# has anyone here ever found a mannequin while outdoors?

**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [December 30, 2018, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901 "2018-12-30T03:44:41Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/1 "2018-12-30T03:44:41Z")

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I have a true-crime show on in the background, and on those shows, people are always out hunting, fishing, hiking, etc. and they think they see a mannequin but realize when they get closer that it isn’t.

So, is there anyone here who HAS indeed found a mannequin out there somewhere?

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### Author: ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/2 "2018-12-30T03:48:55Z")

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I found a mannequin leg one time on the side of the road. I stopped and picked it up. It was a hot minute before I realized it was not a prosthesis leg. I still have it somewhere.

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### Author: ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/3 "2018-12-30T04:22:59Z")

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That would still be really freaky.

The closest thing I can think of to that was when I was in high school, and my mom was taking me somewhere one evening and we saw something in the road that looked like the lower half of a human body. Because there had recently been a car accident involving a young man whose body had been severed at the waist, she told me not to look, but I had already seen it and could tell it was a pair of pants stuffed with hay.

Of course, the gory details weren’t broadcasted on TV or in the newspaper, but a car load of my classmates witnessed that accident and I heard about it from them. ☹ He had graduated a few years earlier and was friends with some of my classmates’ older siblings.

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### Author: ![Ignotus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/ecc23a/32.png) [@Ignotus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignotus)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/4 "2018-12-30T04:52:26Z")

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> [@Beckdawrek](#):
>
> I found a mannequin leg one time on the side of the road. I stopped and picked it up. It was a hot minute before I realized it was not a prosthesis leg. I still have it somewhere.

The side of the road is obviously the place to look! I found a styrofoam torso once when riding my bicycle home from work. I brought it with me, and gave it to a friend, who still has it!

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### Author: ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/5 "2018-12-30T05:00:13Z")

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I’ve found some very interesting things on the roadside. Mr.Wrekker says I gonna open a box and really find something gruesome. My reason for stopping at boxes is I think of poor little kittens or puppies baking to death or getting out and being roadkill. I’ve found my share of those. The grossest thing I’ve found was a box of rotten meat.  
I just recently found a really nice hunting bow. It was banged up a bit. Fell off someone’s truck, most likely, leaving the deer camp.

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### Author: ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/6 "2018-12-30T05:21:43Z")

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What an unexpected question. I live in a city, and I see used mannequins and mannequin parts thrown out from clothing and fashion stores all the time. But I have never, ever seen a mannequin or any dead bodies in the woods, while camping, or while hiking. That sounds super crazy, finding a mannequin in the wild I mean- obviously people do occasionally perish in parks as a result of sporting activities and somebody is going to find them, usually the rangers sent to look for the body.

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### Author: ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/7 "2018-12-30T07:58:28Z")

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Not a mannequin, but I did find a dressmaker’s dummy once.

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### Author: ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/8 "2018-12-30T10:38:18Z")

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**Moderator Action**

Since this is seeking personal experiences, let’s move this to IMHO (from GQ).

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### Author: ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/9 "2018-12-30T12:53:02Z")

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I’ve experienced the opposite: a man impersonating a mannequin.

For a while when I was much younger, I worked in the display department of a department store. Among other things, we were responsible for setting up the window displays. One of my coworkers had classical good looks, and once in a while he’d pose motionless and wait for someone to come by. At some point he’d wink, and the person would freak out, or tell another person that the mannequin winked at him.

I never did it myself. The store would go out of business with mannequins that looked like me.

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### Author: ![Alpha\_Twit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alpha_twit/32/265_2.png) [@Alpha\_Twit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alpha_Twit)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/10 "2018-12-30T13:26:55Z")

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I was at the landfill one time to drop off a load of construction debris and apparently, one of the local stores had dumped a couple of dozen badly battered mannequins. I gotta say, kinda freaky.

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### Author: ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/11 "2018-12-30T15:49:56Z")

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There’s an old house place near our property where a woman’s daughter killed her. It’s common knowledge. Daughter cut Mom up and scattered her parts. It was found out when a dog came up with her hand. Well, as the story goes all parts were found except her head. If I stumble across a skull I’m gonna be thourougly freaked. I tell you.

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### Author: ![campp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@campp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/campp)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/12 "2018-12-30T16:09:02Z")

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I cleaned out a clothing store once, and the owner gave me a trailer full of manequins and parts. I sold them at a series of garage sales, and they were all in great demand. The people buying them were interesting.

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### Author: ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/13 "2018-12-30T17:15:53Z")

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A buddy and I left a mannequin outside once. Hung it from a pedestrian walkway over a freeway the night before Halloween. Went back the next morning and it was gone.

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### Author: ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/14 "2018-12-30T17:23:13Z")

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I’ve seen discarded mannequins and dummies on city streets, but never “in the wild.”

However, I used to live in an area of the Bronx where some of the local parks or back streets were frequent dumping grounds for bodies from Mafia or drug hits. I never did, but in that area it actually would have been a lot more likely to run into a real corpse than a mannequin.

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### Author: ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/15 "2018-12-30T19:34:58Z")

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I never found one, but I _left_ one at a gun range once, back in my late teens. I went there with a couple of friends, and one of them had brought the mannequin for a target. We left a lot of holes in it.

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### Author: ![mind\_the\_gap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ea666f/32.png) [@mind\_the\_gap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mind_the_gap)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/16 "2018-12-30T19:37:54Z")

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Never a mannequin, but years ago riding in the dez near Coolgardie north of Barstow, we came across a life-size cardboard Michael Jackson from the Thriller era. Probably from a movie theater display. Cracked me up. No bullet holes though, like a lot of other crap abandoned out there.

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### Author: ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/17 "2018-12-30T19:43:49Z")

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I spotted a mannequin in our back woods some time ago, then it got kind of discolored and I don’t see it anymore.

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### Author: ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/18 "2018-12-30T21:08:58Z")

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> [@Alpha\_Twit](#):
>
> I was at the landfill one time to drop off a load of construction debris and apparently, one of the local stores had dumped a couple of dozen badly battered mannequins. I gotta say, kinda freaky.

No doubt the remnants of a Junior “Waste Management” Scouts exercise.

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### Author: ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/19 "2018-12-30T21:13:59Z")

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I have a headless, limbless, pregnant mannequin torso under the house somewhere. I found it in the skip when a children’s clothing store was closing down: it was too creepy not to souvenir, but too creepy to display.

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### Author: ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)
#### Post date: [December 30, 2018, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-anyone-here-ever-found-a-mannequin-while-outdoors/826901/20 "2018-12-30T21:33:14Z")

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There was a giant Budweiser Clydesdale cut out in a a dumpster on a back road. All you could see was the head sticking out of the dumpster. Shades of the Godfather. It was fun to see for months. I guess the trash pickup didn’t want it in their truck.

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