Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump, where it's up, up, and away!

Try to sell a house that features art stolen by the Nazis, and watch the fun begin!

A brief history of pomegranates.

Some remote viewers took a gander at 31/Atlas, and I can't say they came up with cheery stuff.

A serial poisoner in Ohio.

The princess who chose painting over palaces.

The horrors of 19th century merchant service.

The (possibly) sinister story behind the Bean Puzzle Tombstone.

The well-preserved home of an 18th century textile designer.

The U.S. Army's cancer-causing fog.

When tennis was the Sport of Kings.

If you're in the mood to sail across the Indian Ocean, here's a how-to guide.

The world's most dangerous tree.

The start of the school lunch program.

Some talking poltergeists and a ventriloquist.

Why the world mourned the murder of a tree.

The ghosts of an Arizona resort.

How King James I was responsible for the Macbeth Witches.

A Prussian military officer at Valley Forge.

The too-short career of a female bookbinder.

A very special fossil.

For some reason, we're enamored of myths about frogs living in stones.

Two father-daughter poets.

The WWII bomber that influenced modern airplanes.

A brief history of the Louvre.

The disappearance of SS Vaitarna.

A Vanderbilt black sheep.

A Civil War sketchbook.

The controversial Younger Dryas Impact Theory.

In other news, badgers have turned to grave-robbing.

The pig who had a social security number.

A noble revenge.

The stories behind some popular funeral foods.

A Neolithic site that could rewrite history.

We're sorta clueless about how anesthesia works.

The colorful life of a 19th century British MP.

The colorful life of a Founding Father.

Some strange burial mounds in Kazakhstan.

An ancient Egyptian mathematical papyrus.

A murder on a crowded train.

A Pennsylvania haunting.

The life and art of Evelyn De Morgan.

That's all for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll meet a 19th century poltergeist.  In the meantime, here's Emmylou.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

The gang's all here!

The Edenton Tea Party.

The creatures that used to rule the earth.

Christopher Marlowe and Shakespeare.

A man who went from rags to riches to the UK Parliament.

The life of Gothic writer Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu.

A brief history of Pontefract Castle.

The mysterious sound of an ancient theater.

An "extraordinary" 3,000 year old mural.

Sybilla, Queen of Scots.

Dog-headed saints.

A vanished civilization in the Negev desert.

Lourdes and medical science.

A really weird ancient skull.

An engraving of a 17th century engraver.

A possible solution to the Bermuda Triangle mystery.

A possible solution to the "Wow" signal mystery.

The long, strange history of the glass armonica.

A tale of a stingy widow.

A German Shepherd who became a silent film star.

A cat learns not to be lonely.

Some paranormal detectives.

The Clink Prison Museum.

The folklore surrounding a Danish pile of sticks.

The many journeys of a Civil War-era Bible.

The wedding of Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon.

A sacred tree at a Japanese train station.

The very strange death of Cindy James.

The disappearance of Marjorie West.

Chunks of the seafloor are upside down, and scientists are perturbed.

A "horrible butchery."

Australia's deadliest animal may surprise you.

That's all for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll visit some Mystery Fires!  In the meantime, in case you're not familiar with glass armonicas, here's a peek. It's a fascinating instrument.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

Although I regret to note that the Strange Company HQ staffers are becoming a bit egocentric.

The notorious murder of a 19th century prostitute.

Why you probably wouldn't enjoy a ride in an 18th century sedan chair.

Kansas is seeing a lot of UFOs.

An ocean discovery may provide clues about extraterrestrial life.

A legendary "act of insane heroism."

A mysterious cave monument in Thailand.

Summer drink recipes from the Prohibition era.

From prisoner to politician.  Yeah, the jokes sorta write themselves.

The oldest trout in the Great Lakes.

The life of Victorian author Isabella Banks.

Stone Age warfare was pretty nasty.

A famed painter's unconventional cousin.

A regicide's eulogy for a squirrel.

A man has spent years blocking UK traffic, because everyone needs a purpose in life, I guess.

A brief history of the full English breakfast.

I suppose it's not unreasonable to make sure someone is dead before you bury them.

An archaeologist studies Viking seamanship.

The world's scariest library.

The strange death of Blair Adams.

How Davy Crockett became an icon.

