December 2023
December 11, 2023
The Ford Levacar Mach I
It's sixty years later. Where are our Levacars? From Wikipedia:
National Future Farmer - Oct-Nov 1959
Dr. Andrew A. Kucher, Ford vice president, in the Levacar Mach I
Posted By: Alex - Mon Dec 11, 2023 -
Comments (4)
Category: 1950s, Cars
Charmin’s Marshall Money
He's no Mister Whipple!
Posted By: Paul - Mon Dec 11, 2023 -
Comments (1)
Category: Hygiene, Premiums, Come-ons, Giveaways, Lossleaders and Freebies, Advertising, Wild West and US Frontier, 1960s
December 10, 2023
Cattle Bleaching
Strange news from Crook County, Wyoming:Nearly 200 cows were bleached. However, the judge dismissed the case because he couldn't find enough evidence to bring charges.
More info: Cowboy State Daily, AG Daily
Posted By: Alex - Sun Dec 10, 2023 -
Comments (2)
Category: Cows
Dior’s “Conspiration” Design
This 1954 number should have been revived for the Covid pandemic.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Dec 10, 2023 -
Comments (1)
Category: Fashion, 1950s, Diseases
December 9, 2023
Candidate for Harem
Aug 1964: Marie Miller, a 23-year-old divorcee, announced that in return for $50,000 per year she would be willing to join the harem of Sheik Suleiman el-Haseil who lived in Israel's Negev Desert. She explained that she was responding to a magazine ad apparently placed by the Sheik seeking an American wife.The Sheik responded that he didn't want her in his harem. He explained that he had placed an ad for an American wife back in 1958, but he was no longer interested in one.
Chillicothe Gazette - Aug 18, 1964
In fact, in December 1957 Sheik Suleiman had been reported to be seeking not just any American wife. He was hoping to marry Eleanor Roosevelt (widow of FDR).
Newsweek - Dec 16, 1957
The stress of the media frenzy following Marie Miller's offer seems to have overwhelmed her, and she ended up in the hospital with a bad back. She was also kicked out of her church.
Dayton Daily News - Aug 27, 1964
Sheik Suleiman (right) with reporter Paul McMahon (1961)
But where exactly did Miller get the idea that Sheik Suleiman was seeking an American wife? I think it traces back to a February 1964 article in HQ magazine by Trevor L.M. Maynard, "I Buy Brides for Arab Sheiks." It described Maynard's lucrative business as a finder of western wives for Arab sheiks, including Sheik Suleiman. He claimed to have arranged 117 marriages between young western women and Arab sheiks.
Click to read full article (pdf)
Posted By: Alex - Sat Dec 09, 2023 -
Comments (5)
Category: Marriage, 1960s
The Experimental Soundscapes of Henry Jacobs
His Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Dec 09, 2023 -
Comments (0)
Category: Avant Garde, 1950s, Cacophony, Dissonance, White Noise and Other Sonic Assaults
December 8, 2023
301 views
The video below is interesting as a peek into the way that YouTube works, but it's also interesting as a YouTube curiosity because its view counter is permanently stuck at 301, and has been for 11 years now, even though its actual view count is probably well over 1 million. Someone at YouTube had to deliberately freeze its view counter. As far as I know, it's the only video on YouTube that's received special treatment in this way.
Posted By: Alex - Fri Dec 08, 2023 -
Comments (1)
Category: Technology, Internet, Video
Shocking Presentation
Just to prove that B. F. Skinner was not the only guy who could do operant conditioning, Willard Hayes Yeager decided to teach his student to speak better in public by the use of electric shocks.You can read his textbook here.
Teachers shock students at George Washington U. Washington, D.C., Aug. 2. Public speaking students at G.W. U. are only too well acquainted with the shocking machine, invented by Dr. Willard Hayes Yeager, Head of the department, to take the "ahs" "ers" and "ums" out of their diction. He is shown putting on the shocker to Jane Hampton, 17. When the student makes a mistake the professor at the other end of the room, notifies her by a gentle electric shock.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Dec 08, 2023 -
Comments (1)
Category: Education, Sadism, Cruelty, Punishment, and Torture, Rhetoric, Eloquence, Public Speaking, and Vocabulary, 1930s
December 7, 2023
The First Woman to Marry a Hologram
Back in 2018 we posted about Akihiko Kondo, a Japanese man who married a hologram. His holographic wife floated inside a desktop device.Now Spanish artist Alicia Framis has announced she'll also be marrying a hologram. Her holographic partner is a life-size, three-dimensional projection powered by AI. His name is AILex.
Whereas Akihiko Kondo married a hologram because, by his own admission, he had trouble forming relationships with flesh-and-blood women, Framis is marrying a hologram as a piece of performance art which she's titled "The First Woman to Marry a Hologram."
She previously lived with a mannequin named Pierre.
More info: ElPais.com, AliciaFramis.com
Posted By: Alex - Thu Dec 07, 2023 -
Comments (0)
Category: Technology, AI, Robots and Other Automatons, Performance Art, Marriage
Don’t Go Near the Eskimos
Posted By: Paul - Thu Dec 07, 2023 -
Comments (4)
Category: Ethnic Groupings, Music, Stereotypes and Cliches, 1960s, Love & Romance
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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 |
