Category:
Eccentrics

Tubapunk!

Visit his homepage here.



Posted By: Paul - Tue Jun 23, 2009 - Comments (0)
Category: Eccentrics, Geeks, Nerds and Pointdexters, Music

Tennis Grunts

Here's an article about the controversy of grunting in pro tennis. Read it, then check out the samples in the clips below, and decide what you think!






Posted By: Paul - Mon Jun 22, 2009 - Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Sports, Superstition, Screams, Grunts and Other Exclamations

Woody Hockaday

Woody Hockaday (1884-1947) made significant contributions to American history, but he's almost entirely forgotten today. According to the Kansas State Historical Society, he was "the first person to recognize the need for highway marking in the United States." So, on his own initiative, beginning in 1915, he started posting mileage markers on highways. Eventually "Hockaday signs" appeared on 60,000 miles of roads from Washington DC to Los Angeles.

But around 1935 he decided he needed to do something different with his life. So he started calling himself "Big Chief Pow Wow" and launched a "feathers instead of bullets" campaign. Dressed in red shorts, a feather war bonnet, sneakers, a painted sunflower on his chest, and carrying a huge bag of feathers, he would pop up at political rallies and pelt politicians with feathers (or sometimes live chickens). He explained that "to attract attention to peace a man must use sensational methods."

In 1936 he broke into the office of Assistant Secretary of War Harry Woodring and scattered feathers everywhere before being hauled away. And soon after that he launched a feather attack on radio priest Charles Coughlin.

In 1940, he combined a Santa Claus costume with his headdress and showed up in Rockefeller Plaza with a wagonload of 600 chickens. He screamed at the crowd, "I'm Santa Claus from Santa Fe. Peace! The whole world will have peace. Here, my friend, have a chicken."

Soon after that he was committed to an insane asylum. He died in 1947.

Posted By: Alex - Tue Jun 09, 2009 - Comments (1)
Category: Eccentrics, Politics, 1930s

All Apologies

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The Mgt. of WU--Alex, Chuck and Paul-- would like to apologize to our readers for foisting an overly political and jejune and tendentious post on you, even by proxy. You'll note that it's been deleted--although the comments formerly attached to it remain behind, so as to archive the wise and tasteful responses of our loyal readers.

Please forgive us, and continue reading as before.

Posted By: Paul - Sun May 31, 2009 - Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Politics, Riots, Protests and Civil Disobedience, Weird Universe, Comments, Corrections, Reader Recommendation

Multiple Sidosis

Here's a fellow I was unaware of until Sunday May 17th, when I read his obituary. (Find it here.) Sid Laverents was truly One Of Us, a real Weirdo.

Watch his most famous film below.

Posted By: Paul - Tue May 19, 2009 - Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Movies, 1970s

An Orchestra of Motion


When I was very little, growing up in a small suburb of Charleston, South Carolina, one of the most exciting things to do was to sit outside the barber shop and wait for the train to roll through town. Some people might say that would be as boring as watching grass grow, but they are not "railfans". So what's a railfan? The people who camp out for hours, and even days, to watch a train go by. According to Train Magazine, there are over 175,000 railfans in the United States and more than 24,000 railfan videos on YouTube. Bill Taylor, from Montana, sums it up the best by saying "It's an orchestra of motion." Learn more about railfans here.

Posted By: Nethie - Sun May 10, 2009 - Comments (6)
Category: Eccentrics, Obsessions, Travel, Trains

Jonathan Bayliss, RIP

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The Boston Globe reports the death of one Jonathan Bayliss, an eccentric self-published writer of enormous tomes.
















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Here's a sample from one of his novels. (Click on text to enlarge.) There's plenty more here, if you want it!

Posted By: Paul - Sat Apr 25, 2009 - Comments (3)
Category: Eccentrics, Literature, Books, Writers, Obituaries

Breatharian FAQ

Posted By: Paul - Fri Apr 10, 2009 - Comments (4)
Category: Eccentrics, Food, Frauds, Cons and Scams, Religion, Self-help Schemes

Why Tinfoil Hats Don’t Work

You might have seen the newspaper reports last fall about this experiment. Here's how it was done.

Posted By: Paul - Fri Mar 27, 2009 - Comments (4)
Category: Eccentrics, Science, Experiments, Psychology, Technology

Balancin’ Fool

From Life magazine for March 10 1952, we get eight photos of one Robert Dotzauer, who liked to...well, balance things.

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Posted By: Paul - Fri Feb 27, 2009 - Comments (9)
Category: Eccentrics, Human Marvels, 1950s

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Who We Are
Alex Boese
Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes.

Paul Di Filippo
Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1.

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