January 2021
January 16, 2021
Perfect Posture Girl
The Wikipedia page for Alexis Smith
San Francisco Examiner - Dec 20, 1942
Birmingham News - May 11, 1942
Posted By: Alex - Sat Jan 16, 2021 -
Comments (2)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Beauty, Ugliness and Other Aesthetic Issues, 1940s
Kiss Me
The urge to prank is eternal.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Jan 16, 2021 -
Comments (0)
Category: 1900s, Pranks
January 15, 2021
How to eat your Christmas tree
Artisan baker Julia Georgallis recently came out with a book that promises to tell you How To Eat Your Christmas Tree.
Amazon Link
That sounds like an interesting challenge. Unfortunately, as far as I can tell, the book doesn't tell you how to eat the entire tree. Instead, it's mostly about using the needles and bark in recipes.
But some searching on YouTube produced a video that delves into how to eat the entire tree. The catch is that to do so you'll need to pulp the wood and transform it into cellulose powder. Which is probably beyond the means of most people. But the video notes that cellulose powder derived from spruce trees is in many products, including parmesan cheese, pasta sauce, and ice cream. So almost everyone has eaten (highly processed) Christmas trees already.
Posted By: Alex - Fri Jan 15, 2021 -
Comments (2)
Category: Food, Cookbooks, Christmas
The Umbrellaship
The creator's website.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Jan 15, 2021 -
Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Outsider Art, Transportation
January 14, 2021
Anti-Barbecue Preacher
1929: Evangelist G.W. James, who preached against "barbecue sandwiches, cigarets, high-heeled shoes, short skirts, bobbed hair and other modern ideas," announced he was discontinuing his services due to low attendance. If the folks of Normalville wanted to hear him preach, he said, they would need to "indicate a desire for him to resume".
Connellsville Daily Courier - Oct 30, 1929
Posted By: Alex - Thu Jan 14, 2021 -
Comments (1)
Category: Food, Religion, 1920s
Stunt Rock
The trailer first, then the backstory.The Wikipedia entry.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jan 14, 2021 -
Comments (1)
Category: Death, Destruction, Ineptness, Crudity, Talentlessness, Kitsch, and Bad Art, Movies, Music, 1980s
January 13, 2021
Radioactive Spark Plugs
Firestone came out with radioactive spark plugs in 1940. The idea was that radioactive material (polonium) would improve the electrical conductivity of the spark plugs, resulting in better fuel combustion. More details from the Health Physics Historical Instrumentation Museum:
Monrovia News-Post - Mar 27, 1941
Posted By: Alex - Wed Jan 13, 2021 -
Comments (2)
Category: Atomic Power and Other Nuclear Matters, 1940s, Cars
The Sins of the Children
Article source.
WASHINGTON POST coverage here.
Here is the official write-up of the case and its outcome.
Posted By: Paul - Wed Jan 13, 2021 -
Comments (1)
Category: Lawsuits, Parents, Teenagers, 1990s, Pregnancy
January 12, 2021
Shaver’s Golf
Shaver's golf = a game to find out the smallest number of strokes with which you can shave your face.
Minneapolis Star - Aug 6, 1939
A useful aid for this game would be the "stroke-counting razor" invented by engineers at Gillette a few years ago. Using this tool, Gillette determined that the average man takes about 170 strokes to shave his face. So, in the game of shaver's golf, I guess that 170 would be considered par.
Posted By: Alex - Tue Jan 12, 2021 -
Comments (4)
Category: Games, Sports, Golf, Hair and Hairstyling
Peanuts Cast Does “Roundabout”
This is the newest in a series, others to be found here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Jan 12, 2021 -
Comments (0)
Category: Music, Homages, Pastiches, Tributes and Borrowings, Cartoons, 1970s
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction books such as Elephants on Acid. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Chuck Shepherd Chuck is the purveyor of News of the Weird, the syndicated column which for decades has set the gold-standard for reporting on oddities and the bizarre. Our banner was drawn by the legendary underground cartoonist Rick Altergott. Contact Us |
