History is, without a doubt, weird. Not surprisingly, most of the weirdness occurs because humans are also quite strange, and we tend to engage in some bizarre, even nonsensical behaviors.
Whether it’s dancing themselves into a grave or fighting a war over a wooden bucket, people have been finding ways to up the oddness of the world since the human race has been a thing. Here, we will go over 15 historical facts that sound fake, and explain just how real–and weird–they were!
In the Sixteenth Century, People Were Dancing Themselves to Death
In July of 1518, something started in Strasbourg–modern-day France–that we still lack an explanation for to this day.
It all started when Frau Troffea made her way out into the middle of the street. After she reached her destination, she began to dance uncontrollably. Her dancing was furious and jerky, but no matter how many people tried to interrupt her, she just couldn’t stop.
Slowly, others began to join in the manic dance, a crowd growing in the center of the town. At the height of it, in August, an estimated 400 people were being forced to dance. A few of these desperate dancers would even perish, either from heat exhaustion, starvation, dehydration, and even stroke.
Finally, in September, the terrible dancing plague began to subside, and the surviving dancers were sent away to pray. At the time, it was thought the dancers may have been possessed by demons, but now it’s believed they were suffering from some kind of food poisoning, or that they had succumbed to a form of mass hysteria.
Australians Once Fought, and Lost, a War Against Emus
After World War I, many Australian veterans began new lives as farmers and were given land by the government to work with. The normal hardships of farming were expected–drought, failing crops, and insect pests. One thing they were totally unprepared for, though, was the emus.
Emus, large flightless birds similar to ostriches, are native to Australia and would embark on massive migrations each year. They traveled in groups and were happy to eat and stomp all over any crops they encountered. The destruction caused by the emus shocked the new farmers, and after failing to control the problem, they asked for government assistance.
The Australian government assigned the military to cull the emus with machine guns. It was a bloody solution, but the emus were considered pests. Unfortunately for the gunners, the emus were fast, quick to scatter, and had hides tough enough to survive an errant bullet. This culling was attempted multiple times, and while some emus were killed, the mission was ultimately a failure and became increasingly unpopular with the public. Eventually, the emus won the war, and they were left in peace.
London Was Once Flooded With Beer
Beer, for many, is a good thing. In 1814 London, when beer was often safer than water to drink, it was even better. But there can always be too much of a good thing, which is exactly what happened when London was flooded with beer.
On October 17, a 22-foot-tall vat of beer exploded. The vat was owned by Horse Shoe Brewery, and its bursting caused other nearby vats to fail as well.
The flood of beer destroyed the brewery and flooded into a nearby neighborhood, where it killed 8 people. All in all between 154,000 and 388,000 gallons of beer were lost, and the tragic incident would lead to wooden vats being phased out.
Boston, Massachusetts, Was Also Flooded, But With Molasses!
Not to be outdone, Boston had its own non-water flood on January 15, 1910, when 12,000 tons of molasses flooded the streets.
The molasses was stored in stone, not wood, but it would still fail when the swiftly warming temperatures in the area caused the molasses to expand. Molasses, being much thicker than beer or water, devastated the nearby areas. It was so sticky that those caught in the flood struggled to escape and breathe.
Once the molasses settled, 21 people would be dead. For months afterward, molasses would be found on nearly every surface in Boston, tracked through the city by the cleanup crews.
The Austrian Army Once Battled Itself
The Austro-Turkish War of 1787-1791 pitted the Hapsburg monarchy against the Ottoman empire, but would also lead to a bizarre friendly-fire event where the Austrian Army would battle itself.
Called the Battle of Karánsebes, the incident occurred when two separate scouting Austrian scouting parties mistook one another for Ottoman Empire troops. The scouting parties hadn’t planned to run into each other, and the resulting panic from the meeting caused shots to be fired.
Austrian soldiers desperately tried to find the enemy, but when the smoke cleared, what actually occurred was that they had fired not on the opposing Ottomans, but on their own men.
In the confusion, Ottoman forces took over the nearby town of Karánsebes, meaning they had been victorious without even firing a shot.
The City-States of Modena and Bologna Went to War Over a Bucket
The only thing more pointless than fighting against your own men might be fighting over a bucket, but that’s just what the Italian city-states of Modena and Bologna did in 1325.
Wars and skirmishes in the area had been going on for some time, and tensions were high. So high, in fact, that even the smallest thing could be the catalyst for an all-out battle. During one of these previous skirmishes, Modena had taken a bucket from Bologna as a trophy of their victory.
The citizens of Bologna were incensed over the loss of their beloved pail and subsequently went to battle to reclaim it. Embarrassingly for Bologna, Modena emerged victorious and was able to keep their bucket trophy, and assumedly, bragging rights as well.
