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Gates of Hell: The real places said to be entrances to the underworld Hell, Hades, Guinee—the names are different but they all describe an underworld that many believe can be accessed through real gateways.
Religious teachings may vary, but a common concept embraced by many is that the souls of those who committed terrible acts in life will be forced to suffer in the afterlife. Hell, Hades, Guinee—the names are different but they all describe an underworld that many believe can be accessed from Earth through gateways across the globe. The Acheron, Greece The Acheron, prominently depicted in classical mythology, is an actual river that flows through northwest Greece and is also known as the River of Woe. The ancient Greeks believed there were several entrances into hades, one of which was at the ancient Greek temple of necromancy Necromanteion of Ephyra on the banks…
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9 effective tips on how to look taller in photos No photoshop required. Anyone can do this.
The rise and fall of Shia Labeouf’s He Will Not Divide Us art project RIP livestream. You will be missed.
This 1950s science kit for kids came with real uranium What’s even better than a nice refreshing huff of DDT? Giving children uranium to play with to their heart's desire, of course.
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The rise and fall of the Vanderbilts—America’s wealthiest family The Vanderbilts were arguably the most prominent family of the Gilded Age, but time has slowly eroded their fortune and legacy.
The Vanderbilts is an American family of Dutch origin who became the wealthiest and arguably the most prominent family of the Gilded Age. Their success began with the shipping and railroad empires of Cornelius Vanderbilt, and the family expanded into various other areas of industry and philanthropy. Cornelius Vanderbilt’s descendants went on to build grand mansions on Fifth Avenue in New York City; luxurious “summer cottages” in Newport, Rhode Island; the palatial Biltmore House in Asheville, North Carolina; and various other opulent homes. But time has slowly eroded their fortune and legacy. The Commodore The legendary wealth of the Vanderbilt family had its origins with Cornelius Vanderbilt. He left school…
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10 freaky animals with real super powers Many superheroes are based on things found in nature—for a reason.
Colonial Americans were pretty much always drunk The American Revolution was built on a foundation of booze, led by tavern addicted Founding Fathers who could drink any frat boy under the table.
The interview walk out—a video guide to storming out in style Nothing has the ability to make an interview more enduring in the minds of the public than it ending with the interviewee walking out.
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What the office was actually like in the Mad Men era What was work really like over half a century ago? My grandfather tells me it had more alcohol and blackmail than you might expect.
It’s not a long subway ride from my Upper East Side apartment I share with a college roommate to my office in Midtown Manhattan, but on lazier days, I’ll catch an Uber from my iPhone. I swipe in with my key card, take the elevator up to the 19th floor and walk just past the bar carts and beanbag to my desk. Every now and again, whilst sitting here in jeans, reading news about this unusual election, sending people to Mars and spontaneously combusting smartphones, I wonder what this scene would have looked like 50 years ago. Were things really like they appear in Mad Men? To find out, I…
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The caves and tunnels nobody can explain Ancient goblin caves, underground pyramid secrets, and even a preschool's Satanic underground. Let's go caving.
6 ways social media is turning us into monsters All I'm offering is the truth. Nothing more.
The (many) unsexy reasons you would never want to be a male pornstar Getting paid to have sex on camera with hot girls is wildly overrated, and we’ll tell you why.
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Jamming with Elvis and toking with Dylan: what it was really like to tour with The Beatles Author and journalist Ivor Davis saw Beatlemania spread from coast to coast while on the road with The Fab Four in the mid 60s.
Revisiting your past can be risky, damaging even. Dangerous to your mental health, as any shrink will attest. But the other evening I threw caution to the wind and journeyed back half a century. I wallowed in exhilarating nostalgia, enjoying every nanosecond of my sentimental trip back to a less complicated world. In the Summer of 1964 as a callow young America-based foreign correspondent for the London Daily Express, I jumped on a jet to San Francisco and was introduced to four lads from Liverpool who were about to embark on their first ever American tour. Yes. I’m talking about John, Paul, George and Ringo, — The Beatles — also callow…
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Meet the “Virtuous Pedophile” network protected by Twitter The "Minor-Attracted Persons" movement is led by a Canadian doctor who demands a "P" in "LGBT," and Twitter is accommodating them.
15 scientific ways picking up a book makes you a better man (and even gets you laid) Overall reading is on the rise, but quality is on the decline. Let science convince you reading a book is actually life-changing.
How to survive a tornado A closer look at these fearsome freaks of nature and what you can do to protect yourself if one touches down in your area.
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Why Hollywood gets World War II so wrong Hollywood liberals see World War II as the last morally unquestionable war but so often get their facts wrong.
While only 130 movies have been made about World War I, there have been 1,300 made about the World War II. Hollywood liberals see it as the last morally unquestionable war, and so are keen to return to it again and again, replete with its feel-good factor. Two of the most extraordinary episodes from WWII are to be released as new movies, which should fill historians and movie buffs with a mixture of delight and trepidation. The first is the daring killing of SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich in May 1942 on a hairpin bend on his daily journey to Prague Castle by the heroic Czech sergeants Jan Kubis and Jozef Gabcik.…
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10 ridiculously creepy child preachers Ten of the creepiest child preachers currently being groomed to lead congregations in years to come. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
A brief history of early internet amateur porn A look back at do-it-yourself exhibitionism in a time when only scientists and perverts bothered.
How gambling and laziness led to the creation of the sandwich The tale of how a Georgian era British statesman became one of the first food influencers ever.
