1

Paul Bunyan

Image: Abby Savage

Paul Bunyan , the colossal lumberjack of American folklore, is said to have cleared forests from the Northeast to the Pacific Northwest. With his blue ox, Babe , he performed incredible feats of strength, like carving out the Grand Canyon just by dragging his axe behind him, and creating the Great Lakes with his footprints.

Originating in oral traditions among lumberjacks, Bunyan’s exaggerated exploits gained momentum with the American westward expansion during the 19th century and soon became deeply ingrained in the popular imagination.

2

Johnny Appleseed

Image: Aarón Blanco Tejedor

Born John Chapman, Johnny Appleseed wandered the American frontier planting apple trees and spreading goodwill in the early 19th century. A devout Christian, he became a folk hero for his kindness, environmentalism, and pioneering spirit.

Contrary to the popular image of Johnny Appleseed randomly scattering apple seeds, he was a skilled nurseryman who meticulously planted apple tree nurseries. Each nursery was carefully fenced to shield the saplings from livestock and wildlife. After establishing these nurseries, he entrusted them to neighbors but revisited them periodically.

3

Pecos Bill

Image: JosephHershMedia

Pecos Bill , a fictional cowboy raised by coyotes in the wilds of Texas, became a larger-than-life figure known for taming cyclones and roping tornadoes. His adventures, first popularized in the early 20th century, embody the frontier spirit and Texas mythology, blending humor with tales of rugged individualism.

Among his many tales, one credits him with creating the Gulf of Mexico . According to legend, during a severe drought in Texas, Pecos Bill lassoed a storm cloud in California and brought it to Texas. The resulting deluge caused extensive flooding, ultimately forming the Gulf.

4

Davy Crockett

Image: Joseph Corl

Davy Crockett , known as the "King of the Wild Frontier," was a real-life frontiersman later turned politician whose exploits were mythologized even during his lifetime. Born in East Tennessee, he quickly gained fame for his sharp hunting skills and captivating storytelling.

During his time in the U.S. Congress, he staunchly opposed many of President Andrew Jackson’s policies, particularly the Indian Removal Act, and championed the rights of small landowners. Crockett’s life ended with valor at the Battle of the Alamo , solidifying his folk legend as a symbol of courage and patriotism. His legacy remains an enduring part of American history.

5

Calamity Jane

Image: Vidar Nordli-Mathisen

Martha Jane Canary, better known by her alias Calamity Jane, was a frontierswoman and scout famed for her sharpshooting skills and daredevil exploits. During her youth, she stepped up to provide for her large family, taking on various jobs, from ox team driver to scout for Fort Russell. Eventually, she embraced the rough and adventurous lifestyle that made her a legend.

Despite her fearsome reputation, Calamity Jane was compassionate and often helped those in need. Her adventures in the Wild West alongside figures like Wild Bill Hickok cemented her status as a legend of the American frontier.

6

Molly Pitcher

Image: Garry T

Molly Pitcher, the nickname given to Mary Ludwig Hays McCauley, became famous for her bravery during the American Revolutionary War. Although several historical figures are known by this moniker for similar deeds, Mary Ludwig Hays distinguished herself during the Battle of Monmouth in June 1778, where she served as a water carrier for the soldiers.

When her husband, an artilleryman in the Continental Army, fell to enemy fire, she took his place, swabbing and loading the cannon with such bravery and determination that she earned a commendation from George Washington.

7

Daniel Boone

Image: Scott Longerbeam

Daniel Boone was a legendary frontiersman and explorer who blazed trails through the Appalachian Mountains and into Kentucky. Born in 1734, Boone became famous for his expert hunting and survival skills, as well as his role in establishing the Wilderness Road, a trail that facilitated westward migration through the Cumberland Gap.

After serving as a militia officer during the Revolutionary War, he was briefly taken in by the Shawnees in the Northeastern Woodlands. After a few years, he returned and continued to help protect the Kentucky settlements.

8

Buffalo Bill

Image: Judy Beth Morris

William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody was a legendary figure of the American West, known for his Wild West shows that toured the United States and Europe. Born in 1846, Cody was a skilled buffalo hunter, Army scout, and showman who brought cowboy skills and frontier life to audiences worldwide.

He earned his nickname after the Civil War by providing Kansas Pacific Railroad workers with buffalo meat, hunting record numbers of the animal. He even engaged in hunting competitions with his partner, Bill Comstock. His legendary figure has been frequently portrayed in film and television, especially during the height of the Western genre in the 1960s.

