An account of the life and death of John Cummings, a man who strove to earn a Darwin Award long before the concept of Darwin Awards existed. Reported in the Chicago Tribune, March 14, 1880:
In the narrative of memorable cases connected with Guy's Hospital there is a curious story of a sailor named John Cummings, who, in a spirit of vulgar brag, and mostly when half intoxicated, swallowed clasp-knives. In 1799 he had seen a French juggler perform the trick of assumedly swallowing knives of that kind at a public entertainment. The feat was so cleverly performed that the spectators -- or at least some of them -- were under the belief that the knives vanished down the throat of the juggler, instead of being put by sleight-of-hand in some part of his dress. The sailor, in his simplicity, was one of the credulous sort, and to astonish his messmates he began to swallow clasp-knives. He at first only swallowed four, which, fortunately for him were expelled, and no inconvenience ensued. He thought no more of knife-swallowing for six years. In March, 1805, when at Boston, he was one day tempted, while drinking with a party of sailors, to boast of his former exploits, and was ready to repeat his performance. A small knife was produced, which he instantly swallowed. In the course of that evening he swallowed five more. The next morning crowds of visitors came to see him, and in the course of the day he was induced to swallow eight knives more, making in all fourteen.
He paid dearly for his frolic; for he was seized with constant vomiting, and pain in the stomach. Taken to a hospital, he was by efficacious medical treatment relieved, as he imagined, of all the knives he had swallowed. But in this he would appear to have been mistaken. Portions of knives undissolved remained in his stomach. The amount of relief, whatever it was, did not cure the poor wretch of his folly. When at Spithead in December, 1805, and somewhat tipsy, he resumed his boastfulness of being able to swallow knives, and to amuse the ship's company swallowed nine clasp-knives, some of them of a large size. Again he became ill, and was in the hands of the ship's surgeon for several months, during which portions of knives were discharged. At length he was admitted as a patient at Guy's Hospital in 1807, and again he came to the hospital in 1808. There he remained, sinking under his sufferings, until March, 1809, when he died in a state of extreme emaciation.
On her resume, cabaret comedienne Amy Gordon lists her Special Skills as: Rollerskate dancing (disco, tap), Ukulele, Swing Dance, Tango, Stilts, Slackwire, Rolling Globe, Yoga, Prat/Stairfalls, Hat-tricks, Juggling (pass clubs, knives, fire), rubber face/body, dialects, Dutch/French languages, Pyrotechnic Shooter.
Her acts include doing a Flamenco dance on rollerskates, singing "Taint No Sin" accompanied in harmony by skulls she wears as a bra, as well as playing "America the Beautiful" in three part harmony on kazoos from three different orifices. The latter act you can see below.
So far as I can tell, this famed bit of performance art is an exact depiction of what most of the WU commenters are always seeking to arrange amongst themselves.
Fans of famed comics artist Jules Feiffer will surely recall his good-hearted but light-headed character who spontaneously broke into dance to celebrate or bewail any proposition or concept, however absurd. You can see an example of Feiffer's creation to the far right.
Well, it appears that Feiffer did not create such a character, but merely drew from life. Or perhaps the gal whom you see in mid-air, next to the Feiffer panel, was inspired by Feiffer.
For in this BOSTON GLOBE obituary we learn how "Gabrielle Orcha of Cambridge, a choreographer and playwright," intends to mark her grandmother's passing.
"As a tribute to her grandmother, Orcha has choreographed a dance, commissioned by the Citi Performing Arts Center, that she will perform at the Shubert Theatre in May."
In the video below magician Keith Barry gives a performance at the annual TED conference in Monterey. Speakers at the TED conference are usually leaders in their field, so I don't know how Barry got chosen. I would have thought someone like Ricky Jay would have been a much better choice if they wanted a top-quality magician. Barry tries to spin his tricks as "brain magic." Actually, they're just standard, run-of-the-mill tricks. Still, it's always fun to guess how a magician does his tricks. My hypotheses are below. (I cheated by reading the comment thread at the TED talk site, where many people already left their guesses.)
Note: if the embedded video isn't showing for you, you can see the video at the TED site.
The turning hand trick: At one point during the trick Barry releases his hands to point at someone in the audience. He rotates his arms before bringing his hands back together. Conveniently, the camera cuts away while he's doing this.
Driving a car blindfolded: I'm not sure. Possibly he memorized the route, or he's getting instructions from someone viewing through the camera behind him.
The voodoo experiment: He actually does touch the woman on her back early in the process of waving his hands around her, so it's no mystery when she says she's been touched there. He also moves his hands very close to her arm, so she probably did feel a tickling sensation there.
Synchronicity experiment: In some of the shots you can actually see Barry stepping on the guy's foot in order to indicate to the guy when he should raise or lower his arm. Very amateurish.
Shattered Coke bottle: There are commercially available "trick" bottles that will produce this effect. They're called Bologna Bottles. So it's physics, not magic.
Cup and Stick illusion: I don't know how the trick works, but you can buy this illusion off-the-shelf at many magic stores. And even though Barry claims that the audience member chose all the cups he was going to crush, that's not true. Barry chose the first cup. He only asked the audience member to confirm if his hand was over a cup.
According to the Raffaele De Ritis blog, the performer in this video is Elvis Mokko from Mozambique: "He was a regular feature of european night-clubs in the 70s, then turning to theme park and events in Germany." This video shows a performance in Cirque d'Hiver, Paris, during the late 70s.
The question I have is how he ever dreamed up this performance in the first place. What inspires a person to find out if they can lift a chair in their mouth?
I recently met a woman who could tie a knot in the stem of a maraschino cherry with her tongue. I thought that was pretty impressive. But what this Romanian chewing gum sculptor can do is even more impressive.
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.