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The double-helix structure of DNA was discovered in 1953 by James Watson and Francis Crick. The length of a single human DNA molecule, when extended, is 1.7 metres (5 ft 5 in). |
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7 of the Weirdest Human Enigmas
Posted on Saturday, September 23, 2006 (CDT) by Thoth
 Most kids love reading the color funny papers on Sundays. As a kid, one of my favorite strips was "Ripley's Believe It or Not." It always featured some fantastic facts or coincidences. Often it would tell of people with unusual abilities, characteristics, or circumstances: a man with a birthmark in the shape of a perfect heart on his chest; a woman whose head was shaped like a Ming vase; twins with six ears between them. Stuff like that.
It makes interesting reading and, of course, I'm still fascinated by such amazing tales. Here are 7 of the strangest stories of most mysterious people of unknown origin, fate or astonishing, unexplained abilities.
The Green Children: In 1887, two small children were found alone near the town of Banjos, Spain. But these were no ordinary children who had been lost or abandoned by parents. They were discovered by field hands who were distracted from their work by frightened cries.
Upon
investigation, they found a small boy and girl, scared and crying,
huddled near the entrance to a cave. Their language was unknown to the
workers – it certainly wasn't Spanish. More mysterious still, they wore
clothes made of a strange metallic cloth... and their skin had an odd
green tint.
After being taken to the
village to be cared for, the boy soon died since it was difficult to
get either of them to eat anything. But the girl survived, and when at
last she was able to communicate in Spanish with her caregivers, she
told them that she and her brother had come from a place that had no
sun, but a land of perpetual twilight. When asked how they came to be
at the cave, she said that they had heard a loud bang, were pushed
through "something," and then were in the cave.
A Modern Jonah
The Bible records the
account of Jonah who was swallowed by a whale or a great fish, but was
later freed from the beast. In 1891, a British sailor lived through the
same fate. The seamen aboard the whaling ship The Star of the East
struggled to kill a great sperm whale and bring it on board. In the
battle between man and beast, two sailors disappeared. But when the
whale's stomach and liver were hoisted onto the deck of the ship, it
was noticed that something was moving inside the stomach. Cutting open
the stomach, the crew found James Bartley, one of the missing men,
curled up, unconscious, but still alive.
The Disappearance of Bernardo Vazquez
Twenty-year-old Bernardo
Vazquez was obsessed with the unknown and black magic, as well as
getting rich. People who knew him in San Juan, Puerto Rico say he may
have succeeded with a bizarre experiment that made him invisible. After
consulting his books on the occult, he one day told his mother that he
had learned how to become invisible – through a strange ritual
involving a black cat, wood from an old coffin and a tin can. He
believed that by boiling the cat and using a resulting bone to place
under his tongue he could be invisible at will.
One night be barricaded
himself in his room at the back of the house to carry out the ritual.
His mother became concerned when he never came out, and she called the
authorities. They had to break into his room where they found the
disturbing remnants of his ritual – the burned wood and a disemboweled
black cat. But Bernardo was nowhere to be found. Did he indeed become
invisible... or did he vanish into the unknown?
Firestarter
Benedetto Supino’s
astonishing and dangerous abilities came to public attention in the
early 1980s, when he was just 10 years old. Benedetto, of Formia,
Italy, could set things afire just by staring at them. More often, his
power to start fires was involuntary, erupting merely by his presence.
The first incident took place in 1982 in a dentist’s waiting room.
Without cause or warning, the comic book Benedetto was reading suddenly
caught fire.
One morning he was awakened
by a fire in his own bed – his pajamas were in flames and the boy
suffered severe burns. On another occasion, a small plastic object held
in his uncle’s hands began to burn as Benedetto stared at it. Just
about everywhere he went, furniture, paper, books and other items would
start to smolder or burn. Some witnesses even claimed to see his hands
glow at these moments.
The Delphos Wolf Girl
There are many stories of
feral children – children who apparently have been raised in the wild,
sometimes by animals and adopting animal-like behavior – but the story
of the wolf girl sighted near Delphos, Kansas in the early 1970s is one
of the strangest. Weirder still, it might have a UFO connection.
It began in July 1974 when
reports began to come in of the sighting of a wild-looking girl of
about 10 to 12 years of age. Witnesses said she had matted yellow hair
and wore ragged red clothing. Upon being sighted, the girl would
scamper away like an animal on all fours. During searches for the girl
by authorities around the central Kansas town, some people were
attacked and scratched by the girl.
The possible UFO connection
actually begins two years earlier in 1971 when 16-year-old Ronald
Johnson claimed to see a mushroom-shaped UFO land in a wooded area near
Delphos. He further claimed that seeing the UFO had injured his eyes
but had also given him psychic powers. It was during this time that he
said he encountered a wild, blonde-haired girl who ran away from him on
all fours. Was it the same girl... and was there a connection to the
UFO?
Zana the Apewoman
Zana’s story is that of
another feral female, but her story is quite different than others.
While feral children are wild and animal-like in behavior but always
human, Zana actually looked somewhat less than human. Discovered in the
mid-1700s in the Russian province of Georgia, Zana, as she was named,
had many ape-like features: thick arms, legs, and fingers, and she was
covered with hair. Some have speculated that she was a survivor of the
Neanderthal race... or perhaps a female Bigfoot... or some human/ape
hybrid.
Defying Gravity and Belief
Daniel Dunglas Home may not
be as familiar a name to us today as Harry Houdini, but perhaps he
should be. Either he was one of the greatest psychics of the 19th
Century, able to demonstrate remarkable (some say paranormal) feats, or
he was one of the greatest magicians. At séances he could make heavy
tables and chairs (often with people sitting in them) levitate. Under
close observation he could place his hands and face into red-hot coals
without harm. He could make himself grow and stretch up to 12 inches
taller.
In his most famous
demonstration, he is said to have floated out of a window of a
four-story building and then appear outside an adjacent window, which
he then climbed in, to the astonishment of his audience. Unlike many
mediums of his day, Home welcomed scrutiny by scientists and skeptics.
None were ever able to prove his feats were tricks or to explain how he
accomplished them.
Sources:
Copyright: About.com
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Re: 7 of the Weirdest Human Enigmas
by FyreSpirit on Saturday, September 23, 2006 (CDT)
(User Info | Send a Message | Journal) | The story about the green children of Banjos could be based on an earlier English story from the 12th century. Here's the account in our Content section : http://www.thothweb.com/content-448.html
Also, here's a link to a site with more detail on the English and Spanish accounts. http://www.holloworbs.com/green_children_wolfpitte.htm
We also have a link to an excellent site dealing with the phenomenon of feral children : http://www.mysteriouspeople.com/ |
Re: 7 of the Weirdest Human Enigmas (Score: 1)
by Bob62901 on Saturday, September 23, 2006 (CDT)
(User Info | Send a Message) http://members.toast.net/bob62901/public%5Fhtml/ | | The account of the green children is almost identical to the accounts told by English historians William of Newburgh and Ralph of Coggeshall of green children found at Woolpit (Wolf's Pit), England in the mid-12th century. There is no doubt that the Spanish account is based on this story. |
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Re: 7 of the Weirdest Human Enigmas
by kernopolis on Saturday, September 23, 2006 (CDT)
(User Info | Send a Message) | I love this stuff - Brings me back to elementary school when all I wanted to read were Guiness World Book's of Records.
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