Category:
Magazines

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Awhile back I posted a link on here to an article about strange places to visit. More recently I wrote about unusual contests. Now I can combine the two! Men's magazine askmen.com has created a list of what they think are the top ten weird festivals held around the globe each year. For example, there's the Cow Painting Festival held in Luxembourg each summer. And you probably shouldn't miss the Moose Dropping Festival in Talkeetna, Alaska in July. Plus there's the So Joo Festival in Porto, Portugal in June - bring a hammer! You can see the entire list here.

Posted By: Nethie - Sun Oct 10, 2010 - Comments (2)
Category: Animals, Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Contests, Races and Other Competitions, Customs, Fairs, Amusement Parks, and Resorts, Magazines, Parades and Festivals

Historic Dwarfs:  Bertholde

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Imagine a day when a children's magazine would run a series entitled "Historic Dwarfs." Yet such was the case a century ago, in the pages of ST. NICHOLAS MAGAZINE.




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Read about this charmer here.

Posted By: Paul - Wed Aug 04, 2010 - Comments (7)
Category: Freaks, Oddities, Quirks of Nature, Magazines, Children, Historical Figure, Natural Wonders

Poulet a la Baby Poop

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"Yes, Mr. Dithers, we did happen to clean the chicken in the same sink where Junior had his bath. Why do you ask? What do you mean, Dagwood won't be getting that raise?!?"

Alternate interpretation: "Cannibals? Us?"

For the full story, visit here.

Posted By: Paul - Fri May 07, 2010 - Comments (3)
Category: Food, Magazines, Babies and Toddlers, 1950s

Just a Little Off the Muzzle

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[From Life Magazine for May 21, 1951.]

Posted By: Paul - Thu Feb 11, 2010 - Comments (1)
Category: Business, Magazines, Dogs, 1950s

Cult Magazines

I've just gotten the advance galley of this book from my pal Luis Ortiz, the publisher. I can guarantee that WU-vians will love it!

Posted By: Paul - Tue Jul 28, 2009 - Comments (2)
Category: Eccentrics, Collectors, Magazines, Subcultures, Books

Boris Artzybasheff

The art of Boris Artybasheff certainly qualifies as weird. You can sample it in a recent reprint of one of his classic books, seen to the right.

Or, you can admire some of his covers for Time magazine.










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Posted By: Paul - Fri Jun 19, 2009 - Comments (3)
Category: Art, Pop Art, Surrealism, Magazines, 1950s

Two Weird Books

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In the UK, sex services leave their advert cards in phone booths, These items are known as tart cards. A representative sampling has been collected in book form, as you can see in the link below.

But aren't phone booths going extinct everywhere? Who will save the endangered tart card?!?






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And of course, the Golden Age of print magazines is long gone or vanishing as well. But you can encounter the weirdest examples of the great Era of Zines in a new volume entitled Bad Mags 2. It's supposed to release in June, although Amazon is uncertain, so you'll have to check out its predecessor first. And visit the Bad Mags site here.





Posted By: Paul - Sat May 02, 2009 - Comments (5)
Category: Magazines, Sexuality, Advertising, Books

Marvin Hewitt, Imposter

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Sometimes it seems as if credentials-faking imposters are a wholly recent phenomenon, due to our contemporary insistence on the all-important documentation needed to get ahead. But of course, the human race has churned out imposters ever since the days of Baron Munchausen and prior, giving our pal Alex plenty of material for his Museum of Hoaxes.

I ran across a fifty-year-old case recently in Life magazine from April 12, 1954. The perp was one Marvin Hewitt, and he managed to masquerade as a college-level physics professor, among other positions!

You can read most of the article here. The ending, unfortunately, was missing from my issue of the zine.

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More in extended >>

Posted By: Paul - Mon Sep 15, 2008 - Comments (0)
Category: Celebrities, Crime, Education, Hoaxes and Imposters and Imitators, Magazines, 1950s

It Takes a Weirdo to Know a Weirdo

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Under the aegis of my pal, Gorgeous and Brilliant Editor Ann VanderMeer, the legendary magazine WEIRD TALES is entering a renaissance. But Ann & company surely haven't forgotten the past, as they've compiled a list of the 85 weirdest storytellers of the past 85 years, to celebrate the zine's long existence.

And perhaps you won't be entirely surprised to learn that our own Chuck Shepherd made their honor roll! Don't let that sunny, smiling countenance to the right trick you into imagining he's not the equal of Stephen King or Warren Zevon!

Way to go, Chuck! H. P. Lovecraft is beaming down on you from above. Or up at you from below. Or through the cracks of the spacetime continuum.

Posted By: Paul - Sat Aug 23, 2008 - Comments (7)
Category: Awards, Prizes, Competitions and Contests, Celebrities, Eccentrics, Horror, Magazines, Pop Culture, Weird Universe, Chuck

Six Faces of FATE

Please enjoy this imagery from one of the spiritual ancestors of WEIRD UNIVERSE, FATE MAGAZINE.






More in extended >>

Posted By: Paul - Thu Aug 21, 2008 - Comments (11)
Category: Art, Eccentrics, Forteana, Magazines, Paranormal, Pop Culture, Unsolved Mysteries, 1950s, Yesterday’s Tomorrows

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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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