Recent Activity

• October 7, 2010 michelle updated the The Dequindre Cut Greenway
  

  The Dequindre Cut Greenway

  Railway-turned-greenway provides a pedestrian link in downtown Detroit and celebrates urban artwork

  An urban recreational path, the Dequindre Cut Greenway officially opened to the public in May of 2009. The 1.35-mile greenway provides a pedestrian link between Detroit's Eastern Market,... »

  Incredible Ruins | Edited by Nicholas Jackson, michelle and others

• July 18, 2010 michelle updated the Deyrolle Taxidermy
  

  Paris, France

  Deyrolle Taxidermy

  Paris' fabled purveyor of exotic taxidermy and natural history curios

  Deyrolle was founded by well-known entomologist Emile Deyrolle in 1831, and has been at its current premises since 1881. Exotic taxidermy, entomology, and natural history collections displayed in... »

  Purveyors of Curiosities | Edited by Josh, Dylan and 3 others

• May 13, 2010 michelle updated the The Vacuum Cleaner Museum
  

  The Vacuum Cleaner Museum

  These machines have been collecting dust for decades

  Tucked away in a not-so-dusty corner of Stark's Vacuum Cleaner Sales & Service in downtown Portland is a collection that would make any prop master, house wife, or history buff slobber with... »

  Unique Collections, Inspired Inventions, Electrical Oddities | Edited by jamesb, wythe and others

• February 28, 2010 michelle added Giant's Causeway
  

  Giant's Causeway

  Northern Ireland's Brobdingnagian stepping stones

  Famed for its thousands of interlocking hexagonal columns that rise vertically like steps, the Giant's Causeway is a geological oddity that looks distinctly man-made. In fact, the unusual... »

  Geological Oddities | Edited by Josh, michelle and 2 others

• February 28, 2010 michelle added The Hash, Marijuana and Hemp Museum
  

  Amsterdam, Netherlands

  The Hash, Marijuana and Hemp Museum

  The history and future of cannabis

  In 1985 the same year that Jack Herer published "The Emperor Wears No Clothes," his famous book explaining the benefits of cannabis and hemp, the Hash, Marijuana and Hemp Museum opened its doors... »

  Pharmacy Museums, Unique Collections | Edited by Dylan and michelle

• February 25, 2010 michelle added Minyatür’s Nautical Instruments
  

  Istanbul, Turkey

  Minyatür’s Nautical Instruments

  Turkish adventurer antiques in the heart of the Grand Bazaar

  The Grand Bazaar, or Covered Bazaar (Kapaliçarsi) in Istanbul is a magical city within a city. With over 60 streets and more then 4400 shops, the world’s first mall is a buzzing hive of activity,... »

  Purveyors of Curiosities | Edited by michelle

• February 23, 2010 michelle added Dead Horse Bay
  

  Dead Horse Bay

  First a horse rendering plant, then a 19th century landfill, this beach of glass is scavenger heaven

  Like most of New York City, Dead Horse Bay has a long history of changes. Over the years, much of old New York has been torn down, replaced, torn down again, and replaced again by new buildings... »

  Disaster Areas | Edited by michelle and Annetta

• February 11, 2010 michelle added Historical Dental Museum
  

  Historical Dental Museum

  Museum boasting a bucket of teeth and the tale of a twentieth-century dental circus

  Show girls, singing and dancing. A band with blasting bugles. A dental chair poised, at the ready, in the bed of a horse-drawn wagon. And there at the center of it all is Painless Parker, dressed... »

  Medical Museums, Instruments of Science | Edited by michelle and wythe

• February 10, 2010 michelle added Vanderbilt Museum
  

  Vanderbilt Museum

  An eccentric playboy's astounding natural history collection

  The Vanderbilt Museum on Long Island, New York is housed in the mansion once owned by William K. Venderbilt II (the great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt, founder of the New York Central Railroad... »

  Museums and Collections, Mummies | Edited by michelle and Annetta

• February 9, 2010 michelle added Zymoglyphic Museum
  

  Zymoglyphic Museum

  Private collection of art inspired by cabinets of curiosity

  Located at the end of a suburban cul-de-sac and open to the public for only two days a year, the Zymoglyphic Museum houses the cabinet of curiosities created by artist Jim Stewart. Early... »

  Wonder Cabinets, Outsider Art, Unique Collections, Obscura Day Location | Edited by Josh, zymoglyphic and 4 others

• February 3, 2010 michelle added John Lennon Statue
  

  John Lennon Statue

  His music once banned in Communist Cuba, John Lennon is now imortalized in bronze by Castro, who considers Lennon a "fellow dreamer"

  It's no surprise that the music of John Lennon and the Beatles was banned from Communist Cuba in the 1960s and 70s. Cuban authorities considered the music "ideological diversionism," and decadent... »

  Unusual Monuments, Strange Statues | Edited by michelle

• February 3, 2010 michelle added The Lost River Fleet
  

  London, United Kingdom

  The Lost River Fleet

  The largest of London's subterranean rivers and once a mad, bad center of London life

  The River Fleet was a part of London life before London was even London. This tributary of the Thames, called the Holburna ("hollow stream") by the Anglo-Saxons, is the largest of London's... »

  Watery Wonders, Subterranean Sites | Edited by michelle, wythe and others

• January 28, 2010 michelle added Eisriesenwelt (The World of Ice Giants)
  

  Werfen, Austria

  Eisriesenwelt (The World of Ice Giants)