"Reconstructing" two Stone Age miners.

Another one for the "rewriting human history" file.

That wraps it up for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at an unsolved car bombing.  In the meantime, here's a bit of Haydn.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome!

It seems appropriate for this week's Link Dump to be hosted by an authentic 16th century witch's cat.

Just be careful how you pet him.  You don't want to turn into a frog.

What the hell is 31/Atlas?  And do we really want to know?

One of the first celebrity dogs.

A pitchfork murder.

Paging Graham Hancock!

A visit to Christ Church, Spitalfields.

There's really nothing like morgue humor.

The mystery of the Hopkinsville goblins.

Remembering VJ Day, 1945.

Poland's first encyclopedia.

The puzzling Sabu Disk.

Who were the first storytellers?

The long history of people falling out of windows.

"Visitations" in medieval England.

Some important historical jewelry.

The difference between jealousy and envy.

Did you know that Van Gogh ate paint?  News to me.

Why Beethoven was not black.

An invincible lock.

The fear of Ouija boards.  It's possible I'm wrong, of course, but I knew someone who "played" with Ouija boards, and I'm convinced it opened them up to spirits you really don't want to meet.

The man who was eaten by an apple tree.

The remains of a man who disappeared in Antarctica in 1959 have finally been found.

The "least foolish woman in France."

The 19th century ice trade.

A weird Stone Age skull.

Fatalities at a brothel.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll meet some very weird extraterrestrials.  In the meantime, here's a bit of lute music.

And trains.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

And later, feel free to join the Strange Company staffers for a stroll.

The last of the Dionne quintuplets.  (I have to admit, I didn't know any of them were still living.)

The last of the medieval Minnesingers.

Mongolia, where dogs are both sacred and profane.

How Josiah Wedgwood went from pottery to politics.

Why our mouths have roofs rather than ceilings.

In which we learn that peacocks have lasers in their tails.

The narrator whispers, "Maybe they had boats."

A heroic naval artist.

It seems that ancient Romans camped out in the ruins of Pompeii.  An eerie thought, really.

You wouldn't want to breathe prehistoric air.

A new book reexamines WWI.

The Werewolf of Bedburg.

The UFOs of Rendlesham Forest.

The strange death of attorney Jonathan Luna.

Desi Arnaz, television revolutionary.

A mysterious shipwreck survivor.

Solving the mystery of Winston Churchill's dead platypus.

A "swashbuckling Tudor mercenary."

An actor with a devilish grin.

Terrorism in 1890s Paris.

A brief history of the word "dude."

Things Jane Austen disliked.

"Spirit in the Sky," the song that just won't go away.

Bow Cemetery in summer.

The Susquehanna "mammalian monsters."

A look at Japanese cat lore.

How DNA sent German police on a wild goose chase.

19th century sun stroke victims in the morgue.

The invention of corn dogs.

Just when you think the CIA can't get any weirder...

The papers of a noted philologist.

A "lost" story by Mark Twain.

The Walworth parricide.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll meet a very touchy ghost.  In the meantime, here's the one and only Spike Jones.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

The Strange Company staffers have decided this is Take Your Kittens To Work Day.

Five really weird books.

A murder in Madison County.

The author of William the Conqueror's "medieval big data project." 

You can now read online the oldest known book about cheese, which for my money is one of those times when you have to salute the internet.

17th century ship's doctors also had to be mental health therapists.

Indonesian monkeys are enough to make Bonnie & Clyde blush.

The Royal Navy's bombardment of Sidon, 1840.

The world's longest lightning strike.

2,500 years ago, a Siberian woman had some incredible tattoos.

In which we learn that Abbey Wood has an abbey.  And a wood.

Thomas Wolsey and the 1513 invasion of France.

When a B-25 hit the Empire State Building.

When undertakers bargain over ice.

An ancient message from Moses?

That time when the Golden Gate Bridge almost got a roller coaster.

The unique misery of headaches.

A man dies while a passenger on a plane...and then disappears.

An 18th century man's many careers.

Two connected tragedies.

An early Hollywood scandal.

The mysterious petroglyphs of Oahu Beach.

Archaeologists have just discovered a new language.

The body under the floorboards.

When New York was the City of Oysters.

A new theory about Jimmy Hoffa's disappearance.

