History is one of the most engaging and exciting subjects at school, students are given a chance
to learn about conflicts and social history and explore how those events impacted the
world we live in today.
However, there are some dark and creepy historical events that they don’t teach you in school.
5 - Vipeholm Experiments Sweden is listed as one of the happiest countries
in the world, with a high life expectancy, good healthcare and infrastructure, it’s
easy to see why Swedes are so happy.
But behind closed doors, Sweden is home to one of the scariest and darkest moments in
modern history.
Between 1945 and 1955 Sweden conducted what is known as the “Vipeholm Experiments”
that were sponsored by the sugar and the dental industries.
These experiments aimed to see what effect carbohydrates had on dental health and without
these studies, our current understanding of carbohydrates and sugars on dental health
would not be as large but these experiments have a dark side to them.
Initially, the experiment started in 1945 as vitamin trials with the Swedish Government
signing off on these.
However, two years into the trials, the medical staff conducting these tests changed them
to carbohydrate and sugar tests without informing the Swedish Government.
As far as the Government were concerned, the trials that happened between 1945 and 1955
were of vitamins.
The test subjects were given a high sugar diet, being fed large amounts of sweets every
day.
Some of these sweets had been specially formulated by manufacturers to stick to subjects' teeth
to gain maximum results, much to the detriment of the subjects.
Between 1947 and 1949, the experiment solely focused on a sugar-heavy diet and as a result,
50 of the 660 subjects had permanent tooth damage.
Some people’s teeth had been completely ruined and they had to be removed from the
test.
This creepy historical event wasn’t fully exposed until the early 2000s, with independent
bodies finding that the experiments had violated medical ethics.
The test subjects had not been made fully aware of the tests they were taking part in
and they had not consented to test sugar and its effect on dental health.
4 - The Radium Girls With the onset of the First World War, women
began playing a larger part in society.
As most of the men were away at war, women were left to keep things running smoothly
back home.
This was a great boost for the feminist and independence movements, however, behind the
scenes, there were still people willing to take advantage of the situation.
The story of the Radium Girls is one of the creepiest and scariest stories that has almost
been forgotten.
Between 1917 and 1926 the U.S Radium Corporation produced a new and innovative product, luminous
paint.
After extracting radium and processing it, they created a luminous paint that they called
“Undark”.
They used this new invention to paint details on watch faces and other products.
A 1921 poster advertising Undark reads “Manufacturers have been quick to recognise the value of
Undark.
They apply it to the dials of watches and clocks, to electric push buttons, to the buckles
of bedroom slippers, to house numbers, flashlights, compassess, autometres and many more.”
This brand new invention quickly took off, with consumers demanding that more and more
products be coated with Undark.
Little did they know that the product they were raving for would be the centre of one
of the scariest historical events that nobody talks about.
It has been estimated that at least 70 women were employed by U.S Radium Corporation to
handle the radium and perform other duties.
These women were not given the proper PPE and after a spate of mysterious deaths, an
investigation was opened by the coroner of Maryland County, Newark, New Jersey in the
late 1920s.
In that time, the U.S Radium Corporation hired around 4,000 women from working-class backgrounds
to work in their factories and paint watch faces with ‘Undark’.
For these women, it was a privilege as this job paid significantly more than other factory
jobs.
Things quickly took a dark turn for the women, those around them called them “ghost girls”
because when they finished their shift at the factory, they would glow in the dark.
Some women would even paint their teeth with ‘Undark’ before they went out dancing
to draw in the attention of men.
Little did the women know that they were coming into contact with a lethal substance.
In order to paint the fine details, the women were instructed to “lip, dip and paint”,
they would dip into the ‘Undark’, put the brush between their lips and make the
brush as thin as possible.
In the process, the women were swallowing pieces of the Radium paint, giving way to
one of the creepiest moments in history.
The alarm was raised after several women had fallen severely ill as a result of working
in the factory.
Women were reporting that their teeth had fallen out and that they had large growths
in their mouth and jawbone.
Sadly, several women did not survive the exposure to Radium and passed as a result.
Others who did survive were left with life-changing injuries, with one woman reporting that her
lower jaw had to be removed.
The U.S Radium Corporation denied any involvement in these incidents and attempted a full-scale
cover-up.
However, after more and more people began expressing their concern, they finally consulted
an expert who found that there was a link between the Radium based paint and the women's
injuries.
Despite this independent finding, the U.S Radium Corporation still tried to brush it
off and cover it up, a truly scary moment in history for all of those involved.
Thankfully, by 1927 the women who had been affected had sought the help of a lawyer and
after a lengthy battle, the case was settled out of court.
Whilst this wasn’t the verdict they had been hoping for, they had raised awareness
of Radium poisoning, forcing the scientific community to explore it further.
3 - Sanfrancisco Plague We’ve all heard of the Black Plague that
swept across Europe and Asia between 1346 and 1351 but did you know that the U.S had
its own outbreak that has largely been forgotten?
