Smallpox is estimated to have killed around 300 million people in the 20th century alone. Thanks to a global vaccination campaign, the last natural case was recorded in Somalia in 1977, and the WHO declared the disease eradicated in 1980. To date, it is the only human disease humanity has wiped out completely.
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.