by Jacopo della Quercia

The Columbia Broadcasting System and its affiliated stations present… What? No! It can’t be! That thing has a diameter? That’s impossible! Run for your lives! It’s…

Wonder Race

Portugal and Castile crush a Marinid invasion at the Battle of Río Salado in 1340. The victory marks the last time a Muslim army was able to invade the Iberian Peninsula, and would have made a nice addition to Age of Empires II: The Conquerors expansion.

Translation: “El Cid is still dead”

Game Over

King Henry VII is crowned King of England, spelling an end to the last season of England’s real life Game of Thrones: the Wars of the Roses.

Sadly, without any direwolves

“Be our guest! Be our guest…”

Cardinal Cesare Borgia holds his infamous Ballet of Chestnuts at the Papal Palace in 1501 with a whole bunch of clergy and even more prostitutes. It remains one of the filthiest chapters in the history of the Vatican until… well, the cleanup the next day.

It sounds like half the attendees had to be carried out

B.A.M.F.

Nathaniel “Nat” Turner, a literate, highly religious escaped slave with “natural intelligence and quickness of apprehension, surpassed by few,” is captured in 1831 after leading the largest and bloodiest slave uprising in US history.

Nat Turner, pointing out that his wallet is the one that says “badass mother!*^%er”

“This is Orson Welles…”

Twenty-three-year-old Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of “The War of the Worlds” on CBS with the Mercury Theatre. It caused a phenomenon similar to John Galt’s speech in Atlas Shrugged, only infinitely less boring. Had Welles been reading Ayn Rand, this story would have read: “Unimportant Nobody Reads Long, Boring Speech”

“Dude, calling to apologize for last night’s Halloween party. I was wasted. Yeah, like INCREDIBLY wasted. I’m wasted right now, in fact”

Play ball!

Jackie Robinson signs a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1945, breaking the color barrier in baseball. “I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me,” he later said. “All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.”

In the face of ghastly racism, Robinson was a portrait of dignity and class.

BFG-9000

The Soviet Union detonates the Tsar Bomba, a 50 megaton hydrogen bomb with a blast radius of more than 20 miles. It remains the largest explosive device ever detonated despite being scaled down from its intended 100 megatons. We’re guessing anything larger would have knocked the Earth out of orbit.

It’s either the Tsar Bomba test or the Green Lantern premiere
(actually…it’s Operation Badger. Tsar Bomba pics are copyrighted. Sorry!)

Super Punch-Out!!

Muhammad Ali knocks out undefeated World Heavyweight champion George Foreman at the famous “Rumble in the Jungle” in Kinshasa, Zaire. Considering the success of the George Foreman Grill, it can truly be said that both men won the fight.

And by extension, so have we

The Dawn of ¥s

The PC Engine, later known as TurboGrafx-16, is launched in Japan, officially kicking off the 16-bit era of video game consoles. If it had one failing, it’s that it was extremely expensive. Also, its lack of a second controller port.

Also, that it wasn’t really a 16-bit system

Goodbye everybody, and remember the terrible lessons you learned today. This is the Columbia Broadcasting System. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming…

A notorious badass exits the stage of life in a badass manner

Jacopo della Quercia is a man of many talents who somehow eluded death in 1438. He can regularly be found at Cracked and on Twitter @Jacopo_della_Q.

Imitating Felix Baumgarten is dangerous because odds are the universe might mistake you for him and strike back

Check out last week’s cornucopia of humanity: This Badass Day in History: October 24, or see what other Halloween shenanigans are cooking besides Martian invasions.