5 Monsters You Never Heard Of

BIGFOOT, NESSIE, MOTHMAN, even the dinosaur-like mokele-mbembe have become as familiar to us as wooly mammoths and saber-toothed tigers. The difference is that the first group might still be hanging around out there somewhere.


There are many other crypto-creatures whose names might not be so familiar to you, however. And as we go through our list, you’ll notice that most of them share a trait in common: they have been reported by native tribes in remote, mostly unexplored parts of the world. This fact raises these possibilities as to the reality of their existence:

• They are merely folklore of the tribespeople.
• They are modern-day creatures known to science, but as yet unidentified.
• They are species as yet unknown to science.
• They are species known to science but thought to be extinct, such as creatures from the dinosaur era.
• It’s that last possibility that whets our appetite, of course, because it certainly is feasible that a prehistoric animal could have survived in these dense, tropical areas, protected from human civilization.

The only way to find out which of these possibilities is true for any of these creatures is to mount expeditions to these isolated pockets of jungle and swamp and document evidence. Such expeditions have taken place, in some cases, but came up empty-handed. (Naturally, if they were successful, these creatures wouldn’t be listed in 5 Monsters You Never Heard Of – they’d be big news.)


BURU


If it existed at all, this swamp-dwelling monster may have only recently died out. Local tribes of the Apa Tani Valley and the Jiro Valley in northern Assam, India, claimed to have seen this large, crocodile-like monster many times over the years. They described it as measuring between 11 and 13 feet long with a long snout, four limbs, and 5-foot-long tail. Unlike a crocodile, however, the buru did not have scales, but rather was smooth with blue and white coloration. Natives testified that it would occasionally lift its head out of the water and let out a bellow that could be heard over great distances.

After many run-ins with the creature, the natives deliberately set out to destroy the creature by draining its swamp habitat. The last one may have died sometime in the early 1940s, although some natives believe it only retreated underground. An expedition sponsored by London’s Daily Mail in 1948 proved fruitless, although it came away convinced that the natives were quite sincere in their belief in its existence.


Cryptozoologist Dr. Karl Shukar, after examining all the available evidence, surmised that the buru might have been a species of giant lungfish.


DINGONEK


A walrus-like creature in the heart of Africa? Such is the description of the dingonek by John Alfred Jordan, an explorer who actually shot at this unidentified monster in the River Maggori in Kenya in 1907. Jordan claimed this scale-covered creature was a big as 18 feet long and had reptilian claws, a spotted back, long tail, and a big head out of which grew large, curved, walrus-like tusks.

Natives of the area further described it as having a scorpion-like tail and reported that it would kill any hippos, crocodiles, or human fisherman that dared encroach on its territory.


This sounds like a fantasy creature, but consider this: At the Brackfontein Ridge in South Africa is a cave painting of an unknown creature that fits the description of the dingonek, right down to its walrus-like tusks.


EMELA-NTOUKA


Emela-ntouka literally means “elephant killer,” aptly named by natives of the Republic of Congo who have seen this swamp-dwelling monster attack and disembowel elephants that cross its path. The instrument of this disembowelment is a large, ivory or bone horn on the animal’s head, leading to speculation that the emela-ntoouka might be a surviving relative of the triceratops or styracosaurus.

This is a nasty, vicious creature, according to the natives, who further described it as having a red-brown color, massive legs, and the ability to hide totally submerged beneath the water. Interestingly, its attack on elephants seems only to be defensive or territorial, since the monsters don’t eat the elephants. They seem to be plant-eaters.


KONGAMATO


Pterodactyl-like flying monsters are said to have been sighted in modern-day Southwestern United States. The kongamato is the African version of this dinosaur-era holdover, reportedly seen in Zambia and Zimbabwe. Although not as large as pterodactyls known from fossils – 4- to 7-foot wingspans compared to as large as 33-foot wingspans – the kongamato resembles the prehistoric creature in virtually every other respect: a long, tapered jaw filled with sharp teeth, bat-like membranous wings, and an overall lizard-like appearance.

Some researchers think the kongamato could in fact be a large species of bat. However, in 1923, explorer Frank Melland heard of this creature while traveling through Zambia. Intrigued, he showed illustrations of a pterodactyl to the locals, and "every native present immediately and unhesitatingly picked out and identified it as a kongamato."


MINHOCÃO


Let us leave the African continent now and travel to South America, where there have been reports not of a dinosaur-like creature but (perhaps more disturbingly) of a giant worm. Witnesses in Uruguay and southern Brazil describe the monster as looking like a gigantic armor-plated slug. Imagine a black slug as big as 14 feet long with a snout like a pig’s and two tentacles poking out of its head. Some reports have it as long as 75 feet! Normally living underground, the minhocão occasionally surfaces, leaving deep trenched in its wake.

Most scientists think its length has been exaggerated and suggest that the minhocão could either be: an unknown species of horned viper; a glyptodont, a giant relative of the armadillo, thought to be extinct; or an outsized caecilian, a subterranean worm-like amphibian.


Those are good guesses. But we know what the minhocão really is. Like the other creatures profiled in this article, they are the living, breathing monsters that hide in the damp, dark shadowy corners of our planet.

Create a Ghost...!!!

Is it possible to create a ghost? Consider these familiar types of ghost experiences:


A group of teenagers gathered around a Ouija board receives mysterious messages from a person's spirit who claims to have died 40 years ago.
A paranormal society conducts a séance where they contact a ghost that communicates though table rappings.
The residents of a century-old home continually see the spirit of a young child playing in the hallway.
What are these manifestations? Are they truly the ghosts of departed people? Or are they creations of the minds of the people who see them?


Many researchers of the paranormal suspect that some ghostly manifestations and poltergeist phenomena (objects flying through the air, unexplained footsteps and door slammings) are products of the human mind. To test that idea, a fascinating experiment was conducted in the early 1970s by the Toronto Society for Psychical Research (TSPR) to see if they could create a ghost. The idea was to assemble a group of people who would make up a completely fictional character and then, through séances, see if they could contact him and receive messages and other physical phenomena - perhaps even an apparition.