In early 1900 Wong Chut King died from a mysterious illness and an autopsy confirmed everyone's
worst fears, the Black Plague had finally reached American Soil.
The Black Plague swept through Europe and Asia for centuries, the disease would lay
dormant, only to attack large populations at any given time.
The first outbreak was in 1346 but for centuries after, the disease would come and go, making
a striking impact on human history.
There are three types of Plague, Bubonic, Septicemic and Pneumonic, with each type deadlier
than the last.
The Black Plague was an outbreak of Bubonic plague with symptoms of fever, chills, headache,
fatigue, muscle aches and Buboes that developed in the groin, armpit or neck.
These Buboes would become infected and cause the sufferer significant pain.
If these Buboes burst, they could transmit the illness.
The Black Plague came and went and by the turn of the 20th century, the world was faced
with yet another plague.
By this time, scientists had an idea of how this disease was spreading and we now know
that rodents were the cause of the transmission.
Ships travelling across the world, going port to port carried rodents that were infected
with the Yersinia pestis bacteria.
This was only transmitted to humans after they had been bitten by a flea that had fed
on an infected rodent and as the rodent problem was out of control on ships, the disease spread
quickly.
Scientists believe that the plague was brought to the U.S.A by ships carrying infected rodents
and by the end of 1900 the Black Plague had landed on American soil.
As a result, 280 people became infected in San Francisco with 172 fatalities.
Not wanting to affect their trade or scare the American people, officials did everything
they could to cover up the plague, allowing it to spread further as a result.
Marylin Chase of UC Berkeley said in her book ‘The Barbary Plague: The Black Death in
Victorian San Francisco’ “There was a very real threat that California’s $40 million
fresh produce industry would be lost.
With that in mind, the state actually appealed to and secured the collaboration of the surgeon
general of the United States to keep word of the disease silent.”
The state of California went into strict measures, forbidding anyone to talk about the epidemic
they were facing and constantly denying it to outsiders.
8 years later in 1908 they had finally eradicated every single rat and declared themselves ‘plague
free’.
This was undoubtedly a scary time in history for those who lived in California.
2 - Genghis Khan - CO2 levels The name Genghis Khan is known throughout
the world and conjures up images of fierce invading armies conquering distant lands.
Khan is known as the world’s most ferocious leader and in the 13th and 14th centuries,
he and his army were responsible for the deaths of 40 million people worldwide.
Whilst you might have learnt about Khan’s reign in school and how that changed the political
landscape, what they didn’t teach you is that his actions had huge environmental consequences.
Climate change and global warming are a hot topic right now with Governments and companies
pledging to do more to help combat it.
Our planet is showing signs of the impact that global warming is having, giving way
to some of the scariest moments in human history.
Genghis Khan will be remembered for his sprawling Mongolian empire but what most people don’t
know is that he was one of the ‘greenest’ leaders.
Despite his methods, Khan is responsible for the removal of 700 million tons of carbon
from the atmosphere and during the 13th and 14th centuries when he was active, this had
a huge impact on the planet.
This event allowed the land to recuperate, more trees began growing and absorbing carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere.
It is even believed that Genghis Khan is behind the first-ever man-made global cooling incident.
Scientists have estimated that 700 million tons of carbon dioxide is the same amount
that is made in one year by using petrol.
Khan’s reign certainly changed the landscape of Europe, but no one had anticipated that
he would have been the biggest eco-warrior.
1 - Magdalene Asylum Irish history is seldom taught in schools
outside of Ireland or the U.K and many people are unaware of the creepy historical events
that took place on the Emerald Isles.
Between 1837 and 1992 the Donnybrook laundry in Dublin, Ireland was home to thousands of
women who were kept against their will.
This wasn’t the only institution responsible for this scary time in history, Ireland had
numerous places that they called “The Magdalene Asylums.”
These laundries were set up by both Catholic and Protestant churches in Ireland for “fallen
women”.
To the outside world, these institutions claimed that they wanted to take in “fallen women”
and rehabilitate them and make them into upstanding members of society.
However, behind closed doors, things were very different.
Women found themselves placed in these institutions for not conforming to what the Church believed
to be ‘the ideal woman’.
Their perceived crimes ranged from being flirtatious to having relations outside of marriage and
the Church believed that they should be in charge of setting these women straight.
After being found guilty, the women would find themselves placed in the institution
for an unknown period, initially, their sentences may have been short, however, the laundries
were allowed to keep them for as long as they wanted.
If the nuns didn’t believe that the women had ‘redeemed’ themselves by the end of
their sentence, they were allowed to keep them there.
Historian Helen J. Self told History.com “Redemption might sometimes include a variety of coercive
measures, including shaven heads, institutional uniforms, bread and water diets, restricted
visiting, supervised correspondence and solitary confinement.”
The women were forced to redeem themselves through lace-making, needlework and doing
laundry which is where the ‘laundries’ name comes from.
These women worked for no pay and were stripped of their names, instead, they designated a
number.
It wasn’t until 1992 that the truth about these institutions was revealed and the Irish
Government officially closed the last institution in Donnybrook.