Despite being one of the richest countries in the world, England was also home to some of the most destitute neighborhoods, with 35 percent of Londoners living in poverty at the end of the 19th century.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, explorations into the jungles of South and Central America uncovered ancient ruins hidden under vegetation — revealing the rich history of the people who once lived there.

From 1917 to 1925, Dr. Harold Gillies performed more than 11,000 operations for over 5,000 wounded World War I veterans in Britain.

Once revered as the first woman in space, Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova has since become a contentious figure as she has fought to keep President Vladimir Putin in power.

The future Queen Elizabeth was barely a teenager when World War II threatened her nation, but she was determined to do what she could for her country — and she soon became the first female member of the royal family to enlist in the British Army.

For years, Mary Lumpkin was forced to bear her enslaver's children and help him run his jail, but when he died and left the property to her, she helped turn the prison into a school for Black students.

Despite experiencing history's longest case of hiccups which lasted from 1922 to 1990, Iowa farmer Charles Osborne managed to live a relatively normal life.

Richard and Mildred Loving were an interracial couple who married in 1958 when Virginia prohibited it. Their fight to remain lawfully wed soon became a historic court case.

As founder of the California-based Heaven's Gate cult, Marshall Applewhite and 38 of his followers died by suicide in March 1997 to ascend to an Earth-saving spaceship.

While Stede Bonnet is featured in the comedy series "Our Flag Means Death," the 18th-century Barbadian pirate lived a much wilder life than the show portrays.

Christa McAuliffe was supposed to be the first American civilian in space — but her story ended in tragedy when her space shuttle exploded in 1986.