THE BIRTH OF PHILIP


The TSPR, under the guidance of Dr. A.R.G. Owen, assembled a group of eight people culled from its membership, none of whom claimed to have any psychic gifts. The group, which became known as the Owen group, consisted of Dr. Owen's wife, a woman who was the former chairperson of MENSA (an organization for high-IQ people), an industrial designer, an accountant, a housewife, a bookkeeper and a sociology student. A psychologist named Dr. Joel Whitton also attended many of the group's sessions as an observer.



The group's first task was to create their fictional historical character. Together they wrote a short biography of the person they named Philip Aylesford. Here, in part, is that biography:

Philip was an aristocratic Englishman, living in the middle 1600s at the time of Oliver Cromwell. He had been a supporter of the King, and was a Catholic. He was married to a beautiful but cold and frigid wife, Dorothea, the daughter of a neighboring nobleman.


One day when out riding on the boundaries of his estates Philip came across a gypsy encampment and saw there a beautiful dark-eyed girl raven-haired gypsy girl, Margo, and fell instantly in love with her. He brought her back secretly to live in the gatehouse, near the stables of Diddington Manor - his family home.


For some time he kept his love-nest secret, but eventually Dorothea, realizing he was keeping someone else there, found Margo, and accused her of witchcraft and stealing her husband. Philip was too scared of losing his reputation and his possessions to protest at the trial of Margo, and she was convicted of witchcraft and burned at the stake.


Philip was subsequently stricken with remorse that he had not tried to defend Margo and used to pace the battlements of Diddington in despair. Finally, one morning his body was found at the bottom of the battlements, whence he had cast himself in a fit of agony and remorse.


The Owen group even enlisted the artistic talents of one of its members to sketch a portrait of Philip (see picture above). With their creation's life and appearance now firmly established in their minds, the group began the second phase of the experiment: contact.


THE SÉANCES BEGIN


In September 1972, the group began their "sittings" - informal gatherings in which they would discuss Philip and his life, meditate on him and try to visualize their "collective hallucination" in more detail. These sittings, conducted in a fully lit room, went on for about a year with no results. Some members of the group occasionally claimed they felt a presence in the room, but there was no result they could consider any kind of communication from Philip.


So they changed their tactics. The group decided they might have better luck if they attempted to duplicate the atmosphere of a classic spiritualist séance. They dimmed the room's lights, sat around a table, sang songs and surrounded themselves with pictures of the type of castle they imagined Philip would have lived in, as well as objects from that time period.


It worked. During one evening's séance, the group received its first communication from Philip in the form of a distinct rap on the table. Soon Philip was answering questions asked by the group - one rap for yes, two for no. They knew it was Philip because, well, they asked him.


The sessions took off from there, producing a range of phenomena that could not be explained scientifically. Through the table-rapping communication, the group was able to learn finer details about Philip's life. He even seemed to exhibit a personality, conveying his likes and dislikes, and his strong views on various subjects, made plain by the enthusiasm or hesitancy of his knockings. His "spirit" was also able to move the table, sliding it from side to side despite the fact that the floor was covered with thick carpeting. At times it would even "dance" on one leg.


PHILIP'S LIMITATIONS AND POWER


That Philip was a creation of the group's collective imagination was evident in his limitations. Although he could accurately answer questions about events and people of his time period, it did not appear to be information that the group was unaware of. In other words, Philip's responses were coming from their subconscious - their own minds. Some members thought they heard whispers in response to questions, but no voice was ever captured on tape.


Philip's psychokinetic powers, however, were amazing and completely unexplained. If the group asked Philip to dim the lights, they would dim instantly. When asked to restore the lights, he would oblige. The table around which the group sat was almost always the focal point of peculiar phenomena. After feeling a cool breeze blow across the table, they asked Philip if he could cause it to start and stop at will. He could and he did. The group noticed that the table itself felt different to the touch whenever Philip was present, having a subtle electric or "alive" quality. On a few occasions, a fine mist formed over the center of the table. Most astonishing, the group reported that the table would sometimes be so animated that it would rush over to meet latecomers to the session, or even trap members in the corner of the room.


The climax of the experiment was a séance conducted before a live audience of 50 people. The session was also filmed as part of a television documentary. Fortunately, Philip was not stage shy and performed above expectations. Besides table rappings, other noises around the room and making lights blink off and on, the group actually attained a full levitation of the table. It rose only a half inch above the floor, but this incredible feat was witnessed by the group and the film crew. Unfortunately, the dim lighting prevented the levitation from being captured on the film.


Although the Philip experiment gave the Owen group far more than they ever imagined possible, it was never able to attain one of their original goals - to have the spirit of Philip actually materialize.


THE AFTERMATH


The Philip experiment was so successful that the Toronto organization decided to try it again with a completely different group of people and a new fictional character. After just five weeks, the new group established "contact" with their new "ghost," Lilith, a French Canadian spy. Other similar experiments conjured up such entities as Sebastian, a medieval alchemist and even Axel, a man from the future. All of them were completely fictional, yet all produced unexplained communication through their unique raps.


Recently, a Sydney, Australia group attempted a similar test with "the Skippy Experiment." The six participants created the story of Skippy Cartman, a 14-year-old Australian girl. The group reports that Skippy communicated with them through raps and scratching sounds.


CONCLUSIONS


What are we to make of these incredible experiments? While some would conclude that they prove that ghosts don't exist, that such things are in our minds only, others say that our unconscious could be responsible for this kind of the phenomena some of the time. They do not (in fact, cannot) prove that there are no ghosts.


Another point of view is that even though Philip was completely fictional, the Owen group really did contact the spirit world. A playful (or perhaps demonic, some would argue) spirit took the opportunity of these séances to "act" as Philip and produce the extraordinary psychokinetic phenomena recorded.


In any case, the experiments proved that paranormal phenomena are quite real. And like most such investigations, they leave us with more questions than answers about the world in which we live. The only certain conclusion is that there is much to our existence that is still unexplained.