The paintings that were designed to comfort those about to be executed.

What happens when psychiatric patients suddenly become sane?

A disappearance with possible ties to the CIA and Watergate.

A New Year's Day disappearance.

The people of 1925.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at an unusual murder method.  In the meantime, here's an instrument that's new to me.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

Uh, sir, the sign over there says "No smo..." oh, never mind.

What the hell happened to Mercury's meteorites?

An influential Queen Consort.

Some striking-looking carousels.

If you want to please gorillas, give them truffles.

The battleship best known for promoting cigarettes.

The Battle of Shrewsbury, 1403.

The diary of a lonely ship stewardess.

How supernatural beliefs vary across America.

So, how do you wear a gown made of glass?  Very carefully.

The pirate city that was swallowed by the sea.

The eccentric works of Lord Dunsany.

Watercolors depicting Old Spitalfields.

The royal "pyramids" of Scotland.

We're still talking about Agatha Christie's weird disappearance.

We're still talking about the Scopes Monkey Trial.

A brief history of gardening books.

The fine art of restoring mourning crepe.

The disappearance of Michael Alfinito.

The mysterious "dwarf" chambers of India.

The St. Elizabeth's flood of 1421.

The life of medieval knight Othon de Grandson.

William Burroughs and DMT.

The ever-popular mystery of Rennes-le-Chateau.

The sled from "Citizen Kane" just sold for a silly amount of money.

An assortment of youthful murderers.

"Weird space weather" from 41,000 years ago.

That time when the Nazis stole a fragment of the Bayeux Tapestry.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll recall the time hippos nearly conquered America.  In the meantime, here's Rod.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

Meanwhile, the Strange Company HQ staffers are off on their summer camping trip.

The questions about how Neanderthals buried their dead.

I never thought I'd see "Ulysses S. Grant" and "erotic vampire novels" in the same headline, but I guess it's just that sort of world.

The Knights Templar and Jesus' bones.

An 18th century abduction "under color of law."

In praise of the Etch A Sketch.

Britain's first book-of-the-month club.

The classic movie that may have been responsible for several deaths.

A newly-decoded Babylonian hymn.

How Napoleon spent his years in exile.

An aristocrat who was "Good for nothing and lived like a hog."

Why weddings have flower girls.

The mysterious death of "the only midget ever to play baseball in the major leagues."

The war between an Empress and a Queen.

A murder victim haunts the site of his death.

A historic library battles hungry beetles.

In case you're wondering what scientists do with all that sweet grant money, they have now proved that sloths break wind.  You're welcome.

The couple who survived 118 days on a rubber raft.

Meet Pepper, the virus-hunting cat.

The last soldier killed in WWI.

A new study about Easter Island.

An East India Company laborer goes from rags to riches.

A visit to Chatham Royal Dockyard.

A "wicked little thermometer."

A hotel where stray cats find a home.

The American Revolution and the Beeline March.

The 19th century craze for stupid (and dangerous) hoaxes.

Decoding a mysterious medieval tale.

Tortoises have feelings, too!  So, show them a bit more courtesy.

A 1678 crop circle.

Murder by cuspidor.

That's all for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll investigate a Weird Sound in the Woods.  In the meantime, here's another Blast From the Past.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Enjoy this week's Link Dump!

While you read, please feel free to join us in the club for Strange Company staffers.

The surprising DNA of an ancient Egyptian.

A visit to Old Rotherhithe.

A quite awful new theory about why cats were first domesticated.

Why "Peggy" is a nickname for "Margaret."

The capture of a slaver, 1845.

The Girls Who Killed the Rats.

The latest research about the Carnac stones.

Boccaccio and his literary self-portraits.

The surprising secrets of da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man."

That time when something very weird landed in Ireland.

That time when something very weird was spotted in New Mexico.

The Founding Mothers of New France.

What our ancestors wore to the beach.

A particularly brutal murder in Montana.

A look at underwater archaeology.

The menace of Merry Widow Hats.

The latest news from the Great Pyramid.  It'll be interesting to see if any of this truly holds up.

How 18th century New Jersey women briefly gained the right to vote.

Marie Curie's radioactive fingerprints.

This is for all of you who've been wondering what ancient Rome smelled like.

That time when cats got married at the Plaza Hotel.

