Month: February 2011

Posted by Steve Busti
Almost a year ago we had a report that came out of N.C. from resident mountain-man Timothy Peeler who had an encounter with “Knobby,” a bigfoot like creature he described as being 10 feet tall, having six fingers on each hand and “beautiful hair”. You can watch the news report here.

Maybe this expedition will uncover actual evidence of Knobby. I wonder if the searchers will think to bring along a coyote caller like the one Tim Peeler used — it couldn’t hurt, right?

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Rick Lunsford, a Wilkes County resident who says he saw Bigfoot more than 30 years ago, is planning an expedition to look for proof of the elusive creature.

"I’m really looking for evidence, and looking for people to go with me," Lunsford said Thursday.

Bigfoot is said to be a large, fur-covered creature that lives in forests and avoids human contact. Bigfoot sightings have been reported in every U.S. state except Hawaii, according to the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization, a national group that investigates such reports. The evidence to date has consisted largely of witness reports, plaster casts of footprints, and fuzzy images.

Lunsford plans a March 5 expedition to search for evidence in the Roten Creek Road area in Wilbar. That is where he says he saw the creature back in late August or September 1978, when he was 20 years old.

Lunsford, now 52, came forward with his story last year.

He described Bigfoot as being somewhere between 6 and 8 feet tall and as broad as a refrigerator. Its arms were bowed out. It had dark hair, 3 or 4 inches long, on its arms. It gave off a terrible odor, he said.

But what he remembers most vividly, he said, were the creature’s dark, round eyes and oval head.

Read more: http://www2.journalnow.com/news/2011/feb/25/wsmain02-bigfoot-search-planned-in-nc-ar-811886/

Posted by Santellana
Book bound in human skin?! And wait- its NOT a cookbook? Still, we need more human-skin bound books in the Museum of the Weird.

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When Devon murderer George Cudmore was sentenced to hang at the Lent Assizes in 1830, he knew that part of his sentence was that his dead body would be taken to an Exeter hospital to be dissected.

What he probably was not aware of was that a chunk of his skin would eventually be flayed, tanned and used to cover an 1852 copy of The Poetical Works of John Milton.

The book is now housed at the Westcountry Studies Library in Exeter.

It will go on show to the public for the first time on 26 February as part of Devon’s annual Local History Day.

An inscription in the front of the book states whose skin it is and his crime.

Cudmore, a ratcatcher from Roborough, was convicted of killing his wife Grace by poisoning.

He was hanged at the Devon County Gaol – on the site of the current Exeter Prison – on 25 March 1830.

"We don’t really know why the skin was retained or, indeed, where," said Tony Rouse, senior assistant librarian.

"It must have been kept somewhere until 1853 when it was used to cover the book."

While binding books in human skin is not common, it is not unusual, says Mr Rouse.

The practice is known as anthropodermic bibliopegy and seems to have been most popular during the 18th and 19th centuries.

Many of the first books covered in human skin were medical books – the skins were primarily from amputated body parts and unclaimed corpses.

Occasionally, as in the case of Cudmore, the skin of executed prisoners was used. "It sounds grim but if I gave you the book to hold and didn’t tell you what it was covered in you would never know, it just looks like normal leather," said Mr Rouse.

And although no-one knows for sure who covered the book there are some theories it was Exeter bookseller W Clifford, as his bookseller’s ticket was discovered in the front of the book.

The bookplate in the front of the volume shows it was once part of a Mr Ralph Sanders’ library, which was probably donated to the Exeter City Library, eventually ending up in the Westcountry Studies Library.

This year’s local history event has a crime and punishment theme and as well as the book, the Exeter witchcraft trials and executions and the sites of the gallows in the county are up for discussion.

"I would really encourage people to come and have a look," said Mr Rouse.

"It’s not been on display before and it’s really not as gruesome as it sounds, although it is certainly one of the more unusual items we have here."