Paranormal Hot Spots of the West

There are many places around the US that seem to be focal points of high strangeness - vortexes of bizarre sightings, unexplained encounters and eerie events. Reports gathered over the decades have bestowed reputations on these locations as places you might not want to travel alone, or at least tread carefully. The interesting thing about most of these areas is that they are confluences of a variety of phenomena, from ghosts and monsters to Bigfoot and UFOs. Following are a handful of them, and the strange things seen there.


The Superstition Mountains - Arizona


This mountainous area in south central Arizona didn't get its name for nothing. And white men weren't the first to note its bad vibrations; the Apache Indians called it the Devil's playground.

Among the reported strangeness are:

• An entry into a subterranean world. Those who claim to have penetrated the tunnel tell of the remains of ancient structures and a spiral staircase that leads down into the bowels of earth. Some say Reptilian humanoids have come out of these portals.
• Time and dimensional shifts. Mary Sutherland relates her weird experience of "apportaton" at Apache Junction.
• Spirit faces in the rocks.
• A legend that the mountains were once guarded by a race of pygmies.
• Location of the famous "Lost Dutchman" mine.
• Site of the Circlestone medicine wheel, 6,000 feet up in the mountains - "an artifact that could be as important as England's Stonehenge," according to some researchers.
• During the '50s, '60s and '70s, numerous UFOs were sighted around Flat Iron and Bluff Springs Mountain, which is adjacent to Circlestone. In 1973, two campers reported seeing a UFO land and then take off from the Circlestone area.

Sedona - Arizona


Sedona has become a kind of Mecca for New Age seekers, psychics, UFO hunters and explorers of the unexplained, and was the site where the "harmonic convergence" of 1987 was celebrated. It's been called the "New Age Disneyland of karmic consumerism."

Strangeness reports include:

• "In recent years, Sedona has become known as the site of frequent UFO sightings," says Loy Lawhon, About.com's former Guide to UFOs. "The objects seen most frequently there are the 'ball of light' type UFOs rather than those that resemble metallic craft."
• Site of the alleged Sedona Vortex - an interdimensional portal or doorway between our dimension and some other, or to a higher level of consciousness. (There's a lot of money being made by guided tours, seminars, psychic readers and the like surrounding these vortexes.)

Bigelow Ranch - Uintah Basin, Utah


This 480-acre cattle ranch in central Utah was so plagued by UFOs and other strange phenomena that its one-time owners, Terry and Gwen Sherman, were eager to get rid of it. A willing buyer was found in Las Vegas real estate tycoon Robert T. Bigelow because he was intrigued by the mysterious goings-on. He brought in a team of investigators and set up arrays of surveillance equipment to find out what was taking place. Some have dubbed the ranch "the strangest place on Earth."

Here's just some of what was going on:

• Unexplained cattle mutilations, and cattle that just disappeared. Ten of the Sherman's cows reportedly vanished.
• UFOs "the size of football fields." And in 1980, a rancher claimed to have seen a 40-foot silver sphere on the ground of what later became the Sherman ranch.
• Terry Sherman claimed to have actually seen aliens come out of one UFO. "It was a human type, over seven feet tall, decked out in a totally black uniform and very huge, very heavyset," he reported.
• Interdimensional portals that were seen to open in mid-air. The Shermans said they saw lights emerging from these doorways.
• Floating balls of light, one of which might have toasted the family dogs. The Sherman's three dogs vanished after chasing a ball of light. A circular burn mark was found on the ground near where the dogs were last seen.
• Gwen Sherman was supposedly chased by several red balls of light while driving home one night.

Big Thicket - Hardin County, Texas

The Big Thicket spreads across East Texas and Southwestern Louisiana, and may be home to a host of paranormal phenomena and earthly anomalies:

• Ghost lights, some of which have been known to disable automobile engines and seem to exhibit intelligence. This light can be found along Black Creek near the old ghost town of Bragg in eastern Texas. The Big Thicket Ghost Light has been described as starting as a pinpoint of light among the swamp trees that grows to the brightness of a flashlight, then dims and fades away. Its color has been likened to that of a pumpkin.
• Phantom primitive Indians who allegedly have attacked people.
• Howling, ape-like wildmen. They "wander the deep woods at night, and occasionally even the town margins and suburbs, howling like banshees," says author Rob Riggs.
• Unexplained fireballs that streak through darkened skies.

Point Pleasant, West Virginia

Mothman and all the bizarre activity and high-strangeness that accompanied it back in the late 1960s put Point Pleasant on the paranormal map. Although things seem to have calmed down in Point Pleasant in recent decades, the Mothman event, chronicled by John Keel in his book The Mothman Prophecies (which later became a film), stands as one of the most peculiar and multi-layered episodes in the annals of paranormal phenomena. So many odd things were taking place that a list of them looks like an entire season of "The X-Files":

• Sightings of the Mothman creature itself by more than than 100 witnesses - a tall, headless beast with glowing red eyes and huge bat-like wings.
• UFO sightings.
• Men-in-black appearances. Arriving black cars, these weird men mumble codes and bits of strange languages. They try to drink jelly and have difficulty using knives and forks.
• Phantom phone calls.
• Electrical disturbances to such devices as TVs, telephones and a police radio.
• Eerie predictions and spontaneous prophecies, some of which were oddly out of sync.
• Missing time.
• Animal mutilations.
• Mental telepathy.
• Strange coincidences and repeating numbers.
• A missing, possibly dead dog.

The Bridgewater Triangle - Massachusetts


This paranormal area was first defined by researcher Loren Coleman in his book Mysterious America. The Triangle encompasses an area of about 200 square miles and includes the towns of Abington, Rehoboth and Freetown at the points of the triangle, and Bridgewater, West Bridgewater, North Middleboro, Segreganset, Dighton, North Dighton, Berkley, Myricks, Raynham, East Taunton, and Taunton inside the triangle. Central to the area is the mysterious Hockomock Swamp, which the Native Americans called "the Devil's swamp."

