Homeless Jim Carrey at 12 years old: 30 photos that speak for themselves (31 photos)

Life is sometimes incredible. For example, how a man with three legs, four feet and sixteen fingers worked as a circus performer and raised four children. Or how a guide dog saved his owner's life by carrying him down 78 flights of stairs at the World Trade Center on the day of the September 11 attacks. Here are photos that capture amazing facts about celebrities and the unusual fates of ordinary people.





1.



The photo was taken around 1900 in Tennessee, USA. Jim Turner, from a wealthy white family, married a black teacher, Carrie. Their sons George, William, and Hardin became doctors.

2.





In January 1925, a diphtheria epidemic broke out in Nome, Alaska. The life-saving serum was 800 km away, and the only way to deliver the medicine was by dog sled. Twenty mushers and 150 dogs took part in the relay. They covered huge distances in harsh winter conditions, where the temperature dropped to -30 degrees. The longest and most dangerous part of the journey was made by a dog named Togo, but it was a husky named Balto who led the last team to Nome. This act made him a national hero.

3.



On October 7, 1943, Ottla Kafka, the beloved sister of writer Franz Kafka, volunteered to escort orphans from the Theresienstadt ghetto to the Auschwitz concentration camp so that they would not be afraid. She was gassed immediately upon arrival.

4.



A polio survivor learns to walk at the Sudbury Rehabilitation Center, Canada, 1953.

Survivors, like this two-year-old, often had to undergo physical therapy for months or even years to regain mobility.

5.



A policeman stops traffic so a cat and kitten can cross the road safely, New York City, 1925.

6.



On January 27, 1945, Soviet troops entered Auschwitz and liberated the prisoners.

7.



In 1871, Anna Swan married Martin Van Buren Bates in London. The wedding was memorable, because both newlyweds were almost 2.5 m tall, and the bride was even slightly taller than the groom.

8.



A young Carrie Fisher watches her mother Debbie Reynolds perform on stage, 1963.

9.



A noodle delivery boy in Tokyo, Japan, 1935.

10.



Children cross a river on their way to school, Modena, Italy, 1959.

11.



Roy Dennis, born December 4, 1961, had fibrous dysplasia of the bones. The rare condition deformed his face. The teenager's story inspired the 1985 film The Mask. Doctors said Dennis would die at age seven, but he lived to be 16.

12.



Surviving children leave the barracks at Auschwitz, January 27, 1945.

13.



One of the last photographs of Nicholas II, taken during his exile in Tobolsk, summer 1917.

14.



When Jim Carrey was 12, his father lost his job. The family found themselves homeless and moved into a small Volkswagen van. It was so cramped that the brothers had to sleep outside in a tent. When his father finally found a job at a tire factory, Kerry and his brother had to work there after school. They worked as cleaners and security guards in eight-hour shifts. Jim eventually dropped out of school at age 16.

15.



The head of the Statue of Liberty at the Paris World's Fair, 1878.

16.



Annie Edson Taylor poses with her kitten and the barrel she rode over Niagara Falls in, 1901.

17.



Defusing a mine in the Gulf of Finland near Haapasaari, Finland, autumn 1944.

18.



An elderly Berliner sits among the ruins, Germany, 1945.

19.



Francesco Lentini was born with a parasitic twin. As a result, he had three full legs, two genitals, one vestigial leg, and sixteen toes. This did not stop him from getting married and becoming a father of many children. He performed in circuses all his life and even made a small fortune.

20.



Rosemary Kennedy was different from her brothers and sisters. After the convent failed to contain her "urges," Joseph Kennedy sent his daughter to a lobotomy and locked her up in a mental hospital. The cheerful girl, who dreamed of becoming a kindergarten teacher, could now barely take care of herself.

21.



Motorcycle police, 1920s.

22.



Worm vending machine, 1957.

23.



Unexploded bomb, Liverpool, November 1940.

24.



Teenagers crammed into a VW Beetle, 1964.

25.



Michael Rockefeller, John D. Rockefeller's great-grandson, graduated from Harvard in 1960. After graduating, the ethnographer did not want to run the family empire. In 1964, he went to New Guinea to study the Asmat tribe. But before he could reach the natives, his boat capsized. Rockefeller had disappeared, and a large-scale search yielded no results.

26.



Earl Tupper founded Tupperware in the 1940s. However, Americans did not like plastic at the time. The company was on the verge of collapse until it noticed its key salesperson, a woman named Brownie Weiss from Miami, Florida. She and her mother were the first to come up with the idea of patio parties, which quickly gained popularity and brought unprecedented success.

27.



Testing football helmets, 1912.

28.



Mary Ann MacLeod, a poor Scottish immigrant, went to America in 1930 with only $50. She moved in with her sister and worked as a maid. Mary soon married Frederick Trump, a successful businessman. In 1946, the couple had a son, Donald, a future US president.

29.



When people moved entire houses on horses, late 1800s.

30.



On September 20, 1991, the commercial fishing vessel Andrea Gail left the port of Gloucester, Massachusetts, bound for the Grand Banks of Newfoundland off the coast of eastern Canada. The plan was to catch swordfish and return in a month. On October 29, three destructive storms converged, creating waves up to 100 feet (30 m) high and battering the vessel with winds of 95 mph (150 km/h), in what became known as the "Perfect Storm" of 1991. The Andrea Gail disappeared, and neither the vessel nor its crew were ever seen again.