# Your favorite historical mystery, legend, conspiracy theory... **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 26, 2004, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341 "2004-06-26T18:47:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Mayfield\_St.Cloud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/67e7ee/32.png) [@Mayfield\_St.Cloud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mayfield_St.Cloud)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/21 "2004-06-27T10:38:52Z")
The grassy knoll. And don’t use that silly Oliver Stone movie as reference material. There is an excellent book called _Ancient Mysteries_ (Peter James and Nick Thorpe) which your daughter might find interesting. Easter Island statues, the Sphinx, Dracula, King Arthur, this book has it all. ---
**Author:** ![ebandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b19c9b/32.png) [@ebandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ebandit)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/22 "2004-06-27T13:21:00Z")
Okay, I will start the “conspiracy theories” My favorite one is “the car that will run for months on one tank of gas” Surely you have all heard it. A car has been invented that uses practically no gas. You can go for hundreds of miles on one tank of gas. Detroit automakers bought the design from some poor mechanic, making him sign a privacy agreement and have kept it secret from the public. My favorite take on this is from a co-worker who SWEARS that a shade-tree mechanic that lived near him as a child (when gas was like 29cents a gallon) modified a car to do this and they rode all over and never filled that tank. Yeah, RIGHT. Why did the guy die poor? he coulda made a fortune modifying every car in the state! ---
**Author:** ![ebandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b19c9b/32.png) [@ebandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ebandit)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/23 "2004-06-27T13:21:08Z")
Okay, I will start the “conspiracy theories” My favorite one is “the car that will run for months on one tank of gas” Surely you have all heard it. A car has been invented that uses practically no gas. You can go for hundreds of miles on one tank of gas. Detroit automakers bought the design from some poor mechanic, making him sign a privacy agreement and have kept it secret from the public. My favorite take on this is from a co-worker who SWEARS that a shade-tree mechanic that lived near him as a child (when gas was like 29cents a gallon) modified a car to do this and they rode all over and never filled that tank. Yeah, RIGHT. Why did the guy die poor? he coulda made a fortune modifying every car in the state! [http://www.geneblack.com](http://www.geneblack.com) ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/24 "2004-06-27T13:25:08Z")
> [@ebandit](#): > > You can go for hundreds of miles on one tank of gas. Hm, I can go about 400 miles on one tank of gas, if it is primarily highway driving, it drops to about 375 if it is less HW driving… ---
**Author:** ![Powers106](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@Powers106](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Powers106)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/25 "2004-06-27T15:51:54Z")
A few of my favorites, for some reason disappearances have always fascinated me: In the UK, there is the famous disappearance of [Lord Lucan](http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/family/lord_lucan/) – pretty interesting, imho. And there are some links at the bottom of the page to other crime stories/mysteries. In Thailand, there was the disappearance of Jim Thompson, an American silk trader. Someone already mentionned Roanoke Island, where a whole colony disappeared. Amelia Earhart. On another note, the Ernest Shackleton account of the Endurance is a fascinating story of survival, not exactly a mystery or conspiracy but for some reason it pops into my head as an interesting topic to research along with the others I mentionned. Cheers, Powers ---
**Author:** ![Incubus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c68b51/32.png) [@Incubus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Incubus)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/26 "2004-06-27T17:00:17Z")
I think my favorite mystery is the Philadelphia project. I did a research project on it, in fact. Interesting to note how soon Nikolas Tesla happened to die during the Philadelphia project… :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![sofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/35a633/32.png) [@sofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sofia)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/27 "2004-06-27T18:10:26Z")
I told my daughter that I posted this thread…and that I already had twenty-some responses. So, according to my daughter, you are all “so cool” for giving her some ideas to research. “These must be smart people you know, Mom,” she says to me. Well, of course. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Unregistered\_Bull](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3da27b/32.png) [@Unregistered\_Bull](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unregistered_Bull)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/28 "2004-06-27T19:26:22Z")