Paranormal activity in the Triangle include:

• Low-flying UFOs. The first UFO sighted over Bridgewater was in 1760, and was described as a sphere of fire that was so bright it cast shadows in broad daylight. Another was sighted on Halloween night in 1908, appropriately by two undertakers. Dozens more UFOs have been seen in the vicinity from the 1960s through to present day.
• Sightings of Bigfoot. The hairy hominid has been seen many times around Hockomock Swamp. In April, 1970, the creature allegedly picked up the rear of a police squad car, much to the surprise of the two officers inside.
• Thunderbird sightings. Witnesses claim to have seen a giant bird or pterodactyl-like flying creature with a wingspan as great as 12 feet.
• A large phantom dog with red eyes was seen killing two ponies. The witness, the ponies' owner, said the beast ripped their throats and was almost as big as the ponies themselves.
• Assorted strange or out-of-place creatures, including black panthers, giant turtles and snakes as thick as tree trunks.
• Cattle mutilations.
• Indian curses. According to one tale, the Native Americans had cursed the swamp centuries ago because of the poor treatment they received from the Colonial settlers.
• Ghosts. Visitors have experienced such haunting activity as the smell of smoke when there is no fire; a bonfire atop a rock that mysteriously vanished and ghostly voices in Algonquin tongue. There may also be a redheaded phantom hitchhiker who terrorizes motorists on Route 44.
• Spook lights have been seen on a number of occasions

5 Mysteries That Will Never Be Solved

From the ancient Egypt to the afterlife, these are 5 mysteries never be solved


We consider a great deal of paranormal phenomena and mysteries of the unexplained here. There are many such mysteries that have puzzled us all. Through ongoing research, however, we are likely one day to understand many of them. Quite conceivably we will understand how telepathy and precognition work. Bigfoot could be captured next year. We might even discover an explanation for ghost and haunting phenomena. But there are some enduring mysteries to which we may never get the answers:


HOW THE PYRAMIDS WERE BUILT


The astonishing pyramids of Giza, Egypt stand as monuments of ancient man's remarkable engineering skills. Yet, no one is sure exactly how they were built. Their method of construction has been one of the most enduring mysteries of human achievement. There is no conclusive evidence in ancient Egyptian writing or carvings that tell us how they were built. This lack of record has spawned dozens of theories, from the practical to the fantastic.

Traditionalists contend that they were built over decades by massive numbers of laborers, pulling the enormous blocks of stone on wooden sleds up a series of earthen ramps. Again, there is no definitive proof for this theory.


Others who stand in awe of these remarkable constructions say that no amount of human labor could have hauled these massive stones - some weighing several tons - to such great heights and fitted them together with such impressive precision. The Egyptians must have possessed some technology that has been lost to history, they say. Perhaps they knew how to levitate the great stones with anti-gravity devices. Or perhaps they had help from extraterrestrials.


A relatively recent theory is that some of the large blocks, mainly the ones used at the higher levels, were actually poured in place using a kind of limestone concrete.


Why we may never know. We have no definitive evidence. The secret of the pyramids may be lost to history.


The only way we'll know is…. The debate about how the great Egyptian pyramids were built will rage indefinitely. The only way the mystery will be solved is if some ancient writing or artifact from the period of their construction is unearthed that unambiguously depicts the method of building.


THE ROSWELL UFO CASE


Something crashed on William "Mac" Brazel's ranch in June or July of 1947. Exactly what it was is still unknown for sure. Many UFO researchers are fairly certain that it was a flying saucer - a vehicle piloted by extraterrestrials. The U.S. military insists it wasn't; it was something of theirs.

The Roswell case - arguably the most famous UFO incident of all time - is too convoluted to be detailed here. An Internet search will bring you a wealth of information. But what is known for certain is that something did crash there in the summer of 1947 and that the military, led by Roswell Army Air Field Major Jesse Marcel, arrived to clean it up. What made anyone think that it was a UFO? Well, that's what the military itself initially stated it was! In a press release dated July 8, the Army said: ""The many rumors regarding the flying disc became a reality yesterday when the intelligence office of the 509th Bomb group of the Eighth Air Force, Roswell Army Air Field, was fortunate enough to gain possession of a disc through the cooperation of one of the local ranchers and the sheriff's office of Chaves County."


Of course, the military later recanted and admitted that it was just a downed weather balloon. But then in the 1990s they said it was actually debris from the top-secret Project Mogul - balloon-borne equipment designed to detect Soviet nuclear tests.


Research by investigators such as Stanton Friedman and others, which included interviews with Mac Brazel, Jesse Marcel and his family, and many others in the Roswell area, led them to conclude that not only did an extraterrestrial craft crash there, but that the bodies of the aliens were recovered - one of whom may have survived.


Why we may never know. The Roswell incident has become so mired in rumor, questionable "eyewitnesses," hyperbole, deception, and the military's multiple and contradictory explanations that we may never know the truth. The problem is, no hard evidence has yet been presented. There is intriguing circumstantial evidence and some compelling anecdotal evidence, not the least of which is the Army's initial claim that it was indeed a flying saucer.


The only way we'll know is…. At this point, the only resolution to the mystery will probably have to come from the US military. They have come up with so many stories about Roswell so far that it's hard to believe them… but if they can produce the wreckage of the saucer and the alien bodies, we'll know for sure.


THE PHILADELPHIA EXPERIMENT


The Philadelphia Experiment is like the Roswell incident in that it may have been a secret military operation that because of its secrecy has generated a whole shipload of conspiracy theories, contradictory stories and outrageous tall tales.


According to the legend, if we can call it that, in 1943 the US Navy conducted an experiment that involved the destroyer USS Eldridge. The secret experiment wired the Eldridge with powerful electromagnetic equipment that when switched on would render the ship invisible. Not just invisible to radar, like a stealth ship, but invisible to sight. The theory was that the strong electromagnetism would bend light around the ship, effectively making it disappear.