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How one man lied about a cartoon to prove history is meaningless on the internet Everyone just believed. People started fondly remembering, and reviewing, episodes that don't exist.
Of all the great and terrible things about the internet, its ability to shape and rewrite reality might be the most dystopian. History is written by the victors, and every day it looks like the losers are humanity and meaning. In the Metal Gear Solid series, a collection of sinister artificial intelligences manipulate bulk information online to keep the world firmly under their control. A decade ago, I wrote some fan fiction that continues to distort the truth about a knock-off Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon. Everything you think you know about Street Sharks is a lie. Well, that depends on what you think you know about Street Sharks. Before…
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Bits to bullets: the dramatic story behind the 3D printed gun It's got it all—The story behind the world's first 3D printed gun reads like a movie script.
The best of ’80s action movie power ballads If they aren't about love, they at least feature giant choruses that'll have you pumping away in the gym at 254% efficiency.
‘Doop Doop’ and the other theories that explain pop hits (pretty well) Computers may soon write our hits from scratch. One algorithm can predict with 60% accuracy whether a song will be a Top 5 hit.
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How I survived a year of SHTF in 90s Bosnia No electricity, no food, no running water, no law. In a now legendary forum thread, a user named Selco tells preppers about his experiences and what he and his family did to stay alive.
In September of 2011, a user named selco joined the forums at SurvivalistBoards.com and posted “my shtf expirience-wartime,” a thread that would since become legendary in survivalist communities and beyond – in fact, you frequently see people reference it to this day in communities like 4chan and reddit. In it, Selco details his experience of living in a besieged Bosnian town of 50 to 60k people during the Bosnian War (1992-1995). The siege took away everything modern humans take for granted and tested with extreme brutality Selco’s and his community’s ability to survive. But what is so interesting about this war story is that it was told to a group…
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Colonial Americans were pretty much always drunk The American Revolution was built on a foundation of booze, led by tavern addicted Founding Fathers who could drink any frat boy under the table.
The penny-pinching bible: 500 frugal tips guaranteed to save a fortune Twitter's frugality guru presents ingenious life hacks that will set you on track to possibly retire in the future.
The websites stuck in time (and somehow still being served) Let's gawk at websites so old their html was written in Sanskrit—but are still functional and being served up by a server somewhere.
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A brief history of toilets Going to the bathroom used to be a lot weirder. And in some countries, it still is.
The next time you take a seat on your own private porcelain throne: be grateful. You have privacy, toilet paper, and the streets don’t reek of feces. Toilets have come a long way from their dirty, breezy, communal origins. Poop like an Egyptian The earliest humans in hunter-gatherer society would have just gone au naturale out in the woods. But once cities started becoming a thing, the elite needed to figure out a way to keep all that human waste out of their way. The ancient Egyptians were among the first to appoint designated pooping spots for the wealthy. They even concocted some of the world’s first toilet seats—these little…
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7 hilariously stupid self-defense systems that will get you killed dead As long as there’s an Internet, there’ll be people utterly incapable of defending themselves – especially against people saying “Buy this, it’ll totally help you defend yourself!”
Andrew Jackson’s 1400-pound block of cheese Jackson was a legend. And, at some point, he was gifted a humongous wheel of cheese. This is the story of that cheese,
The urban underground: Secrets under today’s modern cities Many cities have rich histories that date back millennia, and the source of that history lies right below the structures and streets that make their modern versions.
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How people used to download games from the radio Downloadable games are the format of the future, but they’re not a modern invention. Eager computer users were downloading wirelessly over 30 years ago.
It’s a Monday night in Bristol in July 1983. Your parents are downstairs watching Coronation Street while you skulk in your bedroom under the pretence of doing homework. In reality, you’re hunched over your cassette recorder, fingers hovering over the buttons in feverish anticipation. A quiver of excitement runs through you as a voice from the radio announces: “and now the moment you’ve all been waiting for…” There’s a satisfying clunk as you press down on play and record simultaneously, and moments later the room is filled with strange metallic squawks and crackles. “SCREEEEEEEEEEE…” You’re listening to the Datarama show on Radio West and partaking in the UK’s first attempt…
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The future of humanity depends on this secret society and their 200 million samurai They can raise 200 million samurai at will.
10 cryptid monsters that turned out to be hoaxes A lot of these are silly as hell, too.
8 incredibly bizarre postage stamp controversies You wouldn’t think that the little strips of paper your grandmother used to send you your birthday check could cause riots, but you would be wrong.
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10 reasons Valentine’s Day is evil Just show this to your significant other and maybe you won’t have to buy them anything.
Love is in the air and your paycheck is about to finance an evening of disappointment. Why, it must be Valentine’s Day! Just in case you’ve secretly been loathing the whole enterprise, don’t worry, we’ve got your back. Just show this to your significant other, and when they stop crying, maybe you won’t have to buy them anything. Dark origins: Lupercalia What would a holiday about love and relationships be without shadowy origins involving beating women into submission? Yes, those ancient Romans certainly had a way with sex and violence. Basically Lupercalia was a big naked pastoral festival that lasted from Feb 13-15, where everyone got trashed and banged. The…
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63 things you didn’t know about Arnold Schwarzenegger Did you know his Nazi father favored his older son because he believed his wife had cuckolded him?
The human wonders of America’s long lost sideshows The freak show lives on as reality shows, but the fantasy world dreamed up by PT Barnum lies as a relic in the depths of the American imagination.
The stories behind the 15 most haunted places in America If you don’t believe in the supernatural, you may just start now.
