SortStack #1549 — 2030-09-05

By year · Order from earliest to most recent.

1. Leonardo da Vinci begins painting the Mona Lisa 1503

   It was a minor celebrity until 1911, when an Italian handyman stole it from the Louvre — the theft, and the two-year hunt, made it the most famous painting on Earth.

2. Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species 1859

   The entire first print run sold out to booksellers on the first day. Darwin had sat on the theory for some twenty years before a rival's letter forced his hand.

3. The Suez Canal opens, linking the Mediterranean and Red Seas 1869

   The canal cut the sea voyage from Europe to India by roughly 7,000 km, ending the age of sailing around the entire African continent.

4. The Wall Street Crash wipes out the stock market boom 1929

   The market didn't permanently regain its pre-crash peak until 1954, a quarter of a century later.

5. The world's first website goes online at CERN 1991

   Tim Berners-Lee's original site, info.cern.ch, explained what the web was and how to make your own page. A restored copy is still online today.

6. Lehman Brothers collapses, deepening the global financial crisis 2008

   With over $600 billion in assets, it remains the largest bankruptcy filing in American history.

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