Seven Continents Seven Marathons
26. British explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes has completed seven marathons in seven straight days across seven continents. He did so after a heart attack and a bypass surgery. He has also cut off his own frostbitten fingers with a power tool, found the lost city of Ubar, and climbed Everest in his 60s.
27. In World War II, American soldier John R. Fox was killed after he intentionally called an artillery strike onto himself. After he saw German troops pushing over his unit’s position, the strike held the enemy off long enough for other American forces to mount a counterattack.
28. In 2006, a man in Portland, Oregon hired a hitman to murder his 51-year-old wife. When his wife Susan Kuhnhausen, an overweight ER nurse, was faced in her home by a hitman holding a crab hammer, she fought with him, got her hands around his neck, and told him, “Tell me who sent you here and I will call you a fu*king ambulance!”, before choking him to death.
29. After Olga of Kiev’s husband was murdered, she pursued the people responsible and not only destroyed their entire families through merciless killings, but also wiped out their city by setting the whole city on fire with pigeons and sparrows.
30. During World War 2, a Newfoundland dog named Gander held off two Japanese ambushes. When they returned again, this time with a grenade, Gander grabbed it and ran back at them, killing more Japanese, saving his wounded team, dying in heroic fashion, and earning a medal after his death.
31. In the 1950s, after the Canadian government compelled the Inuit to move into settlements, an elderly Eskimo wanted to get away from the government settlement. When his family removed all of his tools to make him stay in the settlement, he fashioned a knife from his own feces and frozen spit, used it to kill a dog, and then used the dog’s ribs and organs to build a sled. He fastened his sled to other dogs and rode away.
32. In 1971, a high school student named Juliane Koepcke was pulled out of an airplane after it was hit by lightning. She dropped 3.2 kilometers to the ground while still strapped to her chair and survived, then had to make a 9-day journey to the closest civilization. She was the only person who survived the crash.
33. In 1988, 2.5-year-old Michelle Funk fell into a freezing creek and remained underwater for 66 minutes. By the time rescuers reached her, she had no pulse and was not breathing. Three hours later, her blood was rewarmed. Once it reached 71 degrees Fahrenheit, she revived and is still alive today.
34. Sergeant Stubby was a stray dog discovered during military training in 1917. He fought with the 102nd Infantry Regiment in World War 1. Because he could detect mustard gas from far away, he repeatedly saved his regiment from sudden mustard gas attacks, located and comforted the wounded, and once seized a German spy by the seat of his pants, keeping hold of him until American soldiers arrived. He remains the only dog promoted to sergeant through combat in World War 1.
35. Gordon Ramsay almost died in 2008 after falling 85 meters down a cliff in Iceland into the icy water below. In 2011, while he was investigating shark fin trading in Costa Rica, he was threatened at gunpoint and doused with gasoline.
Bagpipes Through the Battle
36. During the Allied invasion of Normandy, a Scottish piper named Bill Millin played his bagpipes while walking along the beach as the slaughter unfolded around him. Later, he asked the captured German soldiers why they had not fired at him. They replied that they believed he was on a suicide mission and was plainly insane.
37. After Genghis Khan sent a merchant caravan to the Khwarazmian Empire, the ruler of one city confiscated it and had the traders killed. Genghis Khan answered by attacking the empire with 200,000 men and executing the governor by pouring molten silver into his eyes and mouth. He also diverted a river through the Khwarezmid emperor’s birthplace, removing it from the map.
38. Theodore Roosevelt Jr., the son of Teddy Roosevelt, received the Medal of Honor for leading the first wave of American soldiers assaulting Utah Beach on D-Day. He had volunteered for the duty and needed a cane because of injuries he suffered in World War I and a heart condition. At 56, he was the oldest man in the first wave.
39. Faced with more than 1,000 North Vietnamese Army troops, Roy R. Benavidez flew into a firefight to rescue 12 Special Forces soldiers armed with only a knife. He was hit several times and was thought to be dead until he spat in the face of the medic trying to place him in a body bag. Over the six-hour battle, he survived 37 separate bayonet, bullet, and shrapnel wounds.
40. In 1956, as a drunken bet, Thomas Fitzpatrick stole a small airplane from New Jersey and landed it perfectly on a narrow Manhattan street in front of the bar where he had been drinking. Then, two years later, he repeated it after a man doubted that he had done it the first time.
41. In 1939, Nicholas Winton, a stockbroker, brought 669 Jewish children from Czechoslovakia to England just before the Second World War, saving their lives. He would not accept credit for what he did until his wife discovered a scrapbook of the children he had rescued and showed it to the BBC. He died in 2015 at 106 years old.
42. Miyamoto Musashi was a Japanese swordsman from the 17th century. He had so much confidence in his own skill with a sword that he used a wooden one no matter what weapon his opponent carried. He arrived late to two duels and beat both enemies. In the following duel, he showed up early and attacked the group that had gathered to ambush him. He is also said to have killed an opponent with a sword that legend says he made from an oar.
43. Simo Hayha, also known as The White Death, was a Finnish sniper who stood 5’3″ tall. In 1940, he recorded 505 confirmed Soviet kills over just 3 months, using a rifle without a magnifying scope in temperatures that often fell below -40°Fahrenheit. He was shot in the face six days before a treaty was signed, but he survived and lived to be 96. Before the war, he was not a soldier at all, but a farmer.
44. In 1983, Cliff Young, a 61-year-old Australian potato farmer, entered a 544-mile ultramarathon and won, setting a new record by nearly 2 days. He had no official training and outran sponsored young athletes because, unlike them, he never stopped to sleep. He said the race “wasn’t easy.”
45. Jack Churchill is the only man confirmed to have made a Longbow kill in World War 2. He carried a longbow, a broadsword, and bagpipes. He played the pipes before battles and survived the war. He is also remembered for the motto “any officer who goes into action without his sword is improperly dressed.”
Hemingway Survived Many Perils
46. During his life, Ernest Hemingway lived through anthrax, malaria, pneumonia, dysentery, skin cancer, hepatitis, anemia, diabetes, high blood pressure, two airplane crashes, a ruptured kidney, a ruptured spleen, a ruptured liver, a crushed vertebra, and a fractured skull. On one occasion, after his plane caught fire on the runway and the door would not open, he used his head like a battering ram, struck the door twice, and escaped.
47. In 1943, an Australian soldier called Leslie Charles Allen, despite being wounded, carried 12 American casualties to safety by himself while under heavy fire at Mt. Tambu. He earned the nickname “Bull” because, in Australian Rules Football with the battalion, he charged through the opposition.
48. While serving in the army, Mr. T was assigned the task of cutting down trees. The sergeant did not specify how many. In 3 1/2 hours, he felled 70 trees before a stunned major overruled the sergeant and told him to stop.
49. In the 1300s, a Frenchwoman named Jeanne de Clisson turned to piracy to avenge her husband’s death, after he was beheaded for treason. She sold her family land to purchase three ships and painted them black with red sails. For the following 13 years, she carried out a pirate campaign against King Philip VI’s ships and personally beheaded the French nobles she took prisoner with an ax.
50. In 1976, Armenian finswimmer Shavarsh Karapetyan was finishing a 12-mile run when he heard a bus crash into the water. He dove 33 feet down and rescued 20 people, one at a time. He is an 11-time World Record holder, 17-time World Champion, 13-time European Champion, and 7-time USSR Champion. About 10 years later, he entered a burning hospital to save more people.
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