Did it happen? The vacuum created by the Navy's lack of documentation about the experiment (whatever it was) was filled with creative stories. Not only was the Eldridge rendered invisible, one story goes, it was actually briefly teleported from the naval shipyards in Philadelphia to a naval base in Norfolk, Virginia! Not only that, the unfortunate crew was affected in horrendous ways, from going stark raving mad to finding their bodies embedded in the steel bulkhead of the ship!


Such tales fire the imagination and, by some crazy sense of logic to some, are so outrageous that they must be true. That military is always up to something! A more plausible explanation about the experiment is that the goal was to degauss the ship, so that it would not be so attractive to mines and torpedoes. Or that it was to be invisible only to radar. Or that the equipment was intended to heat the air and water around the ship to create a fog in which the ship could hide.


Why we may never know. There is far less credible evidence - circumstantial, anecdotal or otherwise - for the most fanciful claims about the Philadelphia Experiment than there is for the Roswell incident. There are few witnesses who claim the stories are true, but then the conspiracy theorists say that the rest of the witnesses have been threatened or brainwashed to conceal the truth. And, of course, the Navy is just covering it up. Like most such cases, you can't prove that it didn't happen, even though there's virtually no evidence that it did.


The only way we'll know is…. Only full disclosure by the US Navy will put the matter to rest. But if they haven't done so sixty years after the fact, will they ever?


CROP CIRCLES


Will we ever get to the bottom of crop circles? Are they all manmade? Or are there other unexplained forces involved in their creation?


I suspect that most crop glyphs are probably manmade. The so-called circlemakers have demonstrated quite convincingly that they can stomp down amazingly intricate patterns in crop fields using simple tools and detailed planning. So people can make them. Even long-time crop circle researcher Colin Andrews admitted that he believes 80 percent of crop circles are manmade.

What about that nagging 20 percent, however? There are qualities of some crop glyphs that seem to defy the man made explanation:


Huge, complicated glyphs are formed in an impossibly short span of time.
Enigmatic changes in the plants, which cannot be accounted for simply by stomping them down, including: elongated and blown-out nodes; increased plant size and crop yield; cellular changes; and altered seeds.
Other strange effects have been reported within "genuine" crop circles, including: effects on equipment; unusual electromagnetic measurements; unexplained sounds; drying out and changes to the soil; dizziness and other physiological effects claimed by researchers.
So if some are not manmade, who or what is making them? Extraterrestrials have been blamed, of course, although no compelling explanation has been offered for what the aliens' intention might be. The Earth itself is creating them, some contend, as a way of trying to communicate with humans that they are not being good caretakers of the planet. If so, Earth's symbolic message is unclear at best.


Perhaps it's the military that's responsible again. Perhaps they have the ability to create these complex patterns via high-intensity microwaves beamed down from computer-controlled satellites. Maybe, but again - why?


Why we may never know. Human circlemakers can certainly prove that they have created glyphs that they have been involved with, if they wanted to. But can they prove that they have created all of them? If the Earth or aliens are responsible, they're not likely to admit it. And if it's the military, they are unlikely to reveal the technology.


The only way we'll know is…. I'm not sure how we'll ever know, unless the circlemakers really do document every glyph they make and perhaps explain how all the anomalies occur. Or unless the military conducts a public demonstration of that satellite.


WHAT HAPPENS WHEN WE DIE?


This is the big question. The one that has puzzled humankind since we have been able to contemplate such things.


Is there life after death? Where do we go? Is there a literal Heaven and Hell? Do we go to another dimension? Another planet? Or do we just blink out and cease to exist?


There is no hard, scientific evidence for life after death. But there is a great deal of anecdotal evidence that our spirits – our energy, our souls, or whatever it is that makes us who we are – survive death in some other plane of existence. There are the thousands upon thousands of ghost reports, recorded since the beginning of human history, the most compelling of which are the encounters with recently deceased loved ones who appear to relatives to assure that they are well and happy in their new lives.

Then there are the near-death experiences in which people who have clinically died are revived. They report having been transported through a tunnel of light to another existence where they meet loved ones who have passed on, as well as, in some cases, religious figures. Did they experience life after death firsthand?


And there are the many remarkable cases of reincarnation. Are they evidence for life after death?


Why we may never know. As compelling as we may find the reports of ghosts, near-death experience and reincarnation, we must admit that they are not proof. We can consider the sheer number and consistency of them as evidence, but they are not conclusive proof.


The only way we’ll know is…. When we die. And it’s inevitable – we’ll all find out sooner or later.

Bloody Mary: A Timeless Urban Legend

The urban legend of Bloody Mary is a rather simple and straightforward urban legend with many different versions that have surfaced over the years. The most common is to go into a bathroom close the door and turn off the lights and light a single candle. While looking into the mirror you chant “I believe in Blood Mary” 3 times and Bloody Mary will appear to you and do one of the following things:


- Scratch your entire body.


- Gouge your eyes out and leave you to die.


- Grab you and bring you into the mirror to live with her for eternity.


- Show herself in the mirror.


- Be driven insane or scared to death from the sight of her.

As I see it this is one of the most talked about and  common of any urban legend of all time. As it is one of the older urban legends over the years there have been many different versions and some confusion of its origination. From what I have read there are 3 different women in history that all get twisted together when this urban legend is told. Mary Tudor (Queen Mary I)and Mary Worth are two names and their parts in history, one being the Queen of England and the other a witch burned at the stake during the witch trials.


Queen Mary I who reigned during the Tudor period has been mistaken as “Bloody Mary.” It is easy to understand the mistaken identity because Mary Tudor was a rather gruesome ruler burning and executing people for heresy to the point that the streets reeked from the burnt corpses and decaying bodies. A different version of the legend talks of a baby, such as “Bloody Mary I stole your baby”. Mary Tudor suffered from multiple phantom pregnancies with no record of ever giving birth leading to the conclusion of her infertility. This legend states that Bloody Mary had a child, so Mary Tudor is not the women that this urban legend is based on, however, there are many similarities to the woman I believe it to be based on.