Juarez Murders ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/29 "2004-06-27T21:16:51Z")
**sofia** , if your daughter wants to read the story “He Walked Around the Horses” it is in the short story collection Paratime, by H. Beam Piper. Out of print of course, but easily found. Go to [www.abebooks.com](http://www.abebooks.com) and enter Paratime in the title block and H. Beam Piper in the author block, to search. It can be had for as little as $2.00 plus s&h. Actually, the whole book is fun but that one is on my top five list of science fiction short stories. And googling on Benjamin Bathurst and Charles Fort will throw up links to the tale of the missing diplomat. ---
**Author:** ![gallows\_fodder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8c91f0/32.png) [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/30 "2004-06-27T22:42:33Z")
The [Voynich Manuscript](http://www.voynich.nu/). What is it? A 13th-Century alchemical treatise written by Roger Bacon? A 16th-Century forgery? No one knows. > [@](#): > > The Voynich manuscript is often described as the world’s most mysterious book. It is hand-written in a unique alphabet, about 250 pages long, and contains pictures of unrecognizable flowers, naked nymphs and astrological symbols. > > The manuscript first appeared in the late 1500s, when Rudolph II bought it in Prague from an unknown seller for 600 ducats - about 3.5 kilograms of gold, worth more than US$50,000 today. The book passed from Rudolph to noblemen and scholars, before disappearing in the late 1600s. > > It surfaced again around 1912, when US book dealer Wilfrid Voynich bought it. The manuscript was donated to Yale University after Voynich’s death. > > No one has worked out whether Voynichese is a code, an idiosyncratic translation of a known tongue, or gibberish. The text contains some features that are not seen in any language. The most common words are often repeated two or three times, for example - the equivalent of English using ‘and and and’ - giving weight to the hoax theory. > > On the other hand, some aspects, such as the pattern of word lengths and the ways in which characters and syllables occur with each other, are similar to real languages. “Many people have believed that it is too complicated to be a hoax - that it would have taken some mad alchemist years to get such regularity,” says Rugg. > > –[http://www.nature.com/nsu/031215/031215-5.html](http://www.nature.com/nsu/031215/031215-5.html) A researcher claims to have [debunked](http://www.keele.ac.uk/depts/cs/staff/g.rugg/voynich/) the mystery, apparently having broken the code, but his findings aren’t completely conclusive. It’s a cool story, though. ---
**Author:** ![gallows\_fodder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8c91f0/32.png) [@gallows\_fodder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gallows_fodder)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/31 "2004-06-27T22:45:59Z")
PS. Here are [pictures](http://www.voynichinfo.com/color/color.html) of some of the Voynich Manuscript’s pages. ---
**Author:** ![sofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/35a633/32.png) [@sofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sofia)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/32 "2004-06-27T23:00:58Z")
gallows fodder, I spent some time the other night looking at the Voynich Manuscript too. Kinda cool…but the pictures weren’t so hot. I know I can do a search for this…but just off the top of your collective head, what was the name of the brothers who were found in their apartment (in New York, was it?)…they’d been living amidst piles of papers/magazines/mail and whatnot for years… I know, not much information…but you are all so _good_. I’m awful with names, but I can remember pieces of the stories…like the woman who kept building onto her house…very odd. ---
**Author:** ![Gr8Kat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gr8kat/32/18668_2.png) [@Gr8Kat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gr8Kat)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/33 "2004-06-27T23:29:39Z")
The Nova Scotia money pit. I would love to know what (if anything) was buried there, and if it could have been recovered with better-planned expeditions. ---
**Author:** ![Lissa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lissa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissa)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/34 "2004-06-28T01:26:04Z")
> [@sofia](#): > > I’m awful with names, but I can remember pieces of the stories…like the woman who kept building onto her house…very odd. Ah, you’re thinking of Sarah Winchester. It has its own [web page](http://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com/) As I remember it, she was afraid that the angry ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles would come for her, so she built the house in such a way as to confuse them. IIRC, she consulted a medium who told her that she’d be protected from the spirits if she never stopped building. ---
