gnostekJohn Paul Getty III800%High profile ransom demandsJ. Paul Getty — then the world's richest man — refused his grandson's ransom until a severed ear arrived by post. He negotiated the $17 million demand down to $2.2 million, the maximum he could deduct on taxes.+ See More01Getty's grandson John Paul Getty III was 16 when kidnapped in Rome in July 1973.02The severed ear and a lock of hair arrived at a Rome newspaper six weeks into the standoff.03Getty Sr. lent his son the final ransom sum at 4% interest — repayment was contractually required.
gnostekGarry Turner4025%Craziest Guinness Book of World Record RecordholdersGarry Turner stretched his stomach skin 15.8 cm — nearly six inches — away from his body in a tent-like pull, caused by Ehlers-Danlos syndrome dissolving the collagen that holds skin down.+ See More01Ehlers-Danlos syndrome eliminated enough collagen that his skin detaches from fascia like loose fabric.02The 15.8 cm stretch was verified by Guinness in 1999 — the skin returned to position unaided.03He also stretched neck skin over his lower face, covering his mouth completely.
gnostek‹›1 / 3Yumen Pass400%Legends of the Ancient Silk RoadYumenguan — the Jade Gate — was a Han-dynasty fort at the Silk Road's western edge. Tang poets used it as shorthand for the world's end: cross it and you were gone from civilization itself.+ See More01Yumenguan was one of two garrison passes controlling movement out of China's northwest into the Tarim Basin desert.02Wang Zhihuan's poem 'Liangzhou Ci' fixed Yumenguan as a cultural symbol of loneliness in 100 characters written around 700 AD.03The fort's mudbrick ruins were excavated in the 20th century and still stand in Gansu, 90 kilometers from Dunhuang.
gnostek+8‹›1 / 15John Law (economist)600%Top economic collapsesA Scottish duelist who killed a man in 1694 talked his way into running France's entire money supply — then collapsed it. He fled Paris in a stolen carriage, died broke in Venice.+ See More01Law was convicted of murder in London in 1694 but escaped prison and reinvented himself as a monetary theorist.02His Banque Générale issued paper money backed by nothing; the resulting Mississippi Bubble wiped out France's middle class.03Louis XV personally granted Law French citizenship and the title Controller-General — the kingdom's highest financial office.
gnostekDaniel Drew1000%greatest investors of all timeDaniel Drew fed his cattle salt before driving them to market, then let them drink until bloated — inflating the weighed price. He applied the same trick to Erie Railroad stock certificates, flooding the market to crush rivals.+ See More01Drew's cattle-watering trick added hundreds of pounds per animal before the weighmaster's scale.02He printed $10 million in unauthorized Erie Railroad shares to defeat Cornelius Vanderbilt's takeover bid in 1868.03Drew died broke in 1879, his entire fortune lost in the panic he had helped engineer.
gnostek‹›1 / 5R. Budd Dwyer700%Disgraced PoliticiansTreasurer Budd Dwyer called a press conference, handed out envelopes to reporters, then pulled a .357 Magnum from a manila folder and fired it through the roof of his mouth — live, on Pennsylvania state television, January 22, 1987.+ See More01Dwyer distributed sealed envelopes to reporters moments before shooting — they contained a suicide note and an organ donor card.02The .357 Magnum was legally purchased; the footage aired uncut on several Pennsylvania news broadcasts before editors intervened.03He maintained innocence in a $300,000 bribery conviction until the moment he died — a later FBI informant corroborated his story.
gnostek‹›1 / 2Eddie Gaedel300%Sports gaffesOn August 19, 1951, Eddie Gaedel — 3 feet 7 inches tall — batted for the St. Louis Browns in a real AL game, wearing number 1/8. He drew a four-pitch walk and was pulled immediately.+ See More01Owner Bill Veeck hid Gaedel inside a papier-mâché birthday cake before wheeling him onto the field.02The American League president voided Gaedel's contract the very next morning.03Gaedel's strike zone was measured at 1.5 inches; pitcher Bob Cain laughed so hard he could barely throw.
gnostek‹›1 / 2Truth and Reconciliation Commission (South Africa)600%South African farm killingsSouth Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission granted amnesty to torturers who confessed on live television — perpetrators named their victims, described exact methods, then walked free while families watched from the gallery.+ See More01Over 7,000 amnesty applications were filed; only 1,512 were granted after public hearings.02Security policeman Jeffrey Benzien demonstrated his 'wet bag' suffocation technique on a survivor in the hearing room.03Victims' families received no veto over amnesty; the state's pardon was unconditional on full disclosure.
gnostek‹›1 / 6Rostam Farrokhzad1000%Greatest Persian generalsRostam Farrokhzad held the Sasanian line at Qadisiyyah for four days in 636 AD; legend gives his sister armor and a horse when his corpse reached her — the last cavalry charge of Persian antiquity.+ See More01The Battle of Qadisiyyah in 636 AD ended four days of fighting with Rostam's death and Sasanian collapse.02Persian legend records his sister, Gordafarid, donning armor and charging Arab lines upon hearing of his death.03His defeat ended 400 years of Sasanian rule and opened Persia permanently to Islamic conquest.