Prize Money From a Deceased Lawyer Led to the Great Stork Derby
For ten years, between 1926 and 1936, the women of Toronto, Ontario, Canada entered themselves into a derby. Not a stock car derby like you might be imagining, though, but a baby derby.
Called “The Great Stork Derby”, this race to the birthing bed was started when lawyer Charles Vance Miller passed away and left a large portion of his estate to the woman who could birth the most babies in the following ten years.
Bizarrely, this stork derby was allowed to proceed. Initially, 11 families entered into the race, but by the end, there would be a four-way tie. Each of the four victors would receive $110,000 as the prize for having nine children.
Beware of Bicycle Face!
In the late 1800s, bicycles were all the rage. Initially something that was enjoyed by boys and men, bicycles quickly became popular among women who enjoyed the freedom of mobility and exercise.
Women riding bicycles offended enemies of feminism, especially when it began to alter the way women would dress. It wasn’t easy riding bikes in huge Victorian dresses!
To combat the feminine love for bicycles, doctors made up a condition that they hoped would scare women into putting down the bike–bicycle face. According to Literary Digest, bicycle face would consist of “usually flushed, but sometimes pale, often with lips more or less drawn, and the beginning of dark shadows under the eyes, and always with an expression of weariness.”
This was all a lie, of course, and women continued to enjoy bicycles with their totally normal faces.
The Author of Sherlock Holmes Was Part of A Ghost Club
The oldest paranormal investigation and research organization in the world was named, somewhat uninspiringly, “The Ghost Club.” Despite the boring name, it managed to draw in all sorts of famous minds.
One of the most famous members, and possibly the member with the most enduring legacy, is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The creator of the character Sherlock Holmes, Doyle incorporated paranormal elements into his stories, possibly inspired by the things he experienced as part of The Ghost Club.
Cocaine Was a Cure-All
Before cocaine made its way across the world, it had humble beginnings as the coca leaf. Coca leaves were chewed by Incas to receive various effects.
By the 1880s, the coca leaf had been transformed into cocaine hydrochloride and was storming the United States. Everything from wine to margarine could contain cocaine, and it was touted as the cure for all sorts of things.
Cocaine, for obvious reasons, helped with lethargy, but it was also attached to false claims like being a cure for stomach ailments or depression. People would become addicted without even knowing how.
Thankfully, by the 1900s, cocaine was starting to be seen as a dangerous drug, and not something you could buy at the local market.
Radium Was the New Wonder Drug
Another unlikely wonder drug was radium. Discovered by Marie and Pierre Curie, the glowing element swiftly became the drug of the day.
There were claims that radium could cure cancer, among other ailments, and was ingested, injected, and even applied to the skin. It wasn’t until it made the infamous Radium Girls deathly ill that people started to realize radium wasn’t a cure of any sort. In fact, it was plenty toxic all on its own.
Green Dresses Were Toxic
During the Victorian era, a vivid green dye began to appear in the dresses of the time. While striking, the dresses held a terrible secret–they were dyed with arsenic.
Women who wore the dresses for long periods would become ill from arsenic exposure, some of them even dying. It took a long time for the arsenic dye to be linked to the sicknesses, and when it finally was, arsenic green was coloring everything from children’s clothing to wallpaper.
The Author of Frankenstein Kept Her Husband’s Heart in Her Desk
Mary Shelley was not just the mother of science fiction–she was also a loving wife, and later, a grieving widow.
The author of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley’s life was shaken when her husband Percy Shelley drowned at sea. During his cremation, rumor has it that Mary snatched what she believed was Percy’s heart from the flames. The macabre writer would wrap the heart in Percy’s poetry and silk, keeping it in her desk for the rest of her life.
Mummies Were Mistaken For Medicine
While we discussed cocaine and radium as medicine earlier on the list, even more bizarre is the use of mummified human remains as a medicinal treatment.
Known as mummia, mummy medicine came about due to Egyptomania in the Victorian era. Europeans found scores of mummies in Egypt, and they would make their way to England where mummy unwrapping parties were all the rage.
Later, some of the unwrapped mummies would be dried and ground into powder. The resulting powder would be used as medicine, and the ingestion of it was a form of medical cannibalism. Mummia cured nothing, of course, but sellers claimed it could fix everything. Anything for a sale!
The Mafia Controlled Artichokes in New York City
Alcohol wasn’t the only thing the New York City mafia had a racket on in the 1920s, but their second-biggest money maker might surprise you.
The hilarious named “Artichoke King”, Ciro Terranova, had a stranglehold on artichoke importers, raising prices and upsetting the artichoke-obsessed New Yorkers of the time. Artichokes were big business, so in order to get the spiny vegetables back in the hands of New Yorkers at a fair price, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia placed a temporary ban on them.
Within a month, the Artichoke King would be no more, and the ban on the vegetable was lifted.
