51 Fascinating, Heartbreaking And Cool Photos That Don’t Let Us Forget The Past (New Pics)

And many of them had family in the camps.

Impressive! Wished more world leaders took his example, and act upon it!

This is an amazing story. Look it up if you are new to it.

The Amerigo Vespucci was launched in 1931 and was built to resemble a 19th Century 74 gun warship. The photo was taken July 12th 1962 in the Mediterranean Sea. The Amerigo Vespucci is still in service in the Italian Navy. The aircraft carrier was decommissioned in 1988 after 40 years of service in the US navy.

WWII or WWI?? 🤔 Edit: just wanted to clarify, yes I knew this was WWI

I took a whole college course on the American war in Vietnam, taught by a professor whose dad served. She was also one of my favorite-ever teachers. Fascinating, brutal. Unnecessary blóodshed. Still a sore subject for many to this day. Ken Burns and his team did a great documentary series on it. And to really sell it to any history-fascinated goth weirdos like me: Trent Reznor did music for it 😹

Remember that this was staged (costumes, poses, etc) by a photographer who romanticized an earlier time.

The Brits did half, too: The British Royal Air Force's was "Operation Manna." The Germans had agreed to the aid and to not firing on the planes.

There are American service personnel in the current Disunited States who could honestly wear this in 2026.

Welp this has to be one of the most random pics of all time

He is a kid.

A particularly blood and brutal battle, particularly since the island wasn't strategically important once the air fields had been destroyed within the first few days. Over 20,000 combined casualties with nearly 100% casualty rate of the 1st Marine Division.

The Angels of Bataan were a group of 77 U.S. Army and Navy nurses stationed in the Philippines during World War II who continued to provide care while imprisoned by Japanese forces. Captured in 1942, they served at Santo Tomas and Los Baños internment camps, maintaining nursing shifts, surviving on starvation rations, and providing care for thousands of Allied POWs for over three years until liberation.

To be fair, hairbrushes were only invented in 1925

The cabin heaters in these B-17s circulated glycol from the engines in order to provide heat. Basically, the cabin was heated by what we would think of as radiator water, and it was insufficient to provide much heat at high altitudes when outside temperatures could hit -40°F or lower. The rest of crew had and needed electrically heated flight suits in the unpressurized and unheated fuselage, They could not have survived without them, and in fact some did not survive. Ball turret gunners suffered the most, and they frequently were exposed to temperatures of -60°F. There were known instances where flesh actually froze and flaked off, and treatment for frostbite after landing was very common.

now you see why a certain segment of the population doesn't want to teach a true history of the USA. They don't want to have to explain why great grandpa was in that mob.

After the show, she was gushing about it to Joe DiMaggio (baseball legend, her boyfriend and eventual husband), saying "You never heard such cheers!". He looked at her and dryly replied "Yes, I have". The marriage lasted 9 months.

My Dad came home with photos he took in Manila. I think of them every time I see photos from Gaza. I have no idea how anyone in Manila survived.

When you want to know more but are also not wanting the answer in case it wasn't good news about them.

"Tiananmen Square, absolutely nothing happened here in 1989" - The Simpsons

Nothing's changed. It's still difficult to get everyone looking at the camera at the same time.

Sick

Not many did.

I love History, but just TIL about Rusyns.

Richard Coggins, 17 years old

one-word reply to a German surrender ultimatum: "Nuts!"

How come the black soldier is wearing light colored boots?

Little known ... members of the 82nd and 101st Airborne landed in flooded fields, scattered drops, and the weight of gear that turned night jumps into silent drownings.

I found more info, link in my hidden reply.

And good riddance!

While this picture has been often mis-identified this way, all the people in this picture are Jewish, it was a mixed community of Jews from the Morishka's, Morocco, Europe, Syria, etc. All Jews, no arabs here

Iwo Jima was hell.

This is Steve and Anna Strack, then aged 37 and 33. She filed based on his drunkenness. The divorce went through. She moved into her parents' home with her 4-year-old son and worked in a gum factory (probably Wrigley?). She never remarried. Her husband remarried within a few years of the divorce. So they likely both ended up happier.

