‘If the anus, that some also call ‘ring’, twitches, it shows inspections, abuses, and the discovery of secret matters’.

Two surviving texts attributed to the legendary diviner Melampous deal with divination: On Divination by Twitchings (Peri Palmon Mantike) and On [Divination from] Birthmarks (Peri Elation tou Somatos)... Both of these texts are very neglected, with no English translation of either in print...

Melampous' Twitchings covers some 187 cases. Involuntary twitchings of the body were easily interpreted as ominous by those who experienced them, and this handy guidebook provided instant advice to the reader as to their meaning... Dating to the third century AD, the earliest papyrus begins with the entry:

[A twitching of] the left buttock means joy: for the slave, something beneficial; for the virgin, blame will fall on the widow for strife [this is somewhat difficult to understand; there may be an allusion here the reader would have recognised]; for the soldier, promotion.

This is in fact a more elaborate version of two short entries in Melampous' Twitchings, which indicate that twitching of either buttock means prosperity.

Siano and Piazza have high hopes for their Tarottells Machine, an invention that so excites Vinnie, the spokesman, that he likes to take off his jacket and stand as he describes it.

Siano, an artist at Grumman Aircraft and a textbook illustrator, rises to lyrical heights demonstrating his machine: "This is the first time in the history of the world — the first Tarot machine. Automation has come to Tarot..."

The machine, with cursor and compass, has a custom carrying case. The game is made of black plastic and bright orange Tarot cards and measures some 27 inches square.

You get the cards' message by pressing a lever to cut the cards three times to the left — mandatory procedure in Tarot. Then they spin around until another lever activates a silver pointer that singles out the card.

"We have also incorporated astrology to get the best possible reading," says Siano, whipping out a tray of beautifully drawn figures of the Zodiac. "And we have also adopted ESP into this machine.

"You'll get a better answer from this than any Ouija Board. What we need is a dynamic corporation that has the guts to turn this thing out."

Siano says a big toy manufacturer had the machine in its vaults for six weeks, but the man who thought it a good idea was fired and the machine was returned.

Wooden houses may not be known in 2020. The street cars, railroad cars, and other familiar methods of travel doubtless will have passed the way of history a century from this hour. Out of all the agencies which men use today electricity alone seems likely to survive. Many scientific men believe that coal and gas will have passed out of common use within the century.

Some one has suggested that the air and the water will furnish us our methods of heat and power in 2020. No one can doubt but that the flying machines of a new and important type, not known today, will be in general use a century removed.

Airplanes probably will be driven by electricity with storage batteries providing the power. Gasoline is not likely to be utilized in 2020. The fuel problem will be solved in a far different way than it is solved now. The air will provide an immense motive power for various things. The sun, doubtless, will be called upon to furnish the greater portion of the heat utilized by manking. Out of the waters on the face of the earth something will be developed for the benefit of the human family.

The automobile will be succeeded by something entirely different. Horses and cows may not be known.

Students of the human race have told us that the primitive man, like the primitive animal, was great in stature. The bones that the scientists have unearthed have verified this. Maybe human beings a century hence will become either much smaller of much larger than they are today. Everything will have changed.

A century past has given us an unlimited amount of great inventions, the sewing machine, electric irons, electric washing machines, airplanes, automobiles, radium and electricity. The next 100 years will see this process of enlargement carried on until it reaches even greater heights.

It may not be a cheerful picture to paint, but most of us will not be here to see the year 2020 roll around. But we can rest assured time will bring changes and improvements. This is a progressive earth and progress has marked each succeeding year since the beginning.

Marshall’s version of the future human being is a sleek-featured, diminutive person, much like the creatures seen in many science-fiction movies.

Today’s diet of soft, processed foods will take its toll on the human jaw and teeth, which have been diminishing since prehistoric days when our ancestors used their mouths as weapons, in addition to making tough foods palatable, Marshall says.

“Nature has a wonderful way of providing for her needs. Whatever she doesn’t need, she gets rid of,” Marshall says. “Things develop according to function. If you use something, it develops. If you don’t, it disappears.”

Since people today do not use their teeth the way they once did, future people probably will have much smaller, and fewer teeth, Marshall’s prediction indicates. They will be practically hairless and their jaws will diminish as they have for thousands of years, he says. The chin and nose will be more prominent.

The changes Marshall foresees also will give future people a wider range of facial expressions…

He has turned his office into a museum on the development of the human skull, tracing its evolutionary and embryonic progress in exhibits and photographs… One of the exhibits in his personal museum is a line of busts depicting the evolutionary changes in the human skull from prehistoric times to his vision of what people will look like 2 million years into the future…

But even with the possibility of scientific advances influencing evolution, Marshall expresses confidence that his projections cannot be disputed.
“No one is going to disprove me,” he says. “They won’t be around.”

-The Semi-Weekly Spokesman-Review - June 15, 1981

Running over a cat is a sign you're about to have a spiritual crisis.

Running over a deer means you're about to hurt someone you love.

Crushing a crow with your car means you're not prepared for the future.

Rolling over a snake could mean you're about to have a heart attack or other serious accident.

If you run over a dog, expect your friendships to take a turn for the worse.

If a bee collides with your windshield, you need to make more time for yourself.

... mashed mosquitos have no effect whatsoever on your future.

He would tell female clients that the ancient Eastern art enabled him to predict the shape of things to come by "reading" their breasts. These were a pointer to the future, a fact well appreciated in India — where, he claimed, Mammarism originated.

The technique — perfected, he boasted in the brothels of Shanghai during a 26-year career in the army — involving daubing the breasts in poster colours with a long camel-hair brush. The breast was then pressed against a sheet of paper to achieve a life-size imprint... After studying the prints — and sometimes the breasts themselves — Mr. Cullen would predict the future.

If one’s knee has peaks or craters on certain parts of it, they indicate traits like patience, compassion, selfishness, fear, luck, humor, humility and curiosity...
A new mole may indicate that the person’s life and profession are on the upswing.