50 Real-Life Stories That Are Nothing Short Of ‘Fascinating’

Scarlett had been severely burned in the process of pulling her kittens from the fire. Her eyes were blistered shut, her ears and paws burned, and her coat highly singed.

The majority of her facial hair had been burnt away. After saving the kittens she was seen to touch each of her kittens with her nose to ensure they were all there, as the blisters on her eyes kept her from being able to see them, and then she collapsed unconscious.

Scarlett and her kittens were then taken to a vet and were treated for injuries.

The weakest of the kittens, a white-coated, died of a virus a month after the fire. However, after three months of treatment and recovery, Scarlett and her surviving kittens were well enough to be adopted.

Scarlett died on October 11, 2008, while with her adoptive family in Brooklyn.

He's mastered the ability of echolocation by clicking his tongue and listening to the echoes.

He can ride his bike in traffic, recognize a building from as far away as 1000ft, differentiate specific kinds of cars. He is able to live a relatively normal life.

Kish and his organization have also taught a form of echolocation to at least 500 blind children around the world.

During the time of the 1993 Bombay bombings in March, Zanjeer helped avert at least three more attacks in Bombay, Mumbra, and Thane.

The first incident happened on 15 March 1993 when Zanjeer alerted his handlers to a scooter bomb on Dhanji Street that contained RDX explosives and gelatin sticks.

He was then called to the scene of ten unclaimed suitcases outside the Siddhivinayak Temple where the dog detected three Type 56 rifles, five 9-mm pistols, and 200 grenades marked "Arges 69".

Days later, Zanjeer investigated two suitcases at the Zaveri Bazaar that contained nine Type 56 rifles.

Over the course of his career he detected more than 2,329kg of explosives, 249 hand grenades, and 6406 rounds of live ammunition.

Zanjeer developed bone cancer and died in November 2000.

He suffered a fractured skull among other injuries.

The incident happened when his son fired a toy Nerf gun and chased after the bullet onto the balcony - only for him to slip and lose his footing.

Both Brad and his son made a full recovery.

He went back five times, saving the lives of 36 soldiers. When asked why he did what he did, he said: That's what you do for a brother.

The two developed such a bond that when the unit left, Nubs picked up the scent and walked 70 miles through Iraqi desert warzone to be with him.

Nubs' miraculous journey forced the Marine's hand, and Dennis and his fellow Marines unanimously decided to keep the animal, building a doghouse at the camp.

When two military police officers told Dennis the dog could not stay at the camp, he decided the only way to properly keep the animal was to get it to the United States.

Dennis' family and close friends helped raise $3,500 to fly the dog to San Diego.

The directors assumed this to be a joke and simply ignored it.

However, sometime later, they received another letter, in which the enigmatic author offered to meet them at an hour of their choosing inside the main gold vault.

According to the bank’s website, the directors were intrigued but considered it impossible for someone to break into the vault without their knowledge.

Nevertheless, they agreed to the meeting and gathered together one evening, inside the vault as agreed.

To their great surprise, at the appointed time, a noise was heard beneath the floorboards, and a man popped up underneath their feet.

He was a sewer worker who had been working on repairs close to the Bank of England site at Threadneedle Street.

During his routine inspection, he had discovered an old drain that led directly underneath the gold vault inside the bank itself.

After a quick stock take, they realized that the sewer worker had not taken anything from the vault, despite having multiple opportunities to do so.

As a reward for his honesty, the directors gifted him £800, a sum that equates to £80,000 in today’s money.

Since it was illegal to test his theory on humans, he drank the bacteria himself and developed ulcers within days.

He treated them with antibiotics and we on to win a Nobel prize in 2005.

The shaft was filled with cold water, but Koenig managed to keep the child's head above the surface for over 2 hours, saving his life.

One employee called Jodee Beery knocked it out of the park with sales and ended up winning the contest.

But instead of a car, she got a small package with a toy Yoda inside and
Hooters claimed the entire contest was only an April Fools’ joke.

A year later Berry and Gulf Coast Wings, Inc., the corporate owner of the restaurant, ended up with a settlement at court.

Berry cited breach of contract and fraudulent misrepresentation and walked out with an undisclosed sum of money in her pockets.

David Noll, her attorney, was quoted on saying that the amount of money the woman received would allow Jodee to “pick out whatever type of Toyota she wants.”

His actions flooded 14,000 acres of farmland, destroyed buildings, and closed a bridge. He was convicted of "intentionally causing a catastrophe" and is still in prison serving a life sentence.

In 2001, Dawnell Batista was suffering from kidney disease and was in need of a transplant.

Richard, her husband at the time, offered to donate one of his kidneys. The transplant was a success, and Dawnell's health improved significantly.

