The Fighter Plane That Shot Itself Down
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 14, 2020
Fighter aviation has come a long way from the crude old days when pilots shot down their own planes as often as the enemy’s. In those early ...
Showing posts with the label Featured
The Buried Village of Te Wairoa
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 10, 2020
Until the late 19th century, the shores of Rotomahana, in northern New Zealand, were adorned by one of the most spectacular travertine terra...
The Fake Dome of The Church of St. Ignatius
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 10, 2020
One of Rome’s lesser-known attractions, the Church of St. Ignatius of Loyola ( Chiesa di Sant'Ignazio di Loyola in Italian), lies just ...
Saint Guinefort: The Holy Greyhound
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 8, 2020
Around the second half of the 13th century, a Dominican friar known as Stephen of Bourbon, began travelling the width and breadth of souther...
Sunomata Castle: The Castle That Was Built on a Single Night
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 2, 2020
Sunomata Castle stands at the confluence of the Sai and Nagara rivers, in the city of Ōgaki in Gifu Prefecture. It’s a typical Japanese cast...
The Yukon Square Inch Land Rush of 1955
Kaushik Patowary
Dec 1, 2020
Marketers give away freebies all the time to generate buzz and promote their products. Usually these freebies are cheap trinkets like toys, ...
Hostile Façades
Kaushik Patowary
Nov 27, 2020
The old city of Segovia, about 90 km north of Madrid, is best known for its aqueduct , but this historic city is full of architectural curio...
The Great Glass Slab at Beth Shearim
Kaushik Patowary
Nov 26, 2020
In a cave adjacent to an ancient cemetery near Beit She'arim, an old Jewish town in northern Israel, there lies a huge slab of glass app...
The Ancient Chinese Earthquake Detector That’s Puzzling Modern Researchers
Kaushik Patowary
Sep 6, 2019
In the year 132 CE, a brilliant Chinese astronomer, mathematician and engineer named Zhang Heng presented to the Han court an impressive inv...
Punkah: The Hand Operated Ceiling Fans of Colonial India
Kaushik Patowary
Sep 4, 2019
When the British first came to India, they had to adapt themselves to a lot of unfamiliar things, such as the climate, the blood sucking mos...
Monadnock Building: The Last Brick Skyscraper
Kaushik Patowary
Sep 2, 2019
In a city full of high-rises, a sixteen story skyscraper might not seem like much, but the Monadnock Building standing in the south Loop are...
Letters Q, W, And X Were Once Illegal in Turkey
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 28, 2019
An alternative spelling for taxi in Istanbul, Turkey. Photo credit: Jürgen Luger/Flickr In 1928, the Turkish government decided to change ...
Jack The Baboon Signalman
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 26, 2019
During the later part of the 19th century, travellers entering Uitenhage railway station, near Port Elizabeth, in South Africa, frequently ...
Mizuko Kuyo: The Japanese Ritual of Mourning The Unborn
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 21, 2019
Losing a child can be very painful, even if that child is yet to be born. In fact, many parents who experienced miscarriages feel the pain i...
The Clay Licks of Amazon Rainforest
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 20, 2019
Macaws and parrots of the Amazon rainforest have developed a particular taste for clay. They collect in large numbers on exposed river banks...
The Chrysler Air Raid Siren Was So Powerful it Could Induce Rain
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 19, 2019
The Chrysler Air Raid Siren was the size of a car. It measured twelve feet long and six feet high, and weighed an estimated 3 short tons. Th...
How Mediaeval Husbands Chastised Wives Who Talked Too Much
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 17, 2019
By putting a muzzle on them, of course. Known as Scold's bridle, these devices of torture and public humiliation were used mostly in En...
The Radioactive Energy Drink That Kills
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 16, 2019
Ebenezer Byers was a well known American socialite, son of industrialist Alexander Byers. In his youth Eben showed promising talent at sport...
Project Isabela: How Goats Helped Eliminate Goats From The Galapagos
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 15, 2019
The Galapagos Islands, off the west coast of Ecuador, are a treasure trove of unique ecological specimens. The islands’ extreme isolation an...
Tomb of Cyrus: The World’s Oldest Earthquake Resistant Structure
Kaushik Patowary
Aug 13, 2019
Natural calamites like floods, hurricanes, and earthquakes have always been considered “acts of god”, yet for centuries our ancestors have r...
