The Roosevelt Island Smallpox Hospital Wikimedia CommonsRoosevelt Island Smallpox Hospital was designed by James Renwick Jr., who also designed the Grace Church and St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. Built in the early 1830s, Roosevelt Island’s Smallpox Hospital was supposed to be a sanatorium for those battling the invisible killer. But as was common in the 19th century, the hospital quickly became a repository for anyone deemed unfit for polite society.

Inside The Bizarre Story Of Kaspar Hauser, The Mysterious Youth Who Baffled 19th-Century Germany Gina Dimuro 2 years ago In 1828, Kaspar Hauser emerged from the woods outside Nuremberg, claiming to have grown up in a tiny, dark cell. But centuries later, it’s still not clear who he was or where he came from. ncG1vNJzZmiZnKHBqa3TrKCnrJWnsrTAyKeeZ5ufonyiwdOhpqtnl567onnDoqSuqp9kvaKzxGhr

In the 1960s, Ann Atwater could feel the breeze through the cracks in her house's walls. Then a housing advocate recommended she attend a community organizing training — and the rest is history.Jim Thornton/The Herald Sun Collections/University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill LibrariesAnn Atwater and C.P. Ellis were named co-chairs of the Durham, North Carolina’s charrette S.O.S., “Save Our Schools.” She was a poor black woman raising children alone in the South in the mid-20th century.

Lyle and Erik Menendez claimed their mother was a neglectful drunk — and so in August 1989, they got revenge on her and their father.When affluent Beverly Hills couple Jose and Kitty Menendez were found murdered in their home on Aug. 20, 1989, an entire nation waited for answers. Their deaths seemed to come at the hands of burglars, which left locals in mortal fear — until months later when authorities realized this hadn’t been a robbery gone wrong, at all.

Ted Bundy's girlfriend Elizabeth "Liz" Kendall not only survived her relationship with him, she later wrote a tell-all book about their time together.NetflixElizabeth Kendall, a.k.a. Elizabeth Kloepfer met Ted Bundy at the Sandpiper Tavern in Seattle in 1969. He asked her to dance and before long, she was Ted Bundy’s girlfriend. Ted Bundy’s notorious series of murders in the 1970s has immortalized him as one of the most terrifying figures in American history.