9

Wild Bill Hickok

Image: Pablò

James Butler Hickok, famously known as Wild Bill Hickok, was a legendary figure of the American Old West. Born in 1837, Hickok gained fame as a skilled marksman, gambler, and lawman.

Though his exploits were certainly exaggerated by the outlandish tales he told about himself, he was involved in several notorious gunfights during his life. Most notably, he dueled with Davis Tutt, a local gambler with whom he had various disagreements, particularly over their mutual affection for the same woman.

10

John Henry

Image: Lucio Patone

John Henry was a legendary steel-driving man whose man-against-machine tale epitomized the strength and resilience of the American worker. An African American freedman, his dangerous job involved hammering steel drills into rocks to create holes for explosives used to blast open railroad tunnels.

According to the legend, John Henry's prowess was tested in a race against a steam-powered drill. He won the race but tragically died after victory, hammer in hand when his heart gave out from the immense physical stress.

1

Spider-Man 3 (2007)

Image: Dante Muñoz

Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man had been one of the most successful hits of the 2000s . That’s why, when Spider-Man 3 (2007) began production in 2005, it was given the highest budget of any movie in history at the time: around $258 million.

If you’ve seen this movie, you might have guessed that the biggest portion of the budget went into special effects for its three different villains. The New Goblin, Venom, and Sandman were three separate challenges for the visual effects team, particularly Sandman , played by Thomas Haden Church. Groundbreaking technology had to be developed to animate explosive sand fists and parting bodies of sand, making the character’s action scenes cost millions of dollars each.

2

Titanic (1997)

Image: Derek Oyen

To begin with, building the full-scale ship model and massive water tank for Titanic (1997) cost over $150 million. Director James Cameron was very particular about authenticity, so the ship’s interior design was meticulously designed to match that of the original Titanic. At the time, it was also the most expensive movie ever made. But one might argue it was all worth it.

The CGI, stunts, and practical effects used for replicating the sinking sequence were especially costly. Bear in mind that Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet were already known young talents by the time they were cast for this movie, so they took a small share of the fortune—around $5 million between them. Famously, though, James Cameron forfeited his paycheck to keep the movie under budget, much like Jack climbing down from the door to keep Rose afloat. It worked out in the end because he earned $97 million from backend profits.

3

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

Image: André Volkmann

Balancing the stories of all of these superheroes was just as challenging as paying all the corresponding actors. Avengers: Infinity War (2018) had an estimated budget of almost $400 million. Who could forget the battle scenes filled with as many timeless superheroes as A-list actors? Reportedly, Robert Downey Jr. alone took home around $75 million after backend deals.

This two-hour-and-a-half movie had over 2,500 visual effects shots, which included the destruction of a planet and a ship, as well as an epic battle in the fictional Wakanda . Not to mention the advanced motion-capture technology required for Josh Brolin’s portrayal of Thanos, the villain of the film.

4

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

Image: Igor Bumba

When Avengers: Infinity War was released, it became the highest-grossing superhero film in history, amassing over $2 billion at the box office. But that title lasted it around a year, until its sister sequel Avengers: Endgame (2019) surpassed it. The sequel cost roughly the same as the previous installment but came just shy of earning $3 billion .

Just like the previous ones, this Avengers installment had a star-studded cast that included Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans, and Chris Hemsworth. A feast of 3 hours worth of cameos, the movie ended with a climactic final battle scene, where almost every hero from the Marvel Cinematic Universe assembled. Making this movie involved hundreds of extras, an enormous amount of CGI, masterful choreography, and an unprecedented skill for star scheduling .

5

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (2007)

Image: cottonbro studio

Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End had a budget of around $300 million, making it one of the most expensive films ever at the time of its 2007 release. Whoever watched this film will remember a waterfall at the edge of the world or a massive final battle between two ships over a maelstrom. Those takes relied heavily on CGI, but not entirely. As with previous productions in the franchise, filming required large-scale water sets and multiple ships to be built. The cost of both practical and visual effects for these scenes was astronomical.

Admittedly, a significant portion of the budget went to the ensemble cast, particularly Johnny Depp, who received a notable pay bump following the massive success of the first two films. Keith Richards , the Rolling Stones guitarist, was also famously featured, adding to the film’s star power.

6

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

Image: Deepak Rastogi

Surprise! The Avengers movie with the most colossal budget was the least liked of the four. It sometimes puzzles fans to learn that it cost $365 million in 2015, which, adjusted for inflation, would be over $430 million today.

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) had to use massive amounts of CGI to create cinematic takes on the levitating fictional city of Sokovia. Destruction, flying characters, drones, and explosions contributed significantly to the costs. More importantly, filming on location and flying so many celebrities around the globe added to the expense. This movie showed scenes filmed all over the world, including the U.S., South Africa, Italy, South Korea, and England.