I admired his style and poise on the sidelines. A bygone era.

Phosphorus Round ... nasty. Could burn thru clothing ... plus suck the oxygen out of confined spaces.

My Nan and Poppy were born in 1930 in Yugoslavia. Nan was 15 when this happened, and everyone rejoiced because they thought the Americans were going to take over. Instead came decades of hunger under Communist rule -_-

Gross.

They must have been so shocked at this treachery by their former ally. Remember, people, World War 2 was started by Germany and the USSR both invading Poland.

I was named after my grandads favourite ship that he served on during WW2, HMS Penelope, you can find me here 40.55°N 13.25°E

Another example of the classic "They'll never attack from that direction" approach.

The worst spot to be stationed at in that plane

My great grandfather was a Screaming Eagle in WW2. He fought in Nornandy.

MacArthur wasn't happy about getting his feet and pants wet. The landing craft ran aground on a sand bar approximately 50 yards from shore and when a MacArthur aide demanded a smaller craft, the beach master is reported as saying "...let 'em walk." They walked.

The 1881 photograph of King Ludwig II of Bavaria with actor Josef Kainz was scandalous because it broke royal protocol by showing physical contact (an actor’s hand on the king’s shoulder), and highlighted the king's intense, personal affection for an actor, which was often viewed as improper or "un-regal" behavior, leading to the original photo being censored/retouched to remove the actors hand from the King's shoulder. King widely believed and accepted King Ludwig II was gay.

Francis Ivan Fenton Jr. died in 1998 after serving in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. He was swarded 3 Bronze Stars and 3 Legion of Merits.

I think my great-grandfather was there for that. If so, lucky for me he survived.

What is more is Israel offered Jordan that if they stayed out of the War with Egypt and Syria Israel wouldnt attack the West Bank of Jordan (the area Jordan annexed in 1950, today known as a the West Bank, and bc Jordan was backed and armed by the US and UK, just like Israel was, they thought Jordan would agree) on day 1 of the war, and Jordan replied with an alpha strike of their entire airforce against Israel, and attacked with 55,000 soldiers and 270 of the newest US made Patton Tanks (assisted by 15,000 Iraqi Soldiers and 100 Iraqi Tanks) against a force of 35,000 Israeli Soldiers and 100 Israeli Tanks, mostly modified Shermans with a few centurion and Patton tanks, who pushed them back (and by day 3, massily reinforced by troops transferred from the Egyptian Front, and within a few days Jordan lost their West Bank to Israel and full retreated. Its why in 73 Jordan decided to stay out. Still till today Jordan considers the move to join in one of their biggest mistakes

Bór-Komorowski famously refused to arm the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, when the Govt in Exile ordered him to he gave 9 pistols, 2 rifles and 600 bullets. When the uprising began, they had 11 pistols, and 2 rifles, mostly the few he gave them. The govt in exile wanted him to give them 1000 guns, and a ton of ammo. They didnt think it would work, but they thought it would bog down the Germans, bc of the smaller scale it only bogged down a few thousand German Troops, rather than the larger number the govt in exile wanted

many Cossacks served in the SS Auxiliary in Ukraine, they were so brutal the SS Einsatzgruppen commanders requested to Himmler that they be reassigned from assisting them. The Einsatzgruppen which k****d over 1 million Jews in mobile d***h squads, the German professional Jew killers, thought these guys were too brutal and barbaric for them. Though in the 1600s the Cossacks massacred over 100,000 Jews in Ukraine, and the Ukraine Pogroms of the late 1800s were mostly Cossack. Basically Jewish History doesnt look well upon the Cossacks

Back when Jews were told to go back to Palestine, and when Palestine was a term associated with Zionism and rejected by the Arab world. Back when in Europe the term Palestinian mean Jews regardless of where they were from (except in the UK where it meant anyone from the British Mandate of Palestine, though it was also used to also just mean Jew). The repurposing of the term when Zionism discarded what they viewed as their roman colonial oppression name, did it get embraced by the arabs and the term Palestine and Palestinian became changed