For over two hundred and fifty years the isolated island nation of Japan was closed to all foreigners.  American Commodore Matthew Perry changed all of that when he arrived in the bay outside of modern day Tokyo and demanded at gunpoint that the Japanese open their ports.

Less than fifteen years later the feudal system in Japan had completely collapsed -- and the empire that would emerge from the chaos became a world power.

North America has a long and consistent history of trains carrying hazardous chemicals derailing and destroying small towns.  


Let's go over a few examples.

After the Civil War around 10,000 Confederates left the country rather than rejoin the United States.  They fled to Brazil, hoping to establish a new society of plantation slavery.

The presidency of Ulysses S Grant was riddled with scandals, including one of the largest cases of tax evasion in American history -- the White House Whiskey Ring.

Lady Six Sky was a warrior-queen of the Maya during their Classical Age.  She took a ruined city on the brink of destruction and turned it into a powerful kingdom filled with monumental art.

Within the ranks of the United States Military the term “Ace” is given to pilots who manage to shoot down five enemy planes.  The level of skill and ability necessary to achieve this dangerous accomplishment was and is incredibly rare.  

During World War II a farm boy from Wisconsin named Richard Bong became the top flying ace of the US, downing forty Japanese aircraft throughout the conflict.  He would be named the “Ace of Aces”, the deadliest fighter pilot in American history.

At the height of the Cold War the US government developed a plan to launch a nuclear warhead into the moon as a show of military strength.   Named Project A119, this absurd program was spearheaded by the Air Force in 1958 and has since been declassified.