In 1295, Marco Polo returned to Venice, recounting his travels in Asia in The Travels of Marco Polo. Among his stories was that of the Assassins, a Muslim sect led by an “old man of the mountain” who supposedly drugged young followers with hashish and promised them paradise for loyalty. European imagination ran wild with these accounts.

On January 5, 1965, U.S. Army Sergeant Charles Robert Jenkins, fearing deployment to Vietnam, defected to North Korea by crossing the DMZ. He planned to seek asylum at the Soviet Embassy and eventually return to the U.S. in a prisoner swap. Instead, he was arrested and forced to live in North Korea for decades.

In 1938, Truus Wijsmuller, a Dutch resistance fighter, met with Nazi officer Adolf Eichmann in Vienna to negotiate the release of Jewish children. Eichmann mocked her request, but agreed to let her take 600 children out of Austria as a “test,” if she could do it on the Jewish Sabbath. Wijsmuller accepted the challenge.

Around 3000 B.C.E., during the First Dynasty, Egypt introduced the world’s earliest known taxation system. The state levied taxes on goods, like grain and textiles, to fund building projects and wars. Taxes were adjusted based on field productivity, using Nile flood levels as a measure.

On August 28, 2007, surfer Todd Endris was enjoying a day in Monterey Bay, California. Suddenly, a great white shark attacked him. The massive predator struck with force, tearing into his back and leg.

In 1929, archaeologists discovered evidence of an ancient culture near Clovis, New Mexico. These people, who lived around 13,000 years ago, are now known as the Clovis people. Their culture is identified by distinctive stone tools, including finely crafted spear points, known as Clovis points.

In 1995, Swedish adventurer Göran Kropp embarked on an extraordinary journey. He left his home in Sweden on a bicycle, with the goal of reaching the base of Mount Everest. Carrying all of his gear and provisions, Kropp pedaled through Europe and Asia, covering more than 8,000 miles on his own.

Henry Avery, born around 1659, was an English sailor who turned pirate in 1694. While serving as a first mate aboard the warship Charles II, Avery led a mutiny, taking control of the ship and renaming it Fancy. He and his crew set course for the Indian Ocean, seeking rich targets.

Rose Dugdale was born in 1941 to a wealthy British family, raised in privilege, and educated at Oxford University. Despite her upbringing, she became increasingly disillusioned with her aristocratic background and British politics, turning towards radical activism in the 1970s.

Josefina “Joey” Guerrero, born in Manila in 1917, was diagnosed with leprosy in her early 20s. During the Japanese occupation of the Philippines in World War II, she decided to use her condition to aid the resistance, volunteering as a spy and courier for the underground movement.