Smiling as he inspected the young troops and seemingly without a care in the world, Adolf Hitler must have been as skilled an actor as he was a tyrannical dictator. By the date of this picture - April 28th, 1945 - Hitler knew that the war was coming to an end, and that he was going to lose it. He'd gone out into the city to inspect bomb damage and try to raise the morale of citizens. It may have worked on them, but there would be no salvation for his own morale.
Having been betrayed and abandoned by his own generals and pincered by the Allies on one side and the Russians on the other, Hitler was trapped like a rat with nowhere to go. He finished his tour of the city, sealed himself in his bunker for two days and tried to think of any way out of the situation. He eventually found one - suicide to avoid being captured.
To insure one’s house, one’s car or to underwrite a life insurance policy, that is common practice. But who would pay an insurance premium for his/her thumb, legs or smile? Stars, of course.
At the top of the ranking are the legs of Mariah Carey, worth 810 million USD: The diva became, in 2006, the Gillette brand muse for the advertising campaign «Legs of a Goddess». She then took out an insurance policy with London Lloyds to protect her legs, a decision that is far from being insignificant. Among its customers, the London insurer then included several icons of music, such as Bob Dylan or Rod Stewart.
David Beckham’s body insured for 195 million USD: European champion with Manchester United in 1999, David Beckham was in 2006 the most renowned footballer of the planet. In relation to his sporting activities, he took out an insurance cover for his legs. The huge amount paid for his insurance would reportedly exceed the 103 million USD disbursed by Real Madrid for the cover of Christiano Ronaldo in 2009. The fashion model would later extend his insurance cover to his entire body.
15 million USD in insurance for Kim Kardashian’s curves: The curves of Kim Kardashian are her number one beauty asset. The reality TV star, who is crazy about plastic surgery, has underwritten an insurance policy worth 15 million USD to protect her famous butt.
The culinary critic Egon Ronay assured his taste buds: The famous Hungarian culinary critic has insured his taste buds since 1957, for the amount of 400 000 USD. An original insurance policy which allows him to cover his sense of taste without which he will no longer be able to practice his job.