7

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019)

Image: LJ

Lightsaber battles have never been cheap. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019) had a reported production budget of around $275 million. It was the third Star Wars movie produced by Disney, and while the budget had decreased compared to the previous installments, it was still a financial success.

The final battle sequence on the Sith planet Exegol required a fortune, but it needed to: as it served as the climax of Disney’s trilogy. Special effects even included the scenes of characters like General Leia, played by the late Carrie Fisher . The film faced the unique challenge of incorporating footage of Fisher filmed for previous Star Wars movies after her passing in 2016.

8

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011)

Image: Pixabay

Even though the 4th installment of the Pirates franchise had relatively low reviews, it became the second film in the saga to surpass a billion dollars in box office revenue. Released in 2011, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides had a staggering budget of $379 million.

Mermaids, zombies, splitting ships, boats on fire, and a Fountain of Youth all required the coordination of several visual effects teams. The salaries of new stars like Penélope Cruz , along with filming locations across Hawaii, the UK, California, and Puerto Rico, added to the costs. Also, this was the first movie in the franchise to be shot for 3D screenings .

9

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)

Image: Nick Wehrli

A movie that revolves around dinosaurs fleeing from a volcanic eruption , Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018), received an estimated budget of around $432 million. How are dinosaurs created? Much like the earlier films of the saga, this one used a mix of CGI and animatronics , especially for the more up-close, intimate scenes involving Velociraptors and an Indoraptor.

For the dinosaur auction scene, a whole large-scale set was built. Filming also took place in Hawaii, England, and Spain. The stars of the Jurassic World trilogy, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, reportedly earned around $10 million each.

10

Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)

Image: Rod Long

When Disney acquired the rights to produce movies from Lucasfilm , it proceeded to give the first installment of their Star Wars reboot the biggest budget it had ever given. That was over $447 million in 2015.

With J.J. Abrams directing a Star Wars movie after so long, he could indulge in creating a full-size Millennium Falcon , animatronic creatures, and remote-controlled puppetry. The Starkiller Base destruction sequence was one of the most expensive scenes. Not to mention that the legendary face of Star Wars , Mark Hamill, had a very short cameo at the end of this movie; that one-minute feature alone earned him $3 million .

1

The Battle of Los Angeles (1942)

On the night of February 24th, 1942, a few months after the Pearl Harbor attack, sentinels identified what they thought was an aircraft near Culver City, which prompted them to fire over 1,440 anti-aircraft shells into the sky.

The enemy was never identified, and no bombs were dropped, although the chaos caused by the shooting resulted in five civilian casualties. The event was later reported as a false alarm, but to this day no one knows what caused the uproar , though some theories suggest it was a weather balloon, a tray bird, or a weather phenomenon.

2

The Great Molasses Flood (1919)

We’ve heard about disasters caused by heavy rains, overflowing rivers, and mudslides, but how often are they caused by syrup? For Bostonians, it was at least once, on January 15, 1919. A 50-foot-tall and 90-foot-wide steel tank owned by the United States Industrial Alcohol Company burst , releasing 2.3 million gallons of molasses into the streets.

A wave of molasses from 25 to 40 feet high swept through Boston's North End, toppling buildings and infrastructure , taking the lives of 21 people and several animals, and injuring at least 150 people. The cleaning efforts took weeks to remove the residue from the street, and a lawsuit against the company resulted in reforms in engineering, building codes, and safety certification.

3

The sliced bread ban (1943)

Pre-sliced bread is one of the comforts of modern life we take for granted now, but there was a time when it was banned as part of the war effort. On January 18, 1943, the American government decided to ban the sale of sliced bread to reduce the use of steel (used for slicing machines) and wax paper (used for wrapping the bread).

The measure was not only unpopular but also ineffective, as it didn’t make a real difference in wax paper and steel savings . The seemingly easy task of slicing bread by hand caused an uproar across the country, and bread sales dropped, forcing the government to lift the ban only two months after.

4

The Ohio "Toledo War" (1835)

Border disputes among states are not uncommon in American history, usually settled in court and unlikely to result in a military standoff. But sometimes they do, as in 1835, when Ohio and Michigan (then still a territory) quarreled over the Toledo Strip, a 468-square-mile piece of land with critical access to Lake Erie . Official boundary demarcations were vague, so control over the area was asserted by constructing roads and collecting taxes in the case of Michigan, and by involving Congress and creating demarcation lines in the case of Ohio.

