Cracked Archive - History

6 WWI Fighter Pilots Whose Balls Deserve Their Own Monument
We usually think of fighter pilots as kick ass cowboys of the sky, living out our video game fantasies and handing out bitchin' nicknames all day long. But today's fighter pilots have nothing on the first of their kind -- the ones who appeared in the first world war.
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- By Johnny Lepper
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534
6 Presidential Secrets Your History Teacher Didn't Mention
We all have personal failures and weaknesses, but a president will work so hard at crafting a specific public persona that we're shocked every time one gets in a sticky situation. With that in mind, here are some of the stranger facts about American presidents that almost never get mentioned in history class.
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- By Ethan Lou
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815
6 Supervillains From History That Make The Joker Look Subtle
Real-life bad guys understand that dry, drawn-out political subterfuge is much cheaper and more effective than a clone army. Then, occasionally, some crackpot leaps straight off the pages into our world, with brazen, insane and often ridiculous plans for world domination that grant him comic book supervillain status.
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- By Jacopo della Quercia
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667
6 Real Historic Battles Decided by Divine Intervention
As it turns out, deus ex machina isn't strictly for fictional scenarios.
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- By Jacopo della Quercia
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824
The 6 Greatest War Heroes Who Got Screwed Out of History
We love us some war heroes. Unfortunately, petty people and circumstances often get in the way of honoring these individuals.
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- By Eric Yosomono
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901
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5 Famous Scientists Dismissed as Morons in Their Time
There have been brilliant rebels who put their own world-changing ideas on the line, only to end up like Doc Brown in his alternate timeline: humiliated, ridiculed, ignored and/or straight driven to insanity.
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- By Anthony Jurado, Nessa B Wilson
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580
5 Minor Screw-Ups That Created The Modern World
We continue our crusade to convince the world that all of the most important events in history turned on some kind of ridiculous accident.
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- By Jacopo della Quercia
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677
5 Real MacGyvers Who Won Battles With Improvised Weapons
If you've ever wondered if you could win a war by using reptiles instead of bullets and using the power of rock 'n' roll, then you're in good company.
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- By Phillip Parsons
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449
The 5 Most Terrifying Jobs in the History of War
The mind-bogglingly shitty jobs people have gotten stuck with during wartime.
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- By Joshua Sherman
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587
5 Things You Won't Believe Aren't In the Bible: Updated
As a predominantly Christian people, Westerners think they know the Bible pretty well. But not everybody realizes that many of the most iconic features of Christianity were never mentioned by the holy book or the church, but were actually pulled out of the ass of some poet or artist who wanted to make a few bucks out of it.
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- By Bjorn Karhunen, Jacopo della Quercia
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3756
The 5 Most Mind-Blowing Coincidences of All Time
The kind of coincidences you'd dismiss as bad writing if seen in a movie happen all of the time in real life.
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- By Jacopo della Quercia
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904
The 6 Most Insane Underdog Stories in the History of Battle
Real-world battles are rarely won by the ragtag team of underdogs. Tanks beat horses, guns beat spears. Though sometimes, the ewoks really do kick ass.
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- By Jacopo della Quercia
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941
5 Simple Things You Won't Believe Are Recent Inventions
We're impressed by new gizmos, sure, but we tend to forget that even the most obvious, basic concepts had to be invented at some point. And some of them were shockingly recent.
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- By Eric Yosomono
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1099
The 5 Most Ridiculous Assassination Plots Ever Attempted
Murder is no joke. Failed assassination attempts are.
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- By Jim Avery
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318
5 Fictional Stories You Were Taught in History Class
Forget about Stephanie Meyer or JK Rowling or Stephen King--at the end of the day, they just write stories and make billions of dollars. No, the writers who really deserve a pat on the back are the ones who wrote completely fictional stories that, over time, were remembered as actual history.
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- By Kathy Benjamin
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722