Sophiatown

The Severan Tondo , c. 199 AD tondo of the Severan family , with portraits of Septimius Severus , Julia Domna , and their sons Caracalla and Geta . The face of one of Severus' and Julia's sons has been erased; it may be Geta's, as a result…

Smoke plumes from a few of the Kuwaiti Oil Fires on April 7, 1991, as seen from Space Shuttle Atlantis during STS-37 .

Apartheid demolished Sophiatown — where Miriam Makeba performed and Trevor Huddleston preached — trucked out its Black residents at gunpoint in 1955, and renamed the suburb 'Triomf': Triumph.

Damnatio memoriae

Rome could condemn a man to nonexistence: his face chiseled off statues, his name gouged from inscriptions, his coins melted down. Domitian's name was erased from 31 separate official monuments after his death.

Bosco Ramos

Bosco, a black Labrador–rottweiler mix, was elected mayor of Sunol, California in 1981 over two human candidates — and held the role until his death in 1994, becoming the town's most beloved public figure.

Superconducting Super Collider

Congress approved a supercollider larger than the LHC, dug 23 km of tunnel under Waxahachie, Texas, then cancelled it in 1993 mid-bore — $2 billion already spent, hole still in the ground.

Kuwaiti oil fires

Retreating Iraqi forces torched 730 Kuwaiti oil wells in early 1991; the fires burned for eight months, turning noon into black night across hundreds of miles. Red Adair's crews took until November to kill the last flame.

Shizuya Hayashi

Shizuya Hayashi killed 19 enemy soldiers in a single engagement in Italy, 1945, armed with a rifle and grenades. The Army awarded him a Distinguished Service Cross. The Medal of Honor took 55 more years and a congressional mandate.

St Nazaire Raid

Commandos drank and fought ashore for hours not knowing the HMS Campbeltown packed five tons of delayed explosive beneath their feet. When it detonated, 40 German officers were inspecting the hull.

Made man

To become a made man, a candidate pricks his trigger finger, bleeds onto a saint's card, and burns it in his cupped hands while swearing omertà — a rite older than the American republic.

Xoloitzcuintle

The Xoloitzcuintli — hairless, wrinkled, warm to the touch — was bred by Aztecs to escort dead souls through Mictlan's nine treacherous underworld levels. Owners were buried alongside them. The breed is over 3,500 years old.