National intervention proved necessary when both governors mobilized their militias, and President Jackson mediated in the dispute. The Toledo Strip was given to Ohio, but in turn, Michigan was granted statehood , and the Upper Peninsula was added to its territory. While the conflict was luckily bloodless, it’s at the root of the historic rivalry between Michigan and Ohio.

5

The Salem tomato trials (1820)

Although Salem, Massachusetts, is famous for its witch trials, this particular case takes us to Salem, New Jersey. In 1820, tomatoes had already been popularized worldwide, but some people still had reservations because they were rumored to be poisonous . Robert Gibbon Johnson, a wealthy local farmer, decided to dispel the stigma and sponsored competitions for the largest tomato grown, which sparked an uproar and drew in the local courts.

According to the story, Johnson arrived at court with a basket full of tomatoes and proceeded to eat them all in front of the crowd. As he didn’t die or become violently ill, it was proven that tomatoes were safe for consumption.

6

The Battle of Athens (1946)

The Greek city of Athens claims to be the birthplace of democracy, but Athens, Tennessee, has also done its part to ensure the safeguarding of democratic values. In the 1940s, McMinn County in Tennessee was part of a criminal network involving politicians and law enforcement, who randomly detained citizens under false charges to collect fines. The system was dependent on rigged elections, so when armed deputies locked themselves with the ballot boxes in the county jail during the August 1, 1946 elections, the people of Athens and Etowah took matters into their hands.

Around 200 veterans, recently returned from WWII, raided the National Guard Armory for guns and ammunition, and laid siege to the jail. After a gunfight that lasted through the night, they breached the entry using dynamite and secured the ballot boxes , which were then counted in public, resulting in a landslide victory for the opposition. All the firearms were then cleaned and quickly returned to the armory, and no criminal charges were raised against the veterans on account of their righteous intentions.

7

The pig war (1859)

The U.S. and the U.K. have gone to war more than once, but only one time was a pig the cause of the conflict. In 1859, the San Juan Islands (now part of Washington state) were a disputed territory between America and the U.K. as a result of vague wording in the 1846 Oregon Treaty. The diplomatic dispute quickly turned into real conflict when an American farmer in one of the islands shot a pig that regularly dug into his garden.

As it turned out, the pig belonged to an employee of the British Hudson's Bay Company. Although the farmer offered to pay for the animal , its owner demanded higher compensation, and British authorities threatened to arrest the farmer . This caused the American settlers to petition for military protection, and both countries mobilized troops into the area. The conflict was resolved through international mediation 12 years later in favor of the United States, with the pig as the only casualty.

8

The child mailing system (1913)

The railroad and the establishment of a national postal system did wonders for communication in America, but sometimes it led to controversial and potentially dangerous situations, such as the child mailing system. In 1913, the U.S. Post Office Department launched a parcel post service for packages up to 11 pounds. The content of the parcels was not clearly delimited, and people started using it to send for small children , as it was cheaper than paying for a train ticket.

Children as small as 8-month-olds were mailed (although unwrapped) with postage stamps attached to their clothes and under the care of railroad workers. The system was short-lived, as the Postmaster General banned the mailing of children as soon as he learned about it, claiming they didn’t count as "harmless live animals".

9

Project Acoustic Kitty (1960s)

At the height of the Cold War, espionage had turned into an art form, with agencies on both sides of the conflict resorting to all kinds of methods to gather sensitive information, including the development of technological gadgets and the recruitment of non-human agents . "Project Acoustic Kitty" was one of the CIA’s attempts, aiming to infiltrate the Kremlin and the Soviet embassies with the help of surgically modified cats.

The cats underwent surgery to implant a microphone into their ear canal and a transmitter into their body, allowing them to record and transmit sound from their surroundings. The cats would then be released near the target location, hoping to pick up conversations between Soviet diplomats and office workers. According to some sources, the first mission ended abruptly when the cat in question was struck by a taxi, but CIA former officials claim that the project never prospered due to the difficulty in training the cats.

10

The Year Without a Summer (1816)

In 1816, North America (as well as part of Europe) experienced freezing cold temperatures during Spring and Summer, all thanks to an Indonesian volcano. In April 1815, the Indonesian Mount Tambora experienced a massive volcanic explosion, releasing millions of tons of ash, dust, and sulfur dioxide across the world , which created a shield in the stratosphere, blocking sunlight.

In America, the event manifested as a fog that was not dispersed by rain or wind, and the lack of sunlight resulted in frost and snow during late Spring and early Summer, especially across New England. While the low temperatures themselves were not as taxing on the population, they were detrimental to the crops and livestock, creating food shortages and causing thousands of families to relocate to different regions of the country to escape famine and poverty.