  A mammoth ice cavern discovered in 1879

  The 65-foot-wide entrance to this massive ice cave gives the feeling of an entrance to another world, and essentially, it is. Beneath the Tennengebirge mountains lies the Eisriesenwelt or... »

  Curious Caves | Edited by Dylan, michelle and others

• January 25, 2010 michelle added Statue of St. Wilgefortis
  

  Praha, Czech Republic

  Statue of St. Wilgefortis

  A crucified and bearded female saint

  There are a number of treasuries and chapels within the famous pilgrimmage site of Loreto Church in Prague, but there is one chapel in particular, The Chapel of Our Lady of Sorrows, that houses a... »

  Strange Statues | Edited by michelle

• January 22, 2010 michelle added The Headington Shark
  

  Headington, United Kingdom

  The Headington Shark

  A 26 foot shark sculpture for nuclear disarmament, clever antennae disguise, and municiple battle royale

  About four months after the incident at Chernobyl, on August 9, 1986, Oxford-resident Bill Heine had a twenty-six foot shark sculpture erected on his roof. Using cranes, Heine and sculptor John... »

  Outsider Architecture | Edited by michelle and Dylan

• January 21, 2010 michelle added Siriraj Medical Museum
  

  Bangkok, Thailand

  Siriraj Medical Museum

  A treasure trove of pathological, forensic, parasitological, and anatomical specimens

  Housed in the oldest hospital - it's where the King of Thailand goes when he is ill - and medical school in Thailand, est. 1886, the Siriraj Medical Museum abounds with medical curiosities. The... »

  Medical Museums | Edited by michelle and Annetta

• January 19, 2010 michelle added Eartha
  

  Eartha

  The world's largest rotating world

  Were you to drive on Maine's Interstate 295 through Yarmouth, it would be next to impossible to miss Eartha. Eartha, housed in a three-story glass gallery at DeLorme Headquarters, is the... »

  Small Worlds and Model Towns, Astounding Timepieces, Instruments of Science, Marvelous Maps and Measures | Edited by Dylan and michelle

• January 6, 2010 michelle added The Chair That Grew
  

  The Chair That Grew

  100 year old chair with joints "cemented by nature"

  John Krubsack was a self-starter. A banker from Embarrass, Wisconsin, he was the first in the area to boast running water, he landscaped his property before it was the fashion, he farmed and made... »

  Extraordinary Flora, Horticultural Marvels, Outsider Architecture | Edited by michelle and A Facebook user

• December 27, 2009 michelle added Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies
  

  Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies

  A lock of Beethoven's hair and the remains of his skull are recent additons to this Center of Beethoven studies

  Keepsakes of loved one and the dead have long been a part of human culture. This memento collection reached an almost compulsive level in Vienna in the early 1800s, with phrenologists collecting... »

  Museums and Collections, Strange Science, Unique Collections, Relics and Reliquaries, Instruments of Science | Edited by michelle

• December 4, 2009 michelle added Holy Land, U.S.A.
  

  Holy Land, U.S.A.

  An abandoned, religious-themed amusement park

  In the early 1950s John Baptist Greco, a staunch Roman Catholic, had a vision of a roadside theme park devoted to God. By the end of the decade, he had created exactly that: a theme park built to... »

  Ghost Towns, Curious Places of Worship | Edited by Dylan, michelle and others

• December 3, 2009 michelle added Pneumatic System of the New York Public Library
  

  Pneumatic System of the New York Public Library

  One of the few places in Manhattan which still employs a pneumatic system

  When a young man in Manhattan writes a letter to his girl in Brooklyn, the love letter gets blown to her through a pneumatic tube—pfft—just like that. — E.B. White, “Here Is New York” The... »

  Inspired Inventions, Retro-Tech, Repositories of Knowledge | Edited by michelle

• November 19, 2009 michelle added Jindo-Modo Landbridge
  

  Indong, South Korea

  Jindo-Modo Landbridge

  Landbridge created by the South Korean version of Moses

  The story of Moses parting the Red Sea in order to save the Israelites from the Egyptians is well-known. South Koreans have a similar story. Their version is that the Island of Jindo was attacked... »

  Natural Wonders, Watery Wonders, Anomalous Islands, Geological Oddities, Eccentric Homes | Edited by Dylan and michelle

• November 13, 2009 michelle added Ospedale degli Innocenti (Hospice of the Innocent)
  

  Ospedale degli Innocenti (Hospice of the Innocent)

  Renaissance hospital featuring a rotating door into which unwanted babies were dropped

  Florence in the 1400s had a problem. Babies. Babies everywhere. Babies in the fields, babies in the alleyways, babies left on the pews of the Church. Florence was crawling with abandoned babies.... »

  Medical Museums, Unusual Monuments, Inspired Inventions | Edited by michelle and Annetta

• November 6, 2009 michelle added Curtain of Fire
  

  Curtain of Fire

  An erupting wall of magma

  When humans breathe, they release carbon dioxide gas that has built up inside them. The Kilauea volcano on the Island of Hawai'i is no different. It is the world's most active volcano. At its... »

  Fiery Wonders, Geological Oddities | Edited by Dylan and michelle

• November 5, 2009 michelle added Otzi the Iceman
  

  Italy

  Otzi the Iceman

  Europe’s oldest natural human mummy

  Three basic conditions can lead to natural mummification: extreme dryness or aridity (as in deserts), and extreme acidity (as in bogs) and extreme cold (as on mountains) which essentially freeze... »

  Unique Collections, Mummies, Long Now Locations | Edited by michelle and Dylan