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-12539388

Posted by Steve Busti
Just days after the mysterious beast was allegedly photographed (above) by eyewitness Tom Pickles, there now comes another sighting. This report comes courtesy of Britain’s The Sun:
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A MYSTERY lake monster dubbed "Bownessie" has been sighted again – less than a week after it was photographed.
Holidaymaker Brian Arton, 61, described seeing something "dark with humps" sitting 300 yards out on the surface of Lake Windermere.
And he said it exactly matched the picture taken five days earlier by kayaker Tom Pickles.
Brian and his wife, from Hovingham, North Yorks, had just checked into a hotel by the Cumbrian lake when they saw the strange shape.
He said: "We thought it must be a pontoon, a log or an odd-looking buoy.
"We didn’t think it could possibly be an animal – but then it just disappeared."

Source: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3433306/Lake-monster-dubbed-Bownessie-seen-again-by-tourist.html

Posted by Steve Busti
Paul Hellyer is speaking this weekend at the International UFO Congress and Film Festival in Phoenix Hills, Arizona. If you are in the area or planning on attending, you can find more information on their website, www.ufocongress.com.
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He is on an advisory body to the Queen, works as an environmental campaigner and is credited with integrating Canada’s armed forces.
But aside from all this, the ex-Canadian defence minister says UFOs are real, aliens have visited Earth and the U.S. government is covering up information about them.
Paul Hellyer says he would probably get fired for his views if he was still Canada’s Minister of National Defense today, but is adamant he has seen UFOs himself.
The 87-year-old, who is the longest-serving member of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada, said he never discussed his views with top officials when he was in office.
‘This is the kind of thing that sometimes they don’t tell politicians about,’ he said.
‘I have no doubt that there were probably people in my employ who would have been more knowledgeable than I was at the time.’
‘I got periodic reports on sightings and I looked at them very casually. It was decided that about 80 per cent of them were natural phenomena of one sort or another and the other 20 per cent roughly were unexplained and therefore unidentified.’
Mr Hellyer is presenting his views on UFOs this week at the International UFO Congress in Scottsdale, Arizona, and says he is ‘convinced’ of their existence.
‘We lived too long in a sense of isolation, thinking that Earth was the centre of the cosmos, that we were the only species and, therefore, probably the most advanced.’ ‘And when we come to the realisation that we’re not any of those things, then I think we should be aware of it (and) learn to live with it,’ he told AOL News.
Mr Hellyer claims to have seen a UFO with his wife when spending last Thanksgiving near Toronto, and they stared at the sky for 20 minutes watching it moving.
He told AOL: ‘By process of elimination, we determined it wasn’t a star or satellite and it wasn’t the space station, so there was really no explanation for it other than it was, in fact, a UFO. It looked like a star, but it manoeuvred in a way that stars don’t.’
He believes the U.S. has developed new forms of energy at secret ‘black operation’ units using alien technology and that a ‘shadow government’ is behind this activity.
Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell, founder of the Institute of Noetic Sciences research group, has described Mr Hellyer’s theory as an ‘important contribution’ to literature.
‘His experience in government, his interest in exo-politics and the issues of sustainability of civilization are significant areas of current discourse,’ he said.
Retired Army Colonel John Alexander, also speaking at this week’s conference, believes UFOs are real but says there has never been a cover-up.
Mr Hellyer added: ‘People keep talking about transparency and still not telling the truth, and this applies in various other areas as well as UFOs.
‘It’s just about time that we started getting open with each other and trying to get along and live together.’
He said he would ‘probably be open-mouthed about it’ and ‘might get fired for it’ if he talked about his opinions in office today.
He said in 2005 that the U.S. military was preparing weapons to use against aliens, and they ‘could get us into an intergalactic war without us ever having any warning’.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1360737/I-believe-UFOs–Ive-seen-says-ex-defence-minister-Paul-Hellyer.html

