Getting people to wear masks for the common good is nothing new in America.

The number of deaths from the 1918 flu was estimated to be at least 50 million worldwide with about 675,000 occurring in the U.S. alone. And yet some people still couldn’t be bothered to take precautions.

When she was still Princess Elizabeth, the current queen joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) in 1945 as soon as she turned 18, becoming the first female member of the royal family to serve as a full-time active member in the military.

She was a mechanic and a truck and ambulance driver during WWII!

Albert Einstein was born into a middle-class Jewish German family in 1879 and renounced his German citizenship at age 16.

He was educated in Switzerland and retured to Germany in 1914, winning the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics.

But his fame made him a target and he and his wife came to the U.S. in 1933.

Some Americans opposed what they saw as his “radical” views, but on June 22, 1940, Einstein took his American citizenship test and was naturalized on October 1, 1940.

The sheer amount of shellfire dispatched during WWI boggles the mind.

There were over 1.5 billion shells fired throughout the conflict – nearly a million shells per day for 4 years straight.

After seeing this photo, it doesn’t surprise us.

François Clemmons wasn’t a cop, but an actor. And he was best-known for his role as Officer Clemmons on Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

And we love them both for this moment in which they show that the color of one’s skin shouldn’t matter when it comes to sharing.

What a powerful but horrifying way to illustrate the lives destroyed during the Holocaust.

Imagine destroying that many marriages, breaking up that many families, and being responsible for the death and torture of so many more.

War is hell. But this photo illustrates that it’s a job that must be done for soldiers.

In another time and place, these two might be friends.

But the most this American soldier could do for his so-called enemy in the moment was to give him one last recognition of his humanity before leaving him to die.

Mobsters are criminals by nature, so we don’t exactly think they deserve complete privacy.

It’s just interesting that maintaining your cover was as easy as sliding a hat in front of your face in those days.

One wonders why they even attended the trial if they were trying to keep a low profile.

We can’t imagine what it would feel like to have a loved one go on a mission like this, knowing the whole world is watching and that things could go wrong in an instant.

The looks of joy and relief are vivid in this photo – althought there was still plenty to worry about before they got back to Earth.

This wonderful photo is the exception, not the norm.

For many Black students, integration was terrifying and dangerous and students weren’t accepting. And we can’t imagine how it must have felt.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t learn an important lesson from a rare happy photo showing all of these kids getting along.

No one in their right mind would ever find an excuse to defend this man.

Joseph Goebbels was the minister of propaganda for the German Third Reich under Adolf Hitler. And you can see the hate in his eyes when he is told the man behind the camera is Jewish. Although we certainly see fear as well.

It’s amazing to think of Las Vegas as just a bunch of desert, but that was the case not too long ago.

And someone must have seen the potential if they were already selling land for $3 million back in the 50s!

Somehow, boxing looks even more violent from above.

It certainly shows the aftermath in more detail than we’d like to see.

Many consider this to be Ali’s greatest fight, in which he defeated Williams via a TKO in 3 rounds.

The detail on this photo is wrong. It’s actually from 1910, which explains why almost nothing is yet built up.

It’s amazing to be able to see Central Park (which was once a poor neighborhood who residents were made to leave). That project began in 1858.

Soldiers have to follow orders, but sometimes when no one is looking they make a decision for the good of individuals, even if it puts their lives or careers at risk.

We’re not sure who shot this photo of a German soldier helping a boy cross the Berlin Wall after he became separated from his family, but we sure hope his superiors never got wind of it.

Isn’t it wild to see celebrities as babies? It’s especially weird when you recognize some of their features.

Back when he was little Farrokh Bulsara, no one could have possibly imagined how he’d change the world with his talent.

Yes, the band The Dead Kennedys used this photo as an album cover.

But that’s not what’s important.

The real power lies in the fact that some people live their wholes lives knowing only the torture of malnourishment. Starvation isn’t something you get used to. And it’s a terrible way to die.

Still, we’ve allowed millions to perish from hunger.

It’s grim to celebrate someone’s death with a blood-red beet soup, but plenty of people would make an exception for Stalin.

We’re not surprised those who were chased out of their home country by his policies would be enjoying a traditional meal on that day.

We can’t imagine what Otto Frank might be feeling in this moment as he remembers his family and their torturous days hiding from the Nazis.

It’s a heartbreaking and powerful photo. And luckily most of us will never understand what it’s like to live in that kind of fear.

So much of Europe was bombed during WWII. But we tend not to think about all of the great works of art that survived.

