10Tom Thomson Canadian painter Tom Thomson was last seen setting out on a fishing trip in a canoe on July 8, 1917. When his body was found floating in Canoe Lake eight days later, the circumstances behind the young artist’s demise became one of Canada’s most infamous mysteries. There were two unusual aspects of the body that led many to believe he hadn’t simply fallen overboard: A piece of fishing line was wrapped 16 times around Thomson’s left ankle, and there was a wound on his temple....

10 Flat Earth Conspiracy Theory Humans have known that Earth was round for more than 2,000 years. Or have we? The Flat Earth Society (FES) disagrees with this commonly held belief. Even though an ancient Egyptian scientist named Eratosthenes explained that Earth was round and was even able to estimate Earth’s circumference, and there is literal footage that displays Earth rotating, the FES proposes an alternative. Watch this video on YouTube The FES argument boils down to a few essential points....

10Napoleon Bonaparte The story of Napoleon Bonaparte’s death mask is more of a mystery than anything else. Napoleon died at the age of 51 on the island of St. Helena on May 5, 1821. That much is known for certain. Two days after his death, the first cast for Napoleon’s death mask was made by Dr. Francis Burton with Dr. Antommarchi presiding. This cast would be the parent mold for the remaining three known to exist....

10Snowflakes Start As Grit Moisture is, of course, a necessary ingredient of snow. But water is in the atmosphere everywhere as vapor and droplets, and only a fraction of it becomes snow. The catalyst is a condensation nucleus. These nuclei can be anything from particulate air pollution to ash from forest fires or volcanoes to radioactive particles from nuclear explosions. It can also be sea salt, meteor dust from space, soil, sand, or pollen....

10 Brigido Lara’s Pottery When Brigido Lara was convicted of looting some of Mexico’s most valuable antiquities, he managed to get the verdict overturned with an odd defense: He wasn’t a looter at all; he was a forger. While he was in prison, he proved that the artifacts that he had been in possession of were his own creation by making more examples and having them presented to the same experts who had called the earlier pieces authentic....

Ever since the dawn of time, there have been men who are just different. Whether it’s the way they dress, how they talk, or even their hairstyles, these Florida men know how to stand out in a crowd. You’ve heard it before, and you know it’s true. Florida men are a breed apart—they’re the kind of men who will do anything to get what they want, even if it means running through a drive-thru with their clothes off or putting a live alligator in their pants....

10Dau Dau was, as of 2011, a project that had broken down in a sense, though that’s not to say filming stopped. What happened instead was director Ilya Khrzhanovsky turned this intended film tribute to Nobel-Prize winner Lev Landau into an insanely over-immersive act of “method” cultism. The cast and crew were required to dress in mid-20th-century Russian clothing to match the time period of the film; they weren’t allowed to have cell phones or anything else so modern....

10 Surgery To Treat Insanity Dr. Henry Cotton believed that localized infections were the root causes of insanity. After he became the head of an insane asylum in Trenton in 1907, he began implementing a procedure he dubbed “surgical bacteriology.” During that time, Cotton and his team performed thousands of surgical operations on patients, often without their consent. First, they extracted teeth and tonsils; if that wasn’t enough, they would go deeper and remove the internal organs which they believed were causing the problems....

In recent years, sleep paralysis has started to move out of the shadows—no pun intended—and into the forefront of people’s minds. Researchers have now conducted a number of studies into this phenomenon, and the topic has even become the subject of several humorous memes. But sleep paralysis is no laughing matter. Read on for some truly creepy theories about what happens during sleep paralysis episodes. 10 Alien Abductions (American Interpretation) Roughly four million Americans believe that they have been the subject of an alien abduction....

Needless to say, we want to warn readers that this list isn’t something you want to read while you’re eating. 10Bobby Wilks In 1988, Bobby Wilks was 51-years-old and he had been the funeral director at the Barber Funeral Home in Cross Plains, Tennessee, for at least 20 years. At the gravesites, Wilks would often advise the families of the deceased to not watch the lowering of the casket because it might be too difficult....

