Thirty-five years ago today, there was a malfunction in the brand new number 2 reactor at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Middleton, Pennsylvania. For several days afterwards, the world held its breath as it waited to see if the hydrogen gas within the reactor would explode and rain radioactive material on the eastern coast of America.

The official report by the Nuclear Regulatory Committee (NRC) eventually blamed the situation on operator error. However, eyewitness reports credited the quick actions of a mysterious, gold-clad hero with beating back the real cause of the meltdown: a radiation-absorbing creature from another dimension.

In the aftermath of the meltdown, the NRC made sweeping changes to prevent a recurrence of the problem. They appear to have worked. In the thirty-five years since, not once has a giant radiation-absorbing creature attacked an American nuclear power station. We'll keep our fingers crossed, just to be safe.

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Today, Vincent van Gogh is one of the most recognized and popular artists on Earth. What makes him so enduring? Is it his colorful, expressionist style? His warped landscapes? His hauntingly lonely self-portraits? Or is it the mysterious man himself?

Historians tell us that van Gogh suffered from depression. One hundred twenty-five years ago today, he cut off part of his own ear. That doesn't sound like the act of a happy person, does it? Could his mood have been improved if he had known that one day he would take his place among the greatest painters of all time? Only a time traveler would ever know.

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Historians and conspiracy theorists continue to debate one of the greatest mysteries in American history: who really killed President John F. Kennedy fifty years ago today?

While Lee Harvey Oswald is officially recognized as the assassin, it is still rumored that there were other shooters. Contemporary accounts indicate that many eyewitnesses believed shots came from a "grassy knoll," not the Texas School Book Depository where Oswald was reportedly hiding.

Perhaps the only way to know what really happened to our 35th President would be to travel back in time and witness it ourselves. That's what Booster Gold did, according to Booster Gold Vol. 2, #25 (in a story appropriately titled "Day of Death").

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Eighty-four years ago today, the New York Stock Exchange experienced a then-record volume of transactions (16,410,030 shares traded). The aftermath of the market crash launched the world into the Great Depression.

While the Black Tuesday crash did mean the ruin of many a fortune, anyone who knew their history and had access to a time machine could make quite a few bucks by buying while the market was historically low. Does that sound like any Corporate Crusaders we know?

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In the early 16th century, Spain was desperate to find a way to reach India without using the trade routes dominated by the Portuguese. To the rescue came Ferdinand Magellan, who was determined to expand on the work of Christopher Columbus and find a western route to the Spice Islands of Indonesia. Magellan set sail on September 20, 1519, and almost succeeded, dying in battle in the Philippines just a few thousand miles from his goal.

No doubt Magellan and his crew must have encountered many incredible peoples during his voyages, but none were so celebrated as the mysterious giant of Patagonia discovered while exploring what would become known as the Strait of Magellan. Magellan's chronicler described the giant as a tall, well-formed man with a broad face whose "eyes were surrounded with yellow." Who could possibly fit that description?

Could it be possible that a race of unusually large and strong men still lurk on the southern tip of South America? Or could it be that the reported giant wasn't a native, but a tourist from the future named Booster Gold? It isn't every day that someone circumnavigates the world for the first time, you know.

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