There are incredible stories about paintings and small artefacts being smuggled to safety in the middle of the night. But some things had to be protected where they stood, like Michelangelo’s David.

And if you’ve ever seen it in person you know how lucky we are to still have it around.

Angry mobs are angry mobs, and they all claim they’re trying to get justice.

It’s hard to have too much sympathy for a Ku Klux Klan racist, but a young Black woman did just that when he was being attacked.

She knew violence was not the answer and mob justice is no justice at all.

Whoa. This looks like a bunch of wicker furniture was gathered from someone’s yard and loaded onto a flying tin can.

And that’s not too far from the truth.

Let’s just say airlines had their heyday – and it’s neither today nor the 1930s when this plane was flying.

Leave it to the Swedes to have a long, convoluted name for the day traffic switched to the right-hand side of the road.

We prefer the world cluster*&#k.

And that’s exactly what happened – especially since many citizens weren’t keen on the new law anyway. But it’s something everyone has to be on board with or else things turn out like this.

It’s hard to feel bad for the people who fought for Hitler during WWII, but the feelings this man felt were just like anyone else’s when he came home from war to find his family gone.

We don’t know the circumstances surrounding the photo, but it sure does make you think.

Few deaths have been as celebrated as Adolf Hitler’s. It feels like a strange thing to say, but the evil he encompassed and the havoc he was willing to wreak with it were second to none.

We can understand – to some extent – how relieved people were to hear that he was gone.

Standing from left to right are King Haakon VII of Norway, Tsar Ferdinand of the Bulgarians, King Manuel II of Portugal and the Algarve, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Prussia, King George I of the Hellenes and King Albert I of the Belgians.

Seated, from left to right are King Alfonso XIII of Spain, King George V of the United Kingdom and King Frederick VIII of Denmark.

The photo was taken place during the funeral of King Edward VII.

There’s a lot of weath and power in that room.

Just a week after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Asians in America couldn’t count on people to recognize their nationality.

This woman was so afraid of being mistaken for Japanese that she flew a giant Chinese flag on the beach.

Now we might see that in a whole new light.

An act of bravery or stupidity (or both)?

We don’t think today’s police would let anyone stop to relish their fame after committing a crime, regardless of whether or not anyone got hurt.

He sure does look truly tiny next to that building though!

Unless it’s New Year’s Eve, it’s rare to see this many people pack into Times Square.

But this is an impromptu scene.

Our favorite Reddit comment on this pic?

“Damn. I can’t even get my three kids to look at the camera at the same time.”

Sadly, it used to be the case that people thought HIV was contagious through things like touch and would avoid going anywhere near sick people.

This misinformation made it so that people wouldn’t even be in the same room with people they saw as “contaminated.”

But one of the most posh women in the world showed everyone there was nothing to be afraid of when she compassionately shook the hand of an AIDS patient.

We want to know what the signmaker thought of this one.

This isn’t something you expect to see anywhere in the world. But it wasn’t that long ago that northern Ireland could be a very dangerous place.

If you’ve ever wanted to see Sylvester Stallone and Pelé try to defeat the Nazi’s in soccer, then we have a movie for you.

This photo is such a bizarre scene thoough – even if Pelé is just taking a break. There’s just something so disturbing about Nazi iconagraphy.

Some things just seem like they’ve always been there – and the Golden Gate Bridge is one of them.

There are very few people still around who would remember seeing it get built.

Nurses have always been heroes.

This one happens to be incredibly brave as well, since smallpox is highly contagious through air droplets.

But if we’ve learned anything this year it’s that masks save lives.

Well, we can’t pretend we have any idea how this moment might feel.

One minute you’re headed towards your death and the next you have a chance to be free.

It looks like they could hardly believe it.

Yes, there are a lot of WWII photos here, but what can we say? They’re all petty powerful.

Just look at all of these sailors returning home. Imagine what it was like to be fighting such a brutal war and then get crammed onto a ship for a long journey home.

There’s no Mr. Rogers in this photo making things right.

Racism was so vile that white people thought a Black man could contamine their water just because his skin happened to be a different color.

Isom was one of a group of young men who swam the pool that day in an attempt at peaceful desegregation. But the City Manager closed the whole facility just to prevent it from becoming integrated.

Imagine having that much hate in your heart.

The world is still dealing with the fallout from the explosion and fire at the Cherobyl nuclear powerplant.

And frankly, this doesn’t look like much damage considering all of the death and destruction (both long and short-term) it caused.