However, the couple's marriage began to deteriorate, and they eventually divorced in 2005.

During the divorce proceedings, Richard made the surprising demand that Dawnell return the kidney he had donated to her or pay $1.5M in compensation, arguing that it was a gift given in the expectation of love and companionship, which had not been fulfilled.

It was ruled that organs in the United States may not be bought or sold, and donating one is considered a gift.

Richard did not get his kidney back or any compensation.

On good days he averaged about five miles an hour along U.S. 18. But about four days into the trip, the engine failed on his mower in West Bend, 21 miles from where he had started in Laurens, Iowa.

Straight spent $250 replacing points, the condenser, plugs, the generator and the starter.

He made it to Charles City, 90 miles from West Bend, when he ran out of money in mid-July, and had to camp out until his next Social Security check arrived.

By Aug. 15, he had made it to within two miles of his brother's house near Blue River, but then his mower broke down again. A farmer helped him push it the rest of the way.

In total, the journey took six weeks, and he inspired the 1999 film ‘The Straight Story.’

On October 17, 1988, Jia Jia's father, known by his surname Mao, took the two-year-old boy out to play in their neighbourhood in the city of Xi'an.

Mr Mao then walked into a hotel to ask for a cup of water for the thirsty toddler, but when he returned, he realised his son had gone missing.

His mother then spent more than 32 years travelling across all of China, through 20 provinces and hundreds of towns looking for him.

During her quest, she helped reunite 4 different children with their families before eventually finding her own son.

It turns out Jia Jia had been sold to a family in Sichuan in south-western China for 6,000 yuan.

Since he knew lemon juice could be used as invisible ink, he was sure it would make his face invisible on the CCTV. He smiled at each camera he saw.

Later that night, the police arrested him.

When they showed him the CCTV footage, Wheeler stared in disbelief. He said to the officers "but I wore the juice."

Salem was initially jailed on a $25,000 bail for allegedly attacking a police officer who was arresting him on charges of shoplifting on November 21, 2014.

Prosecutors for the case, however, failed to land an indictment, and a judge ordered Salem's release on November 28, 2014, just one week after his arrest.

Salem, however, still had to pay two $1 bail charges for two unrelated tampering and mischief charges.

The only problem: Salem didn't know just $2 could set him free. He remained in the overcrowded prison until May 2015.

Despite no previous signs, he went to see a doctor due to the vividness of his dream.

The doctor booked him in for a CAT scan & discovered that Ruffalo did indeed have a brain tumor behind his ear, which was subsequently removed.

Ruffalo addressed the issue in 2011 with W magazine stating: “You just deal with it. You go on. I’m fine now, I only lost my hearing in one ear. I see it as kind of a gift in a weird way. Your priorities become very clear. My relationship to acting became very clear.”

She learned to scale trees, catch birds and rabbits with her bare hands, and lived as one of them until she was discovered by hunters.

In Sylacauga, Alabama in 1954, Ann Hodges was napping on her couch, when a softball-size hunk of black rock broke through the ceiling, bounced off her radio console, and hit her in the thigh, leaving a very large bruise.

A geologist working in the area was called to the scene and determined the object was a meteorite weighing 8.5 pounds and measuring seven inches in length.

Ann Elizabeth Hodges is the first documented case of a human struck by a meteorite.

The "fire” was part of a hallucination he was experiencing after taking mistakenly mixing his cough medicine with LSD.

On Sept. 19, 1863, during the battle of Chickamauga, a musket ball pierced him between the eyes, he fell backward and was left for dead on the battlefield.

He distinctly recalled his captain say, “It’s no use to remove poor Miller, for he is dead.”

Miller relayed his story and personal experiences in an interview he gave to a Joliet, Illinois, newspaper in 1911:

“At last, I became conscious and raised up in a sitting position. Then I began to feel my wound," Miller recalled. "I found my left eye out of its place and tried to place it back, but I had to move the crushed bone back as together as near together as I could first. Then I got the eye in its proper place. I then bandaged the eye the best I could with my bandana.”

Miller had been reported dead by his captain, and his name was printed in the newspapers among the killed. Two months later, friends and family finally received word from Miller that he was alive.

He received a pension from the government and could not work because of his wound. He married and had a son.

It has been standing for over 950 years, dating back to the reign of Edward the Confessor in the 1050s. The door was made from a single oak tree.

Fugate said it takes him approximately 6 to 8 months to walk across the U.S. averaging anywhere between 7 to 14 miles a day and resting for about two days at a time. Fugate's first walk was back in 2001.

During a bout of pleurisy in his 50s, he ordered his nurse to cover him from head to toe in the substance, and soon recovered.

He lived to be 96 and is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, New York City.