America. The specific area in dispute was the San Juan Islands, which lie between Vancouver Island and the North American mainland. The Pig War, so called because it was triggered by the shooting of a pig, is also called the Pig Episode, the Pig and Potato War, the San Juan Boundary Dispute or the Northwestern Boundary Dispute. The pig was the only casualty of the war, making the dispute otherwise bloodless.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:01
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FreudianSlippers posted:Battle of Karánsebes Hahahah, holy poo poo, this is like something out of a comedy. I mean, Austrian troops freaking out and shooting friendly Austrian soldiers because they thought they were Turkish soldiers, then the entire army reatreating from an non-existant enemy? An enemy that wasn't even there? Jesus H. Christ!
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Jan 18, 2011 23:02
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Not wacky and nowhere near as obscure as most of these, but the Wikipedia list of attacks on North America in WWII is always a fun read, just because you hardly ever hear about them.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:09
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The incident that made me major in US History in college, based on just how goofy history can be. Ever wonder how the Panama Canal came to be? Via an uprising, (US-funded, of course) that killed a Chinese guy and his donkey. That was it for casualties.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:10
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Flavor Bear posted:Not wacky and nowhere near as obscure as most of these, but the Wikipedia list of attacks on North America in WWII is always a fun read, just because you hardly ever hear about them. Germans land on Long Island with some bombs to blow some stuff up... "Dasch instead turned himself in to the FBI, providing them with a complete account of the planned mission, which led to the arrest of the entire team." You would think you'd send soldiers who felt a little more strongly about what they were doing.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:15
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Fantastic, Elwood!! I've been dying for someone to make a good, interesting history thread. I would have done so myself but I was a little... erm... frightened. Soon as I've cooked and eaten my Pizza, I'm going to get stuck into this thread! I hope I have a few things to add that might just interest and entertain some of you. Nice one, Elwood, you're a star, mate!
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Jan 18, 2011 23:15
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The Soccer War: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soccer_War . El Salvador and Honduras go to war in 1969 over a soccer game. I mean, they had other reasons too, but the timing is great.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:15
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Sombrerotron posted:The mortgage crisis? The Internet bubble? The 1929 Wall Street crash? Pfff, that's nothing compared to TULIP MANIA. I remember this from a history of finance course. It's funny how similar the circumstances are... But who could forget the Defenestration of Prague? Protestant mob chucks some unpopular Catholic nobles (and their secretary) out of a 70-foot window. They survive the encounter because they landed in a pile of poo poo. The secretary is later made a noble by the Holy Roman Emperor, with the title "Baron of Highfall."  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defenestrations_of_Prague (the second one) I'm also pretty sure "defenestrate" comes from the German word for window, fenster. De-window-ate.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:16
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/203137.stm Recent history is still history, right? I did not believe that this happened when I saw it on Wikipedia's "List of unusual deaths" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_deaths Link because you know you want it.
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Jan 18, 2011 23:17
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Thikskul posted:Huh? Hasn't everyone heard of the boogie woogie fever? I believe it happened some time around the 1600's. Here's an historically accurate portrayal. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7Nb4voFm30
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Jan 18, 2011 23:17
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