10Spearfinger The Great Smoky Mountains are a subrange of the Appalachian Mountains along the Tennessee–North Carolina border. The adjacent Great Smoky Mountains National Park is the most visited park in the US, with millions enjoying the hiking trails, plant and animal life, and simply getting away from the bustle of the city life and immersing themselves completely in nature. These mountains also have several tales surrounding them, and some of them are quite creepy....

10 Lukasz Chojnowski Known as the “Goldilocks Burglar,” Lukasz Chojnowski broke into a home while the owners were away on vacation. Unlike most burglars, Chojnowski didn’t take all of their valuables. Instead, he cleaned up their house. While it would be wonderful to go away for a trip and come home to a clean house, the fact that Chojnowski was an uninvited guest made this an unnerving discovery upon their return....

10 Santa Muerte The cult of Santa Muerte, or Holy Death, can be traced to Mictlantecuhtli, Aztec lord of the underworld, and Christian personifications of death. In her modern incarnation, she appears as a skeletal figure in a wedding dress, carrying a scythe, and often adorned with fabulous jewelry and ornaments. Some claim that they can remember household shrines to the goddess over half a century ago, but her cult began to truly grow in the 1990s following the waning influence of the liberation theology of left-wing activist priests....

Throughout the years, people have done some crazy things to fix their bodies, and only science and the benefit of hindsight have proven them as dangerous as they really were. Whether someone was trying to lose weight or get rid of a pesky STD, humans have been at this health craze thing for a long time. Here are ten of the craziest things people have done to fix themselves....

10Duke Conan II Of Brittany In 1065, William of Normandy was preparing to invade England. To secure his borders, he proposed alliances with the surrounding lords. However, Duke Conan II of Brittany hated the Normans because he believed they had poisoned his father. Conan refused to ally with William and strongly implied that he would attack Normandy as soon as the army left for England. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake since William quickly had Conan poisoned as well....

So it should not be a surprise that some of this music is shaped by actual loss of life. Next time these 10 hit songs pop up on the radio, try to remember that someone really died for these to exist. 10 Three Animals Died For Paul Simon’s ‘Mother And Child Reunion’ Long before he was copying African music, Paul Simon tried his hand at imitating Jamaica. The end result was the 1972 hit “Mother and Child Reunion....

Unfortunately for criminals and murderers, this means it’s much easier to get caught, especially for those who committed crimes before DNA testing. Due to these advances, police have been able to close the book on many cold case murders, all thanks to criminals who left a little DNA before they even knew it could get them caught. 10 Shannon Lloyd and Renee Cuevas In May 1987, 23-year-old Shannon Lloyd of Orange County, California, was murdered in her apartment....

You might have had the experience of stifling a giggle upon seeing what your parents were wearing in old photos, but those old clothes have nothing on the entries in this list. Look back at history’s most depressing fashion trends, and vow here and now never to wear a flour sack—no matter how many people are doing it! 10 Flour Sacking What’s more depressing than a trend born of the Great Depression?...

10The Spanking Squad Spanking children isn’t the disciplinary measure it used to be. One New Jersey mayor was such a fan that he organized a special spanking squad for young criminal offenders. Arthur C. Whitaker was mayor of Bridgeton, New Jersey, during the 1910s. He had an automated spanking machine installed at City Hall and sentenced young offenders to it instead of sending them to reformatory schools. Once he passed down sentence, the squad would carry it out....

10Mammals’ Ancestors Ruled The Earth Before The Dinosaurs Mammals and reptiles don’t look alike, but they do share a common ancestor. As they went their separate ways, reptiles such as the ancestors of dinosaurs became diapsids. The forefathers of today’s mammals became synapsids. That rivalry lasted for over 230 million years, and mammal-synapsids totally dominated dino-diapsids for the first half of that time. Dimetrodon, for instance, a sail-backed mammal ancestor, was the dominant land carnivore of the Permian period....