So, England has a guy prowling around in a panther costume.

When ancient Rome had a urine tax.

The town named after a jungle vampire.

Four cases where men disappeared after being last seen in their cars.

A Shaikh's assassination on the beach.

A child's deathbed, 1883.

The Bayeux Tapestry is (temporarily) returning to England.

England's last political duel.

A case of "love, bigamy, and murder."

Good news, Oscar Wilde!  You can visit the British Library again!

A man and his biblioburro.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when it'll be poltergeists a-go-go!  In the meantime, here's a brief visit to medieval Paris.

Weekend Link Dump

 

The Strange Company staffers wishes all our fellow Americans a happy Independence Day!

The dark side of the Tower of London.

The dark side of small town America.

A 16th century manuscript about Robin Hood.

The mock mayor of Stroud Green.

Once upon a time, there was an ancient Roman with really freaking big feet.

Something that is not--in no shape or form, absolutely not, no way in hell--a photo of a Native American with a wolf.  So there.

The Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916.

Neanderthal "fat factories."

A deadly circus fire.

The unsolved murder of an unidentified man.

July-related customs and folklore.

A very shocking teacher.

Remembering a cat's summertime.

The real Lady Macbeth.

A destitute man gets aid from the India Office.

The tragedy of the human lightning rods.

Forgotten figures of the American Revolution.

So, basically, we have no idea why we call it "iceberg lettuce."

How Ancient Greeks thought you should throw a dinner party.

Fats Domino and Hurricane Katrina.

An ancient temple from a lost civilization.

The myth of Phineas Gage.

The artists who promoted the American Revolution.

A forgotten explorer.

A brief history of Tarot.

Anarchism in 19th century France.

A radical hostess.

The science behind Agatha Christie's poisons.

How Ice Age people harvested teeth.

The oldest known mummy.

The female doctors of WWI.

Could the Epic of Gilgamesh be even older than we thought?

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at a mysterious serial poisoner.  In the meantime, here's a rendition of the national anthem I remember from '77.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Don't be a dunce!  Read this week's Link Dump!

History's heaviest conventional bombs.

Another one for the "re-writing human history" file.

New York City's strangest riot.

The final shots of the Civil War were fired in the Arctic.

The oldest known human fingerprint.

The portraits of Emily Dickinson.

Annie Londonderry's bicycle revolution.

The London Monument.

The magical sea coconuts.

When you want a pension so badly you'll marry a corpse.

A cab driver's unsolved disappearance.

Seagulls may be getting drunk on ants.  Now, there's a sentence I never thought I'd write.

A Renaissance villa in the Bronx.

Yet another "rejected suitor" murder.

The man who invented modern zoos.  For animals and humans.

A 19th century Indian novelist.

The importance of garnets.

In search of Madagascar's man-eating tree.

The world's largest jewelry robbery.

A farewell letter from 1796.

The long history of the slop bowl.

The long history of zombies.

The time Boston had a red snowstorm.

The life of Margaret Tudor.

A brief history of Marseille.

The significance of some 23,000 year old footprints.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll meet a very strange being from medieval England.  In the meantime, here's a bit of modern Celtic folk.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump, where we've got the blues!

The eternal mystery of the Lost Colony of Roanoke.

An ultra-penal colony.

The Boston Bread Riot.

When the CIA tried to turn animals into assassins.  Because, CIA.

There's an "underwater staircase" in the Baltic Sea, and scientists are a bit freaked out.

A lot of strange things go on in Dulce, New Mexico.

It turns out that ChatGPT is a lousy therapist.  Golly, there's a shocker.

The Enlightenment's philosophical gravediggers.

A Kansas UFO incident.

Why "Jack" became a nickname for "John."

Convicts take a brutal journey to Australia.

The slow death of the semicolon.

Why Tokyo has "third-party toilet consultants."

We now have an idea of what Denisovans looked like.

A British MP's museum.

The tribe that doesn't dance, sing, or make fire.

A column wondering why birds haven't developed a complex culture.  I dunno, maybe it's because they have more sense than we do.

The "most coveted and desirable book in the world."

The magic of feathers.

"Jaws" turns 50.

The science behind near-death experiences.

A brief history of Americans being abducted by aliens.

The very weird murder of "God's banker."