It’s scary to wonder what might have happened to that photographer.

The kind of heartbreak that soldiers must go through in the field is incomprehensible to the rest of us.

Imagine all the thoughts you’d have as you tried to comfort a baby whose mother was just killed.

So much for Belgium trying to be neutral.

This is one of the coolest and strangest photos we’ve ever seen.

In fact, Armstrong and his wife look like they’re superimposed onto an Egyptian background.

But this moment took place in 1961 as an act of cultural diplomacy. Armstrong was asked to play at the foot of the Great Sphinx and the pyramids in Giza.

If you were already an adult at the time this aired, this photo will make you feel awfully old.

In fact, it looks like someone colorized it to look like it’s from the 60s.

But some things just happen to change a lot in a short period of time…or 22 years.

The grace and class former presidents have shown by attending their predecessors inaugurations is always covered in the news.

But rarely do we get a glimpse like this.

We can only image what was going through his head and wonder if he felt any sense of relief at no longer being in the hot seat.

It’s pretty amazing to see these images colorized, even if this one is pretty common in black and white.

And it’s even more incredible to think of just how young Ruby Bridges was when she participated in the desegregation of William Frantz Elementary School.

At just six years old, she played a huge role in kickstarting the Civil Rights movement in the American South.

We don’t know much about German fraternities or what they might have been like prior to the war, but it’s interesting to think what lay ahead of these men just a few years later.

It would only get more bizarre from there.

Imagine the kind of love it takes to visit your child on the front lines during a war.

While we don’t know much more about the photo, most people seem to agree that it’s a father and son pictured here.

First, it’s strange to know there was a giant statue of Lenin in Ethiopia, though we know he made the Ethiopians allies.

We just wish we knew what this kid was thinking at the time and if he knew the implications here.

Another description of this photo reads:

“A Soviet slave laborer among prisoners liberated by 3rd Armored Division in Buchenwald points out a former Nazi guard who brutally beat prisoners on April 14, 1945, at the Buchenwald concentration camp in Thuringia, Germany.”

Well THIS sure changes our perspective on the Tianemen protests.

The iconic “tank man” image is the only one we ever see.

It’s hard to imagine that these young people might have been shot not long after the photo was taken.

Actually, it’s not that unbelievable considering our currrent political circumstances.

But this is just sickening.

And it’s very odd to see Hitler smiling like that. Almost eerie.

We’re just mad he has better legs than we do. And maybe the police were too.

You’d think they’d have better things to do than arrest cross-dressers, but we used to criminalize all sorts of harmless behavior.

Iran Air Flight 655 from Tehran to Dubai was shot down in 1988 by the United States Navy. The aircraft was destroyed and all 290 people on board were killed (including 66 children).

The United States government claimed the ship’s crew thought the plane was going to attack after making ten attempts to contact the aircraft. The Iranians say the soldiers negligently shot down the aircraft.

None of that makes this woman’s tears less painful.

If you only know about the Cuyahoga because of an R.E.M. song, then you’ve got a lot to learn.

Those plumes eventually caught fire. And nothing good happens when a RIVER manages to catch on fire.

The caption says it all, but we’re still fascinated by the whole thing.

We’re sure the reading material “determined by consensus” had propagantic sentiments, but these workers probably got more exposure to the world of literature than many Americans do.

There’s no denying that’s David Bowie!

And it’s wild to see him as a teenager. What confidence!

It’s almost like he knew what was ahead of him.

We’re not sure there’s any prize for being the tallest Nazi, but it is interesting to see a peaceful surrender.

Everyone was probably ready for the war to be over at that point.

Politicians have to start somewhere and if they start locally, then they have to get to know all sorts of people (at least if they plan to be good at their jobs).

We could never picture Angela Merkel drinking Schnaps with fisherman until now. But she certainly made the rounds before she made it big.

Racists’ hated stems from fear and ignorance. And nothing says it as strongly as a Klu Klux Klan member cowering behind a Black police officer.

We can only hope he saw the photo at some point if he didn’t realize it at the time.

South Africa’s long, gruesome history of racism supposedly ended in 1994 (though we all know it doesn’t just end after the law changes).

But it’s hard to believe that segregation was the law of the land until so recently.

When we think of cocaine we don’t exactly picture this. Or a photograph of a drug deal, for that matter.

But apparently things are not always what they seem.

There’s a time to run for cover. But that’s not the time to leave your supposed comrades out to keep fighting.

That’s some serious valor these Indian soldiers are showing in the face of enemy fire.