Mary Worth who was a witch that dabbled in the black arts and was later burned at the stake for crimes of witch craft is the most likely origin of the urban legend of “Blood Mary.” It is believed that Mary Worth did not have any children but this does not rule her out as the origin of this urban legend. It may not have been proven but local children started to go missing and the townsfolk searched but found no clue to their whereabouts. Mary was later tried as a witch, found guilty and sentenced to burn at the stake. Before she died, as the flames devoured her flesh, she curse the town and it’s people.  The curse was one of revenge to anyone who dared say they believe in her 3 times.


I am unable to find any evidence to back up this next possible origin but I remember reading this story and it stands out of a very close runner up to the real origin of this urban legend. I do not have any names but it happened a few hundred years ago, back in the era of witch hunts and trials. A commoner had an affair with the mayor of her town but when the woman began to show all the signs of being pregnant the mayor ignored her and even shunned her. Until the day of the child’s birth he denied her and the child. The resemblance between the mayor and the little girl was undeniable. To save face the mayor made the decision to force the little girl and her mother out of the town. The town’s people in an unforgivable act of cruelty chased her out of town with rocks and whips. This wasn’t enough for the mayor as he ordered her killed and in a depraved twist had her watch her own death in a mirror. With her last breathe she cursed the town and all its town folk saying she would have her revenge if anyone dared to say her name 3 times while looking into a mirror. This story appears to have the most possibility of being the real origin of this urban legend however with no facts to back it up its hard to say if it could have happened or if it is just a well written short story.


The last possible mix up is with Elizabeth Bathory who was a real person who did a lot of truly horrifying and sadistic things including bathing in the blood of virgins but her name is not Mary but the bloody part could make sense but I do not believe there is any link between Elizabeth Bathory and the Bloody Mary urban legend.

The 5 Creepiest Urban Legends

1. The Dead Body Under Your Freaking Matress

The Legend:
 

A couple checks into a hotel and have to put up with a foul odor in their room all night. They call the staff to complain and somebody figures out the stench is coming from the bed.

Now, there's no way that scenario is going to have a good ending. You're almost hoping at that point that it'll turn out the last guest just got drunk and pooped behind the headboard. But, no, the staff take off the matress and discover the couple has been sleeping over the rotting body of a dead girl who had been stuffed in the box spring.

 

The Truth:
 

This actually happened, in Las Vegas. Also, Kansas City, MO and Atlantic City, NJ and several times in Florida and California and, well, let's just say that in or under the bed in a hotel room seems to be a fairly popular destination for the recently deceased.

It makes sense if you think about it. The closet and under the bed are the two most popular places to hide just about anything, so it's not surprising a hell of a lot of corpses end up there as well. In fact, the odds are pretty good that at least once a guy has killed a prostitute, tried to stuff her under the bed, only to find there was already a body there.

The strangest part isn't that the bodies wind up in such a terrible hiding place (killers often aren't the type to plan ahead). No, the strange thing is that in almost every story people will sleep part of, or in many cases, the entire night, on top of the corpse before reporting it.

Most people we know will complain if they detect that someone might have smoked a cigarette in their room four months ago. Not these people, they slept inches above an oozing heap of rotting human flesh rather than inconvenience the hotel management by asking for a new room.

Or, at least we hope sleeping is all they did on that bed. Oh, man, can you imagine dying and then the first thing that happens is some middle age couple starts porking over you? Ew.

Hopefully they at least got a free continental breakfast out of the ordeal.

 

2. The Funhouse Mummy

The Myth:
 

A prop at a carnival was discovered not to be made of the usual combination of papier mache and carni spit, but human skin and bone. All the little kiddies at the haunted house had been poking and giggling at a real, mummified dead body.

 

The Truth:
 

Apparently the smell wasn’t just coming from the convict manning the corndog stand. Back in 1976, a camera crew filming an episode of The Six Million Dollar Man began to set up in the haunted house at the Nu-Pike Amusement Park in Long Beach, Calif.

As they were moving aside a "hanging man" prop, they accidentally knocked off its arm and discovered human bones inside. Bionic, this poor sap wasn’t.

The story gets stranger. The body was actually that of criminal mastermind Elmer McCurdy, who was killed in a shootout after robbing a train in 1911. The princely sum old Elmer got killed for? $46 (and two jugs of whiskey).

McCurdy was embalmed by the local undertaker, and apparently the guy was so darn pleased with his work that he propped up the corpse in the funeral home as evidence of his skills. People were charged 5 cents to see the corpse, which they paid by dropping a nickel in the cadaver’s mouth. Remember that little bit of history the next time somebody turns their nose up at you for liking Hostel 2.

Think it can’t get any stranger? After several years of raking in the nickels (how exactly these coins were retrieved after being dropped into the corpse’s mouth is something probably best left to the imagination) our enterprising undertaker’s scheme was ruined when McCurdy's brothers showed up to claim him. Of course, these guys weren’t his brothers at all, but wily carnival promoters. From that point on, McCurdy’s mummy went on a morbid mystery tour all around America, popping up at carnivals all over the country before finally coming to rest in Long Beach.

McCurdy is now buried in Oklahoma. Because McCurdy apparently had the most entertaining corpse in history, they prevented anyone else from taking him on tour by dumping concrete on top of the casket. No, really.

 

3. The Curiously Realistic Decoration

The Legend:
 

What was thought to be your typically charming Halloween decoration depicting a lynched woman hanging from a tree, turns out to be a genuine suicide.

 

The Truth:
 

In the town of Frederica, Delaware, a 42-year-old woman, perhaps distraught by the fact that she lived in Delaware, hung herself from a tree near a busy road on a Tuesday night. The body managed to hang there until the next day and was viewed by many unwitting (or perhaps retarded) spectators before somebody realized it wasn't a decoration and finally called the police.

Once again it's the lack of complaints from passers-by that amaze us. Even if the hanging thing wasn't a body, it was something that looked exactly like one and would be considered an extremely distasteful Halloween decoration (unless she put on a wacky witch's costume before doing the deed).