Panic in Mattoon: A Mad Gasser or mass hysteria?

A famed rat-catcher.

A famed bookbinder.

The birth of "Mark Twain."

The Case of the Murdered Coachman.

The war dead of St. Paul's Cathedral.

The "General Slocum" disaster.

A "sea devil incarnate."

The Jumping Frenchmen of Maine.

A philosopher's "repugnant conclusion."

The theory that we're not the first advanced civilization.

Nothing to see here, just mysterious radio pulses coming from beneath Antarctica's ice. 

The "Holy Grail" of shipwrecks.

More Thundercrows!

Why Mars is currently confusing scientists.

A forgotten Founding Father.

Ancient treasure that's really out-of-this-world.

The discovery of an ancient underwater settlement.

A very weird ghost story from ancient Greece.

The cattiest countries in Europe.

A club for bores.

A brief history of pizza.

When you think you're getting a marriage proposal, and it turns out to be a book deal instead.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at a strange figure from Indian history.  In the meantime, here's Stevie:

Weekend Link Dump

 

Before beginning this week's Link Dump, we have a first for this blog:  a public proposal!

Watch out for Thundercrows!

An alleged UFO abduction at a state park.

A glimpse of a young widow and her child.

Don't look now, but the timeline of civilization just blew up in everyone's faces.

The Roman woman of Spitalfields.

The wreck of the ship Squantum, 1860.

The sort of face you make after spending two and a half years in a Greenland hut.

The Red Cross Murders.

In which we learn that palaeoanthropologists are a bunch of psychos.

The controversial Marguerite of Anjou.

Lydia Sherman, poison fiend.

The world's oldest known synthetic pigment turns out to have some odd properties.

Some largely-forgotten pie flavors.  To be honest, I can fully understand why some of them are forgotten.  In particular, "water pie" needs to be tied to an anvil and thrown in the Mariana Trench.

Related: some vintage dessert salads.

From Romanov princess to fashion icon.

New England, land of hermit tourism.

If you don't have time to read this whole piece, I can sum it up in four words:  Patricia Highsmith was weird.

Edinburgh's South Bridge Vaults.

Newly discovered Byzantine tombs in Syria.

The link between Bovril and science fiction.

Ancient human remains with weird DNA.

Human language probably emerged much earlier than we thought.

The birth of the Brooklyn Museum.

Murder at Sugar Valley Narrows.

Meanwhile, scientists are harassing cicadas into performing classical music.  Even though everyone knows they favor blues-rock.

A balloon expedition ends tragically.

A restaurant owner's mysterious disappearance.

A Gilded Age house that defied the developers.

Some honest-to-goodness zombies.

The tragic end of America's first game warden.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at a couple's unsolved disappearance.  In the meantime, here's a bit of vintage rock.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to the first Link Dump of June 2025!

Wedding season!

A tourist says a ghost is trying to kill him, and then he dies.  So.

Dolphin drug parties.  So.

That time when Petrarch was nearly killed by a book.

An attempt to explain Spontaneous Human Combustion.

The probable story behind a bizarre 1337 murder.

A look at a troubled 17th century pregnancy.

A look at auditory hallucinations.

A look at colonial ducking stools.

A look at our fear of the undead.

The knight who stood up to the Nazis.

RMS Amazon's ordeal by fire.

Bloomsbury Square during the Gordon Riots.

People are changing their brainwaves to feel less pain.

So now we may have to rewrite the history of writing.

An animal which was fossilized from the inside out.

How to build a 19th century dugout.

A famed doppelganger legend.

A betrayed woman's revenge.

A woman who disappeared 60 years ago is found alive and well.

A Victorian feminist.

The famously long-lived Thomas Parr.

A very weird ancient skull.

When Nazi U-boats prowled the Gulf Coast.

The Merry Mermaids of Margaret Morris.

The Vatican and the Monster of Ravenna.

A 17th century woman's sermon notes.

The origins of the term, "talking head."

The American colonists who picked the losing side of the Revolution.

The Dead Sea Scrolls may be even older than we thought.

The widow and her matchmaking cows.

The rat-filled origins of the Tooth Fairy.

The underwater forest that built Venice.

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll learn what happens when you offend a mummified cat.  In the meantime, let's get folky.