1995 Tour de France

North American F-100 Super Sabre dropping napalm in a training exercise

The epitome of the Rohan Master's art is the " Lamentation of the Virgin " (f. 135, Pl. 57) from the Hours of the Cross. The grieving Virgin cannot be consoled by the Apostle John , who looks up in consternation at a saddened God.

1995 Tour de France

Fabio Casartelli died on Stage 15; the peloton rolled neutralized through Stage 16 the next morning, completing the course where he was killed — the race did not stop.

Napalm

Korea was the proving ground where napalm became a mass-casualty weapon. The U.S. dropped 32,357 tons on the peninsula. Villages burned at 1,000 °C. The formula perfected there was still in use in Vietnam.

Duke Cunningham

Randy 'Duke' Cunningham kept a handwritten 'bribe menu' on a sheet of congressional letterhead: a sliding scale of contract values against requested yacht upgrades, antique furniture, and cash — the most literal corruption document in U.S. congressional history.

Winchester Mystery House

Sarah Winchester built stairs that dead-end into ceilings, doors that open to 10-foot drops, and a séance room with one entrance and three exits — reportedly to confuse the ghosts of Winchester rifle victims.

Rohan Hours

In the Rohan Hours, painted around 1420, a skeletal dying man lies naked on bare ground while God leans down from the sky to address him directly — a private conversation between a mortal and the divine, held across a page smaller than a hardback book.

Anwar al-Awlaki

Anwar al-Awlaki, born in New Mexico, was placed on a presidential kill list, denied due process in U.S. courts, and killed by CIA drone in Yemen in September 2011. His lawyers were told they needed a license to represent him.

Mithridates VI Eupator

Mithridates VI ingested measured poisons daily for decades to build immunity, then waged 46 years of war against Rome. When he finally tried to poison himself at defeat, the doses failed. He had to beg a soldier to run him through.

Cerberus Capital Management

Cerberus Capital — named for the three-headed dog guarding the underworld — bought Chrysler from Daimler for $7.4 billion in 2007, then watched it go bankrupt in exactly 735 days. Hell kept the dog; taxpayers kept the bill.

Kaspar Hauser

A boy stumbled into Nuremberg in 1828 able to write one name — Kaspar Hauser — and say one sentence. He claimed a dungeon, a single jailer, and no sunlight, ever. He was stabbed to death five years later.