With the political correctness these days, you'd have expected two special city council meetings and 30 letters to the editor within the first ten minutes of someone seeing it.

We can't help but wonder, if the person who eventually called the police hadn't bothered, how much longer would the body have hung there? This happened five days before Halloween. Add five days of decomposition to the equation and suddenly you have something a whole lot more terrifying.

Also, did the woman plan this? She knew what time of year it was, and intentionally hung herself in a public place. Did she want her corpse to blend in with the bed sheet ghosts and stuffed witches around the neighborhood? If so, it sounds like she may have been a fascinating person.

 

4. A Halloween Stunt Goes Wrong in the Least Surprising Way Possible

The Legend:
 

A teenager manages to provide the Halloween show he’s in with the ultimate finale when, while pretending to hang himself in front of the audience, he actually hangs himself.

 

The Truth:
 

While the fine citizens of Frederica we discussed were perhaps a bit slow on the uptake, the people involved in this hanging-related legend are on the dipshit honor roll. Mainly because it's happened more than once.

Yes, people have repeatedly tried to pull off an imitation hanging for a Halloween show, forgot to include the "imitation" part and went ahead and accidentally killed themselves. Yes, they were pretty much all teenage males.

In one instance, an entire working gallows was built for a show, with the "victim" secured by a harness so that he’d stop just short of actually being hung (take a wild guess how that turned out). Now we’re just thinking aloud here, but if we were standing on a gallows, fake or not, with a rope around our necks, we’d want to take a few precautions. For example, and again just blue-skying, maybe don’t use a real rope that is tied into a real noose that is wrapped around your real neck in a way that could really kill you.

Perhaps the saddest thing about the story was how completely unnecessary the whole thing was. Here’s a tip for anyone trying to thrill kids on Halloween in the future: You don’t need to hang yourself. Just give out full-sized chocolate bars instead of those not-so-fun "fun-sized" ones. We can guarantee the tykes will be talking about the house that gave out full-sized Snickers bars long after some life-risking stunt was forgotten.

 

5. Buried Alive

The Legend:
 

Some poor schmuck is committed to his or her eternal resting place, even though they aren’t quite ready to take that final dirt nap. Scratch marks are later found on the coffin lid along with other desperate signs of escape.

 

The Truth:
 

This not only happened, but back in the day it happened with alarming regularity. In the late 19th century, William Tebb tried to compile all the instances of premature burial from medical sources of the day. He managed to collect 219 cases of near-premature burial, 149 cases of actual premature burial and a dozen cases where dissection or embalming had begun on a not-yet-deceased body.

Now, this may seem ridiculous, but keep in mind this was an era before doctors such as the esteemed Dr. Gregory House gained the ability to solve any ailment within 42 minutes. If you went to the doctor with the flu in those days, he’d likely cover you in leeches and prescribe you heroin to suppress your cough. Their only method for determining if a person had died was to lean over their face and scream "WAKE UP" over and over again. If you didn't react, they buried you.

The concern over being buried alive back then was so real that the must-have hot-ticket item for the wealthy and paranoid were "safety coffins" that allowed those inside to signal to the outside world (usually by ringing a bell or raising some type of flag) should they awake 6-feet under. Though, answering that bell sounds like a good way to get ambushed by a zombie if you ask us.

Unfortunately safety coffins aren’t in vogue anymore, so if you’re at the cemetery and hear a muffled voice calling out "OK guys, joke’s over. Let me out!" it might be a good idea to inform someone with a shovel quickly.

Of course, that last sentence was merely facetious, there’s no way something like this could still happen today. Uh, well, except for this story about a Venezuelan man waking up during his autopsy. On second thought, you might want to consider adding a line in your will that states you’re to be buried with a gas-powered auger in your casket when you go.

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Ghosts predicting the future?

There is much we don't understand about ghosts and the paranormal realm or dimension that they dwell. There are those people that are unsure of their existence and most many others that deny their existence all together. If we could make the assumption that ghosts are actually spirits of the dead and not just hallucinations or are creations of super ESP and so on, then what we do know about these entities is learned from those individuals that have seen and/or communicated with them.
     

One thing that I have noticed about ghosts that have communicated with the living is that many seem to know a great deal about the past, present, and future. One example of this comes from the bible in the Old Testament 1 Samuel 28: 4-25, When Saul consults a medium, the Witch of Endor. He had her raise the spirit of Samuel and when the spirit spoke, he said "...the Lord will also deliver Israel with thee into the hand of the Philistines: and tomorrow shalt thou and thy sons be with me: the Lord also shall deliver the host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines." The ghost of Samuel seemed to know a lot about the near future.
     
Another example of a paranormal prediction of the future comes from the Tyrone ghoststory. Lady Beresfords' brother Lord Tyrone came to her one night in spirit form not long after his death. He said to her "I died last Tuesday, at four o'clock, and have been permitted by the Supreme Being to appear to you to assure you that revealed religion is the only true faith and the only means by which we can be saved. I am further suffered to inform you that you are with child of a son who shall marry my daughter. Not many years after his birth, Sir Martin will die; you will be married again to a man whose ill conduct will make you miserable; you will bring him two daughters and afterwards a son, in child-bed of whom you will die in the forty-seventh year of your age." and sure enough all the ghosts predictions came true throughout the story. Another interesting part is where Lady Beresford asks the spirit if there is any way she can prevent his predictions and he replies "Undoubtedly, you may," said he, "you are a free agent, and may prevent this by resisting every temptation to a second marriage; but the passions are strong; hitherto you have had no trials; you know not their power. More I am not permitted to say..." There seems to be rules and boundaries given to spirits and ghosts that speak to the living according to this paranormal tale.
    
The Bell Witch also seemed to have knowledge of future events. The twisted spirit predicted the Civil War, World War I and II, and also the rise of the power of the United States.
     
