Eccentrics
Marion Stokes and Her 70,000 VHS Tapes
Article here.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Jun 28, 2019 -
Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Technology, Television, Outsider Art, Twentieth Century
Spikehorn Meyer, Friend to Bears
One of the forerunners of those folks who cuddle up to bears. Luckily, Spikehorn was never hurt.Article here.
Find-a-grave site.
Posted By: Paul - Fri Jun 21, 2019 -
Comments (0)
Category: Animals, Cult Figures and Artifacts, Daredevils, Stuntpeople and Thrillseekers, Eccentrics, Regionalism, Twentieth Century
The World’s Most Unusual Drugstore
See their complete 1942 ad here.
"Stack it high and sell it cheap" was Doc Webb's motto. Over the years, he built his empire from a small drug store at Ninth Street and Second Avenue, opened in 1925, to a sprawling bazaar of 77 stores, covering seven city blocks. Webb was as much a national legend as his stores. The unorthodox, merchandising medicine man always had a gimmick to lure thousands of customers through the doors. At ten cents a dance, no wonder the Dancing Chicken generated excitement at Webb's City in this 1975 photo. He sold dollar bills for 89 cents and bought them back the next day for $1.35. He offered three-cent breakfasts, brought in animals that performed at the drop of a coin and mermaids who "talked." He made other merchants mad because he sold his wares below the suppliers' suggested prices.
Article source.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Jun 20, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Business, Freebies, Come-ons and Loss Leaders, Eccentrics, Regionalism, Twentieth Century
Tony Pastor
Mr. Pastor had a somewhat unusual voice and presentation. I'm thinking Jim Nabors combined with Lou Costello.His Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Thu May 09, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Eccentrics, Music, Twentieth Century
World Black Pudding Throw Championship
The Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Wed May 08, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Eccentrics, Food, Regionalism, United Kingdom
Raising a Perfect Wife From Scratch
Sabrina Sidney, was a British foundling girl taken in when she was 12 by author Thomas Day, who wanted to mould her into his perfect wife. Day had been struggling to find a wife who would share his ideology and had been rejected by several women. Inspired by Jean-Jacques Rousseau's book Emile, or On Education, he decided to educate two girls without any frivolities, using his own concepts.
In 1769, Day and his barrister friend, John Bicknell, chose Sidney and another girl, Lucretia, from orphanages, and falsely declared they would be indentured to Day's friend Richard Lovell Edgeworth. Day took the girls to France to begin Rousseau's methods of education in isolation. After a short time, he returned to Lichfield with only Sidney, having deemed Lucretia inappropriate for his experiment. He used unusual, eccentric, and sometimes cruel, techniques to try to increase her fortitude, such as firing blanks at her skirts, dripping hot wax on her arms, and having her wade into a lake fully dressed to test her resilience to cold water.
The full story here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue May 07, 2019 -
Comments (0)
Category: Eccentrics, Education, Husbands, Wives, Eighteenth Century, Nineteenth Century, Love & Romance
The Rotating-Disc Ornithopter
Major article here.
Second piece here.
Inventor's Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Sun Apr 28, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Eccentrics, Technology, Air Travel and Airlines, 1930s
The Suitcase Junket
Hipster musician features homemade instruments, such as in the video below: silverware and cooking pot percussion.His YouTube channel.
His homepage.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Apr 27, 2019 -
Comments (0)
Category: Eccentrics, Bohemians, Beatniks, Hippies and Slackers, Hobbies and DIY, Music
Professor Burt, Endurance Pianist
"Lady nurse in attendance shaves him every day."
Source.
Source.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Apr 16, 2019 -
Comments (3)
Category: Eccentrics, Excess, Overkill, Hyperbole and Too Much Is Not Enough, Human Marvels, Motor Vehicles, Music, 1920s
The Ohwadas and their Tattoos
An instance of the Formerly Weird becoming No Longer Weird.
Original article here.
More pics here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Apr 09, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Art, Eccentrics, Museums, Foreign Customs, 1980s, Asia
| Who We Are |
|---|
| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. 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. Contact Us |