**Author:** ![TVeblen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/4bbf92/32.png) [@TVeblen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TVeblen)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/35 "2004-06-28T01:32:39Z")
> [@sofia](#): > > I’m awful with names, but I can remember pieces of the stories…like the woman who kept building onto her house…very odd. The [Winchester House](http://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com/), built by the heiress of the Winchester gun fortune. She was obsessed with those who’d been killed by the family’s claim to fame and fortune, and believed that nothing horrible would happen to her as long as she was adding onto her house. And enthusiastic agreement for **Gr8Kat’s** idea of the Money Pit. It really is a fascinating thing. IIRC FDR became interested in it and spent a summer during his youth trying to help excavate it. I’d read about it so made a point to go see it on a trip to Canada. Very spooky; the current owners do _not_ encourage or tolerate guests, no matter how harmlessly curious. Get near it and very scary, slit-eyed men come walking toward you. So the violent tradition continues to this day, or at least did a few years ago when I tried to visit. Veb ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/36 "2004-06-28T01:53:18Z")
> [@sofia](#): > > gallows fodder, I spent some time the other night looking at the Voynich Manuscript too. Kinda cool…but the pictures weren’t so hot. > > I know I can do a search for this…but just off the top of your collective head, what was the name of the brothers who were found in their apartment (in New York, was it?)…they’d been living amidst piles of papers/magazines/mail and [The Collyer Brothers](http://members.tripod.com/earthdude1/collyer/collyer.html) I believe the Winchester Mansion is open to visitors. I would LOVE to visit someday-it’s just so beautiful! (I just love eccentrics!) Damn, I wish I lived in a haunted house. Oh, what about the story of Resurrection Mary, Chicago’s most famous ghost? ---
**Author:** ![sofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/35a633/32.png) [@sofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sofia)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/37 "2004-06-28T02:01:52Z")
[QUOTE=GuinastasiaDamn, I wish I lived in a haunted house. [/QUOTE] Oh, ho, ho, no. You think you do _now._ But _believe me;_ you do not. 🙂 I lived almost a full year in a haunted dorm in college…it was cool initially, but later it got decidedly weird. …Had you been there, we’d have had fun, though. 😃 And thank you all for remember and citing for me. This is **awesome**! ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/38 "2004-06-28T02:38:09Z")
I’ve thought the Lizzie Borden story was very cool ever since I read [the Straight Dope column about it.](http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mlizzieborden.html) > [@Incubus](#): > > I think my favorite mystery is the Philadelphia project. I did a research project on it, in fact. > > Interesting to note how soon Nikolas Tesla happened to die during the Philadelphia project… :dubious: Speaking of which, my number one favorite mystery is the 1920s style death ray. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/39 "2004-06-28T03:24:45Z")
[Fortean Times](http://www.forteantimes.com) One of my favorite magazines and if that isn’t endorsement enough, I don’t know what is. it is rather odd ( It took me about a week of reading and re-reading it to \*get[./i] it.) and if left in your bathroom where guests will see it may may them rather nervous about you and your mental state. It will expose you to a whole new world outside of Cosmo/People. Not that \*you \*read that kind of stuff.It has newspaper clippings of paranormal/cult/oddities from around the world. Strange deaths and cultural phenomena’s that are just _so damned interesting_. It pokes into stories: did Pokemon cause kids in Japan to convulse or what? ( can’t remember exactly, but I think it was hysteria.) Was Padre [Pio](http://www.forteantimes.com/articles/162_padrepio.shtml) a loon or a saint? Mothman (truly a fascinating thing there.), Loch Ness Monster, Big Foot, In Search of the Orang-Pendek, The Cult of Elvis, UFO’s, Raelians ( you know, the “we cloned a human” cult.) Vampires!, Zombie Assassins! and a whole bunch of other fascinating articles. It also doesn’t take itself too seriously either, which I admire. It’s a fun read. Its found usually in either the New Age section or Cultural section of Magazines at a nearby discrimating bookstore. ( It is a pain to find, IMHO.) \*\*My name is Shirley Ujest and I endorse this post and it’s contents. \*\* ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2004, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341/40 "2004-06-28T03:28:02Z")
**Conspiracies that I like** Princess Diana was murdered. This is the new Grassy Knoll conspiracy. I just love it and all its sordidness. The Holy Grail stuff. Most of the aboveforementioned conspiracies and about fifty that I am totally forgetting right now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-favorite-historical-mystery-legend-conspiracy-theory/252341.md?page=3)