Now I'm not saying that ghosts having the ability to predict the future is for sure or anything like that, I am just saying that it may be more than just a coincident that so many ghost encounters have come with accurate predictions of future events. If ghosts do have such powers than it would raise many questions such as how or why do the ghosts have information of the future? Why can ghosts only tell us living folks certain information? Should the living ask ghosts for future information or would we be better off not knowing what is to come? Hopefully we will come to better understand ghosts and the paranormal world that is currently far beyond are understanding.
 

Top 10 most haunted places on the planet

Here are some of the places considered to be one of the most haunted places on earth.


1. Borley Rectory, Essex, England





The haunting of the Borley Rectory during the 1920s and 1930s, is undoubtedly one of the most famous in Britain, as well as being one of the most controversial. The wealth of sightings and experiences by independent witnesses, suggests that although much of the phenomena can be explained in rational terms, a percentage remains which can still be seen as inexplicable at the present time.


2. The Whaley House, California 





Author deTraci Regula relates her experiences with the house: “Over the years, while dining across the street at the Old Town Mexican Cafe, I became accustomed to noticing that the shutters of the second-story windows [of the Whaley House] would sometimes open while we ate dinner, long after the house was closed for the day. On a recent visit, I could feel the energy in several spots in the house, particularly in the courtroom, where I also smelled the faint scent of a cigar, supposedly Whaley’s calling-card. In the hallway, I smelled perfume, initially attributing that to the young woman acting as docent, but some later surreptitious sniffing in her direction as I talked to her about the house revealed her to be scent-free.”


3. Raynham Hall, Norfolk, England





aynham Hall is a country house in Norfolk, England. For 300 years it has been the seat of the Townshend family. The hall gave its name to the area, known as East Raynham, and is reported to be haunted, providing the scene for possibly the most famous ghost photo of all time, the famous Brown Lady descending the staircase. However, the ghost has not been reported since the photo was taken. Its most famous resident was Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend (1674-1738), leader in the House of Lords.


4. The Myrtles Plantation, Louisiana 





The Myrtles Plantation was built in 1796 by General David Bradford and called Laurel Grove. Touted as “one of America’s most haunted homes”, the plantation is supposedly home of at least 12 ghosts.[9] It is often reported that 10 murders occurred in the house, but historical records only indicate the murder of William Winter. Possibly the most well known of the Myrtles supposed ghosts, Chloe (sometimes Cleo) was reportedly a slave owned by Clark and Sara Woodruff. According to one story, Clark Woodruff had pressured or forced Chloe into being his mistress. Chloe and Clark were caught by Sara Woodruff, and Chloe began to listen at keyholes, trying to learn what would happen to her.


5. Eastern State Penitentiary, Philadelphia





Designed by John Haviland and opened in 1829, Eastern State is considered to be the world’s first true penitentiary. Its revolutionary system of incarceration, dubbed the Pennsylvania System, originated and encouraged solitary confinement as a form of rehabilitation. On June 1st, 2007 a television show called “Most Haunted” went live to the penitentiary. Part of the group went to Al Capones cell. Two people passed out while “investigating” the prison. One member of the team, Yvette, stated that “this is the most evil place I have ever been.” They claimed to have had contact with spirits but there was no hard evidence that their claims were legitimate.


6. The Tower of London, London





Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress The Tower of London, more commonly known as the Tower of London (and historically simply as The Tower), is an historic monument in central London, England on the north bank of the River Thames. Perhaps the most well-known ghostly resident of the Tower is the spirit of Ann Boleyn, one of the wives of Henry VIII, who was also beheaded in the Tower in 1536. Her ghost has been spotted on many occasions, sometimes carrying her head, on Tower Green and in the Tower Chapel Royal.


7. Waverly Hills Sanatorium, Kentucky





Waverly Hills Sanatorium, located in Louisville, Kentucky, opened in 1910 as a two-story hospital to accommodate 40 to 50 tuberculosis patients. It has been popularized on television as being one of the “most haunted” hospitals in the eastern United States, and was seen on ABC/FOX Family Channel’s Scariest Places On Earth as well as VH1's Celebrity Paranormal Project. It was also seen on the Sci Fi Channel’s Ghost Hunters. Ghost investigators who have ventured into Waverly have reported a host of strange paranormal phenomena, including voices of unknown origin, isolated cold spots and unexplained shadows. Screams have been heard echoing in its now abandoned hallways, and fleeting apparitions have been encountered.


8. The Queen Mary, California





RMS Queen Mary is an ocean liner that sailed the North Atlantic Ocean from 1936 to 1967 for Cunard Line (then Cunard White Star Line). The Queen Mary was purchased by the city of Long Beach, California in 1967 and transformed into a hotel. The most haunted area of the ship is the engine room where a 17-year-old sailor was crushed to death trying to escape a fire. Knocking and banging on the pipes around the door has been heard and recorded by numerous people. In what is now the front desk area of the hotel, visitors have seen the ghost of a “lady in white.” Ghosts of children are said to haunt the ship’s pool.


9. The White House, Washington DC





The home of the presidents of the United States. President Harrison is said to be heard rummaging around in the attic of the White House, looking for who knows what. President Andrew Jackson is thought to haunt his White House bedroom. And the ghost of First Lady Abigail Adams was seen floating through one of the White House hallways, as if carrying something. The most frequently sighted presidential ghost has been that of Abraham Lincoln. Eleanor Roosevelt once stated she believed she felt the presence of Lincoln watching her as she worked in the Lincoln bedroom. Also during the Roosevelt administration, a young clerk claimed to have actually seen the ghost of Lincoln sitting on a bed pulling off his boots.


10. Edinburgh Castle, Edinburgh, Scotland





Edinburgh Castle is reputed to be one of the most haunted spots in Scotland. And Edinburgh itself has been called the most haunted city in all of Europe. On various occasions, visitors to the castle have reported a phantom piper, a headless drummer, the spirits of French prisoners from the Seven Years War and colonial prisoners from the American Revolutionary War – even the ghost of a dog wandering in the grounds’ dog cemetery.