Sent to Lubang Island in the Philippines in late 1944, Lieutenant Hiroo Onoda was ordered never to surrender. Convinced that leaflets announcing the end of the war were enemy propaganda, he stayed hidden in the jungle for almost thirty years. In 1974, a young Japanese traveler tracked him down, but Onoda only laid down his arms once his former commanding officer flew in from Japan to formally relieve him of duty.
Around 2300 BCE, Enheduanna, daughter of King Sargon of Akkad, became high priestess of the Moon god at Ur. She composed hymns to the goddess Inanna and put her name to them. She is the oldest person identified as the author of a literary work, about 1,500 years before Homer.
Squeeze Earth's 4.5 billion years into a single 24-hour day. Homo sapiens shows up around 11:59:54 p.m., roughly six seconds before midnight. All of written history, from Sumerian tablets to today, fits into the final tenth of a second. A cosmic blink.