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The gun the girl is showing is ArmaLite AR-18. It was obtained by the IRA from the US in the early 1970s and became an emotive symbol of the IRA armed campaign. The IRA fighters nicknamed this gun “the Widowmaker“. The AR-18 rifle was found to be very well suited to the IRA fighters’ purposes as its small size and folding stock meant that it was easy to conceal. Moreover, it was capable of rapid-fire and fired a high-velocity round which provided great “stopping power”....

What is likely the first human-carrying electric vehicle with its own power source was tested along a Paris street in April 1881 by French inventor Gustave Trouvé. In 1880 Trouvé improved the efficiency of a small electric motor developed by Siemens (from a design purchased from Johann Kravogl in 1867) and using the recently developed rechargeable battery, fitted it to an English James Starley tricycle, so inventing the world’s first electric vehicle....

Construction on the research facility that became known as Natick Army Labs began 50 years ago in 1962. After World War II, officials wanted a centralized Quartermaster Research and Development center to create modern equipment for its modern military. Since then, many technological breakthroughs here crept into civilian life. This is where the MOLLE, Interceptor body armor, bulletproof clothing, new protection shelters, ever-improving military warrior systems like the Land Warrior and Future Soldier systems, PALS gridding, and MREs were developed (if you don’t like modern MREs, just consider how much of an improvement over MCI C-rations they are)....

This seal was actually a seal to King Tut’s fifth shrine. The king was buried in a series of four sarcophagi, which were in turn kept inside a series of five shrines. This unbroken seal stayed 3,245 years untouched. The late discovery of Tut’s tomb resulted from the fact that it was covered by debris from that of Ramesses IV which was located directly above its entrance. While the outermost shrine of the youthful pharaoh had been opened not once but twice in ancient times, the doors of the second of the huge shrines of gilded wood containing the royal sarcophagus still carried the necropolis seal which indicated the pharaoh’s mummy was untouched, and intact....

Buildings boasted proud facades and balconies, linden trees lined the broad sidewalks, and an unusual number of privately-owned shops remained in business. But in 1985 the crumbling balconies were stripped away, and in 1987, with the soil poisoned by leaking gas lines, the last of the linden trees were felled. Feeling like the “final witness” to something that would soon be gone forever, Zimmermann went out onto the street with a large-format view camera....

The entranceway to the temple was built in such a way that on two days of the year, October 22 and February 22, sunlight shines into the inner sanctuary and lights up three statues seated on a bench, including one of the pharaoh. Historians think these dates mark his coronation and birth. In addition, Abu Simbel has a second, smaller, temple that may have been built for queen Nefertari. Its front includes two statues of the queen and four of the pharaoh, each about 33 feet (10 meters) in height....

After creating his version of the automobile in 1896, Ford moved workshops first to Mack Avenue and later to Piquette Avenue in Detroit. These first two factories were small-scale structures for limited car production. Only in 1913 at Ford’s third factory at Highland Park did mass production begin on a truly large scale. As shown in these rare photographs, Ford applied assembly line methods throughout the factory to all aspects of car production....

This region, full of factories and coal mines, contained resources the French and Belgians intended to use to make up for the unpaid reparations. German workers refused to co-operate with the French and Belgian armies and went on strike. The German government supported them. The French sent in their own workers and arrested the leaders of the German strikers and the German police. This led to violence on both sides....

Remaining loyal to the “Whites”, he was executed by the Bolshevik firing squad after the Russian Revolution, when Kyra was 7 months old. Her young mother never remarried, and they lived in poverty in Leningrad with her grandmother. They lost all the males of their family in the Russian Civil War that followed the revolution. Though the family was poor because it had no male provider, Kyra showed talent. She studied music at the Leningrad Academic Capella and performed with the Kirov Opera and Ballet Theatre....

Originally, it was proposed that two airships be constructed: one, R101, to be designed and constructed under the direction of the Air Ministry, and the other, R100, to be built by a private company under a fixed price contract. The R100, designed by Barnes Wallis, was the first to be finished in Howden, Yorkshire in 1929. The airframe was made of duralumin, an early aluminum alloy, and covered with a giant 5-acre fabric coating stitched together in pieces and stretched into place....

Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, affectionately known as “The Greatest Show on Earth,” holds a remarkable place in American entertainment history. These fascinating Kodachrome photographs were taken by Charles Weever Cushman in the 1940s. The foundations of the circus can be found in the pioneering efforts of several key individuals. Phineas Taylor Barnum, an entertainment visionary, established “P.T. Barnum’s Grand Traveling Museum, Menagerie, Caravan & Hippodrome” in 1871....

From the moment the Quints were born, they were subjected to awful living standards and were abused by the Provincial government for financial gains. But, why were the Dionne Quintuplets and their parents, Elzire and Oliva, manipulated into such a horrible fate? During an era that was struggling economically, the Ontario government took advantage of a very rare event to make short-term financial gains. The small Franco-Ontario hamlet of Corbeil, the birthplace of the Quintuplets, became a booming tourist attraction that generated massive crowds and huge sums of money....

This society exercised a ritual often called a “cannibal” ritual, and some debate has arisen as to whether the Kwakwaka’wakw do or do not practice ritual cannibalism, whether their “cannibalism” is purely symbolic, or literal. The Hamatsa initiate, almost always a young man at approximately age 25, is abducted by members of the Hamatsa society and kept in the forest in a secret location where he is instructed in the mysteries of the society....

It’s widely accepted that race originated in Europe in the early modern period. After that, it was exported to the rest of the world like many other aspects of European culture during the Age of Imperialism. Prior to the 1400s, the concept of race didn’t really exist and was created mostly by slave traders along the Mediterranean as a means of describing their captives to prospective buyers. Prior to this, the people were generally grouped according to their culture....

Both games have their origin in multiple varieties of football played in Britain in the mid-19th century, in which a football is kicked at a goal or kicked over a line, which in turn were based on the varieties of English public school football games. In the 1800s, American universities started playing against one another, though each practiced its own adapted style of football with distinct rules. The shared threads between each school’s “football” were mobs of players violently attempting to advance a ball down a field....

Designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and built by Gustave Eiffel, the statue was dismantled and shipped to the US in early 1885. The finished statue consisted of 350 individual pieces shipped to the US in 214 crates. On June 17, 1885, the French steamer Isère, laden with the Statue of Liberty, reached the New York port safely. New Yorkers displayed their newfound enthusiasm for the statue, as the French vessel arrived with the crates holding the disassembled statue on board....

Young Einstein knew what was important, it seems. Perhaps the legend is founded in the fact that the Swiss school system has a 6 as the best grade, and 1 as poorest, while the German is the other way round. In his certificate of qualification for university matriculation, the lessons which he was less interested in can easily be detected. But the average grade on his certificate was a 5, i....

The Bathysphere was made of steel and was designed to withstand the tremendous pressure of the deep sea. It was equipped with several instruments, including cameras, thermometers, depth gauges, and a telephone that allowed communication with the surface. The Bathysphere was lowered into the ocean using a cable and was used extensively in the 1930s to study the deep-sea environment. Although it has since been replaced by newer submersibles, the Bathysphere’s contribution to oceanography and deep-sea exploration is significant....

The world of geisha and maiko women has always been shrouded in mystery and fascination. These women, who have dedicated their lives to mastering the art of traditional Japanese entertainment, have been the subject of countless books, films, and artworks. However, very few have had the opportunity to see them as they were in the 19th century when the geisha culture was at its height. In this photo collection, we have gathered a series of stunning photographs that offer a glimpse into the lives of these remarkable women during this period....

Photographs can give us a window into the past like no other, and serve as witnesses to that which took place long ago and that might even look quite odd to our modern eyes. By the early 20th century, photography attracted upper middle-class enthusiasts who saw the camera as a new art medium, ready to take snapshots of the world that surrounded them, a world of new inventions, new professions, and new eccentricity....