Posted by Steve Busti
Hey, wait… “Thunder-thighs?” She’s just big-boned, alright paleontologists?
Jerks.
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A new dinosaur named Brontomerus mcintoshi, or "thunder-thighs" after its enormously powerful thigh muscles, has been discovered in Utah, USA.
A member of the long-necked sauropod group of dinosaurs which includes Diplodocus and Brachiosaurus, Brontomerus may have used its powerful thighs as a weapon to kick predators, or to help travel over rough, hilly terrain, experts believe.
Brontomerus lived about 110 million years ago, during the Early Cretaceous Period, and probably had to contend with fierce "raptors" such as Deinonychus and Utahraptor.
The new species is described in a paper recently published in the journal Acta Palaeontologica Polonica by an international team of scientists from Britain and the US.
The fossilised bones of two specimens of Brontomerus mcintoshi – an adult and a juvenile – were rescued from a previously looted and damaged quarry in eastern Utah by researchers from the Sam Noble Museum, US.
Paleontologists speculate that the larger specimen is the mother of the younger and would have weighed around 6 tons, about the size of a large elephant, and measured 14 meters in length.
At a third of the size, the smaller specimen would have weighed about 200kg, the size of a pony, and been 4.5m long.

“Hmm… let me just sit back in my office chair 
while this gigantic beast tramples me to death.”

The authors classified the new genus based on an incomplete skeleton including bones from the shoulder, hip, ribs, vertebrae and some unidentifiable fragments.
They used the bones to identify Brontomerus’ unique features, primarily the shape of the hip bone, which, in the case of Brontomerus, is unusually large in comparison to that of similar dinosaurs.
The wide, blade-shaped bone projects forward ahead of the hip socket, providing a proportionally massive area for the attachment of muscles.
The shape of the bone indicates that the animal would likely have had the largest leg muscles of any dinosaur in the sauropod family.
This is reflected in the name Brontomerus, which literally means "thunder-thighs." The dinosaur’s species name, mcintoshi, was chosen in honour of John "Jack" McIntosh, a retired physicist at Wesleyan University, Conn., and lifelong avocational paleontologist.
"Brontomerus mcintoshi is a charismatic dinosaur and an exciting discovery for us," said first author Dr Mike Taylor, a researcher in the Department of Earth Sciences at University College London.
"When we recognised the weird shape of the hip, we wondered what its significance might be, but we concluded that kicking was the most likely.
The kick would probably have been used when two males fought over a female, but given that the mechanics were all in place it would be bizarre if it wasn’t also used in predator defence."

Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/dinosaurs/8340939/Dinosaur-discovery-new-thunder-thighs-dinosaur-discovered-by-British-scientists.html

10:00 PM CST, TONIGHT: Aron Houdini calls himself "The only living Houdini." It is his real name and he follows in the footsteps of the immortal Harry Houdini as an escape artist. We’ll talk to him about his record-breaking feats and his views on the paranormal as we prepare for the Texas Ghost Show in March.

As always, the lines will be open and we encourage you to call in with your questions. The call in number for tonight’s show is (347) 826-9662 or call toll-free at (877) 867-0829.

Listen right here with our blogtalkradio widget below. You can listen to past broadcasts at any time, or tune in tonight (Wednesday, February 23rd) at 10pm Central for the live broadcast. See you in the shadows…

Posted by Steve Busti
The photo above is not of a real catfish: believe it or not, it’s actually a robotic Unmanned Underwater Vehicle (or UUV) called Charlie and it was developed by the CIA. Containing a pressurized hull, Charlie was able to spy and collect data using complex ballast, communication and propulsion systems.
And you thought this kind of stuff only happened in the movies…
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It’s the sort of idea that would be laughed out of any plot for a spy film: Secret agents using a radio-controlled robot catfish to swim up to their enemies and collect information.
Yet, unbelievably, the Central Intelligence Agency dreamed up such a device in the Seventies, called Charlie – and has now revealed it and other stranger-than-fiction gadgets on a new website.
The agency simultaneously launched a website and pages on YouTube and Flickr last week, revealing the sorts of equipment that would leave James Bond’s Q Branch green with envy.

