A Modern Kaspar Hauser

On Nov. 28, 1999, a man in his mid-20s wandered into an emergency room in Toronto. His nose was broken, his wallet was missing, and he carried no identification. He claimed not to know who he was, and staff diagnosed him with post-concussive global amnesia.

“Mr. Nobody” had a slight Yorkshire accent, according to language experts, and he spoke fluent French and Italian and could read Latin. After his release he began living in Canada, changing his name and residence often.

The story ends even more strangely. In June 2001, a gay porn actor named Sean Spence claimed the mysterious man was really a French model named Georges Lecuit. Mr. Nobody was jailed and disappeared shortly after his release. Now both he and his wife have disappeared.

| Oddities

Arboreal Genocide?

During aerial surveys in 1992, German forestry students were surprised to see a giant swastika north of Berlin. Apparently locals had planted larches in that pattern in 1937, presumably to prove their loyalty to the party. After the war it was forgotten, as the effect could be seen only from the air, and only as the leaves changed.

When the giant Nazi symbol was rediscovered, though, Brandenburg authories worried that it would attract right-wing extremists — so they started cutting down the larches. In the end, 68 of the 100 trees had to fall before the effect was obscured. There’s an irony here, somewhere …

| History · Oddities

Who?

In May 2005, someone delivered a box of ashes to the council chambers of Queanbeyan, a city in New South Wales, Australia. It was engraved with the words “Elizabeth Clarke Cunningham, Aged 59 years, Died 13 June 1997.”

The box was passed on to the New South Wales police, but no one has been able to discover who Cunningham was, whether she had any relatives, or who delivered her ashes.

| Death · Oddities

Moonlighting

It’s already shaping up to be an eventful election year. Among the candidates for governor of Minnesota is Jonathon “The Impaler” Sharkey, a self-proclaimed vampire and satanist.

If elected, Sharkey promises to impale terrorists and pedophiles on the grounds of the state capitol. His Vampires, Witches, and Pagans Party is officially recognized by the United States Federal Election Committee, and he announced his candidacy on Friday, Jan. 13.

His campaign slogan is “A New Deal for Minnesota.”

| Oddities · Society

Creative Uses of Company Time

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:British_Rail_UFO.png

Charles Osmond Frederick was a mild-mannered British engineer at the British Railway Technical Centre in Derby in the 1970s.

Or so everyone thought. Earlier this year, patent researchers discovered that in 1973 Frederick had designed a nuclear-powered space vehicle for intergalactic travel, and even got the British Railways Board to patent it. Apparently no one was paying attention.

When the plans resurfaced, a group of nuclear scientists examined them and declared them to be unworkable; Michel van Baal of the European Space Agency said, “I have had a look at the plans, and they don’t look very serious to me at all.”

But if you like, you can try them out yourself — the patent lapsed when the Railways Board neglected to renew it.

| Oddities · Technology

Anthropodermic Bibliopegy

The Langdell Law Library at Harvard University contains a book bound in human skin. Practicarum Quaestionum Circa Leges Regias Hispaniae, a treaty of Spanish law, contains this inscription on the last page:

The bynding of this booke is all that remains of my deare friende Jonas Wright, who was flayed alive by the Wavuma on the Fourth Day of August, 1632. King btesa did give me the book, it being one of poore Jonas chiefe possessions, together with ample of his skin to bynd it. Requiescat in pace.

The Wavuma were an African tribe in what is now Zimbabwe.

| Oddities

Hope Springs Eternal

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:%22Eagle%22.crashed3.png

Too much optimism is a bad thing. In 1897, Swedish engineer S.A. Andrée planned to reach the North Pole in a leaky and untested balloon, steering only by dragging ropes. He and two companions lifted off from Svalbard in July, drifted north and disappeared for 33 years.

It wasn’t until 1930 that their last camp was discovered — they had crashed after only two days and spent three freezing months trying to walk home.

“Morale remains good,” Andrée had written before his diary became incoherent. “With such comrades as these, one ought to be able to manage under practically any circumstances whatsoever.”

| History · Oddities · Technology

Sergeant Stubby

John Robert Conroy may have regretted bringing his bull terrier to France in World War I — the dog became the star of his unit. It won:

  • 3 Service Stripes
  • Yankee Division YD Patch
  • French Medal, Battle of Verdun
  • 1st Annual American Legion Convention Medal, Minneapolis
  • New Haven World War I Veterans Medal
  • Republic of France Grande War Medal
  • St. Mihiel Campaign Medal
  • Purple Heart (retroactive)
  • Chateau Thierry Campaign Medal
  • 6th Annual American Legion Convention
  • Humane Education Society Gold Medal

I’m not making any of that up. “Sergeant Stubby” fought in the trenches for a year and a half, warning of poison gas attacks, finding wounded soldiers, and listening for incoming shells. He met Woodrow Wilson and John Pershing, was wounded several times, and even learned to salute. His remains are on display at the Smithsonian.

| History · Oddities

Showoff

In 1996, Göran Kropp rode a bicycle from his home in Sweden to Mount Everest, scaled it alone without oxygen tanks, and cycled back home.

“It is not the mountain we conquer,” wrote Edmund Hillary, “but ourselves.”

| Oddities