Andres Serrano

General Tomoyuki Yamashita

Parthian-era bronze statue believed by some scholars to represent General Surena.

Zimbabwean banknotes ranging from 10 dollars to 100 billion dollars printed within a one-year period. The magnitude of the currency scalars signifies the extent of the hyperinflation.

Serrano sank a plastic crucifix in a tank of his own urine, photographed it glowing amber, and received a $15,000 National Endowment for the Arts grant. Congress spent months trying to defund the NEA.

Yamashita's gold

Rogelio Roxas claimed to have found General Yamashita's buried hoard and showed a golden Buddha to prove it; he was then arrested, tortured, and died in custody. The gold has never appeared.

Alberobello

Apulian peasants built conical limestone roofs with no mortar so they could be legally dismantled within hours when tax inspectors approached. The roofs reassembled the same day. The Bourbon inspectors kept coming.

Surena

Surena annihilated seven Roman legions at Carrhae in 53 BC — 20,000 dead, 10,000 captured — then was executed by the Parthian king within the year, fame deemed more dangerous than Rome itself.

Thomas DeSimone

Tommy DeSimone — Joe Pesci's model for Tommy DeVito — was lured to what he believed was his formal mob induction in January 1979 and strangled the moment he walked through the door.

Dnepropetrovsk maniacs

In 2007, two teenagers in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine filmed themselves beating a homeless man to death with hammers and a pipe over several minutes. The video, called '3 Guys 1 Hammer,' leaked online and became one of the most viewed snuff films in history.

Hobby Lobby

A craft-store chain generating $7 billion annually tithed tens of millions to build a biblical museum in Washington D.C. — then watched federal agents seize 5,500 smuggled Iraqi antiquities from its own collection.

Dolly Parton

Dolly Parton quietly donated $1 million to Vanderbilt University's COVID research — helping fund the Moderna vaccine — then turned down a Tennessee statue in her own honor because she felt she hadn't "earned that right yet."

Hyperinflation in Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe's central bank printed a one-hundred-trillion-dollar note in January 2009 — worth roughly $0.40 at issue. Three months later the currency was abandoned entirely. The note now sells for $20 on eBay.