Dragonfly spy: Another device from the Office of Research and 
Development (wow, what were those guys on?) is the ‘Insectothopter’. 
This Unmanned Aerial Vehicle is the grandfather of the modern-day drone

The agency says the sites allow visitors to ‘find new ways to connect to a broad array of Agency content’.
The YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/ciagov) has a range of unintentionally amusing ‘tours’ and potted histories of the spy agency.
But by far and away the most intriguing is its Flickr stream (http://www.flickr.com/photos/ciagov), which shows off some of the weird and wonderful gadgets employed since the Second World War.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1359254/CIA-secret-agent-gadgets-Website-reveals-Charlie-robot-catfish.html

Posted by Steve Busti
Dolphins are amazing animals. The fact that they readily communicate with us is not surprising to me at all. What is surprising is that it has taken us humans this long to establish communication with our “second brightest creatures” on the planet. You would think that with we humans being the smartest, we would have tried interspecies communication like this a long time ago.
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Dolphins are the world’s second brightest creatures after humans and have many brain features associated with high intelligence.
So clever are the aquatic mammals that scientists have frequently communicated with those in captivity by rewarding their responses with fish.
But behavioural biologists have now carried out two-way communication with dolphins in the wild in the first study of its kind.
Dr Denise Herzing and colleagues at the Wild Dolphin Project in Jupiter, Florida, established a shared, primitive form of language using sounds, symbols and props.
‘Many studies communicate with dolphins, especially in captivity, using fish as a reward,’ Dr Herzing told Wired.com. ‘But it’s rare to ask dolphins to communicate with us.’
The experiment revolved around both dolphins and humans asking each other for props such as balls and scarves.
A large underwater keyboard formed the focus of the study; each key was painted with a different symbol and emitted a precisely pitched whistle.
When a dolphin pressed a certain key with her nose, researchers would throw the corresponding prop into the water. Should the dolphin instead decide to whistle the pitch that a certain key would emit, then that prop would be thrown in.
Over the course of three years, the scientists played with the dolphins for 40 half-hour sessions.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1357611/Theyve-really-clicked-Dolphins-scientists-talk-using-shared-primitive-language.html#ixzz1Eisb4x5F

10:00 PM CST, TONIGHT: Welcome to another episode of "The Shadow Hour," an Internet-based radio program that talks about the strange, the odd, and the unusual.

There has been a lot of strange activity, from weird weather, to mass animal deaths and more UFO sightings. What is going on? Our assistant producer, Mark Faulkner, has been curious about these things as well and has been doing some digging. We’re going to talk about the theories he has uncovered and some of the clues that he has found. We’ll also be taking calls so you can give your input.

The lines will be open and we encourage you to call in with your questions. The call in number for tonight’s show is (347) 826-9662 or call toll-free at (877) 867-0829.

Listen right here with our blogtalkradio widget below. You can listen to past broadcasts at any time, or tune in tonight at 10pm Central for the live broadcast. See you in the shadows…

Posted by Santellana
Well this is heartwarming and heartbreaking all at once. And I could not help reading the article and thinking it might be re-written as lyrics to perhaps the best punk song ever.
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Stuck on a rock in a crocodile infested river, this Wildebeest must have feared for its life.

And, separated from the rest of the herd with a group of hippos closing in, the prospects for the animal did not seem appealing.

But in an amazing act of animal compassion one of the passing hippos paddles over and gives the wildebeest a quick leg-up to set it on its way.

The bull hippo takes pity on the struggling creature and fixes it enormous jaws around it and lifts it away from the rock.

The wildebeest was then released from the rock and tried to join the rest of its herd which had been crossing the Masai River during an annual crossing in Masai Mara, Kenya.

Unfortunately despite the hippo’s best attempts the wildebeest struggled to make it across the river and drowned with a broken back.

Photographer Mitchell Krog, 39, said: ‘One of the more mature hippo bulls eventually came very close to the wildebeest and tried nudging him a few times to see if he could free the animal from the rocks.

‘The hippo sensed the wildebeest was injured and had no chance of survival. It’s not often an animal like a hippo shows a softer side.

‘This proved useless and eventually this same hippo grabbed the wildebeest on his back using his mouth and dragged it clear of the rocks and into a deeper section of river where he then released it into the river flow. ‘

Read More : http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1357513/Hippo-help-Amazing-moment-hippopotamus-tries-rescue-drowning-wildebeest.html