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Freaky Florida

Mighty_Emperor

Gone But Not Forgotten
(ACCOUNT RETIRED)
Joined
Aug 18, 2002
Messages
19,408
See also Weird Miami:
www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=949

Florida author explores the offbeat critters and characters that litter the state's history

By Margo Harakas
Staff Writer
Posted April 25 2005


Who would better know -- and appreciate -- the weirdness of this crazy-quilt state than a 10th-generation Floridian?

"Whooaaaa," you say. "No, way. Ain't no critter goes back that far."

Well, say howdy to Charlie Carlson, who dates his cracker roots to the mid-1700s.

Carlson, author of Weird Florida ($19.95, Barnes & Noble Books) offers authentic history as well as the wild rumors, myths and wacky legends that so aptly define the Sunshine State.

As a boy, Carlson sat for hours spellbound, listening to his grandma tell ghost stories. "She swore they were true."

From those early story sessions, Carlson developed an interest in exploring spiritualism and unexplained phenomena.

"I'm basically a historian," he says, actually folk historian and past president of the Seminole County Historical Society. He holds a master's in anthropology, and is retired as a sergeant major from the Army. Been to 52 countries, he tells you, but always returns to Florida. "I wouldn't live anywhere else," he declares. Today he lives in Edgewater, on Florida's east coast near New Smyrna Beach.

A colorful character, he's appeared in several TV documentaries and was cast as the folklore historian in the Curse of the Blair Witch on the Sci-Fi channel. Among fans, he's known as The Man in Black, for the top hat, black suit and pullover he dons for his offbeat folklore presentations.

For his more serious lectures, "I dress more like a medicine man, with a top hat, and a vest and a shirt with garters on the sleeves."

He's co-authored "at least 10 history books" and written scores of newspaper and magazine articles. "Over the years, I've interviewed a lot of credible people who tell incredible stories," he says.

The best of all -- the eerie and unexplained, the history that never made it into the high school texts -- is served up in Weird Florida, Your Travel Guide to Florida's Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets, the latest entry in the Weird U.S. series.

A fine fiddler

For those who tend toward the more verifiable, there's the adventure of Carlson's "seventh-great grandfather" (on his mother's side), Col. William Williams of the East Florida Patriots, a militia group operating out of Georgia.

Captured by the Spanish in 1810, Williams was imprisoned at Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine. He and a compatriot were to be garroted. But first there was a fiesta. Williams, a fiddler, was brought out to entertain the governor and his guests.

Williams found the more he fiddled, "the more rum the Spaniards drank."

As drunkenness and drowsiness set in, Williams bolted, making his way to "the old cow fort in Jacksonville" and then swimming the St. Johns River.

Despite this narrow escape, Williams eventually put down roots in Columbia County.

Among Carlson's favorite figures in Florida's bizarre history is Bone Mizell, "a cracker cowboy who roamed all over South Florida and Hillsborough County. He was a prankster, a rustler and a drunk. You name it and he was involved in it.

"He was also the model used by Frederic Remington for his painting A Cracker Cowboy," says Carlson.

Mizell died in 1921 at a train station in Arcadia waiting for the Lykes Brothers meat company to telegraph a reply to his plea for a loan. Moonshine was listed as the cause of death.

Bumbling baddies

Carlson also has a special affection for the notorious Ashley gang, simply because they were such bumblers.

They "left a trail of crime from the Everglades to Jacksonville," committing everything from murder to robbery.

In 1915, John and Bob Ashley teamed up with a Chicago mobster named Kid Lowe to rob a Florida East Coast Railway passenger train.

"The robbery was less than successful, though, because the gang hadn't worked out who was to shake down the passengers and who was to rob the mail car," Carlson writes.

That same year, during a bank heist in Stuart, Lowe accidentally shot John Ashley in the jaw, blinding him in the right eye.

In 1924, the gang's reign of terror ended when John and three others were shot to death at a roadblock, following the robbery of a Pompano Beach bank. The men were buried in Gomez, near the Ashley family homestead, on a site that today sits in the middle of Mariner Sands, an exclusive residential development.

"They are buried in the back yards of homes owned by bankers and lawyers. Right in the middle of the people they used to rob," says Carlson, savoring the irony.

Even stranger than the sagas of notorious desperadoes are the legendary tales of skunk apes, ghosts and alarming apparitions.

Among the better documented are the odd occurrences at a Miami warehouse.

From December 1966 through January 1967, 225 poltergeist incidents were reported at the Tropication Arts warehouse. Boxes whizzed between shelves, objects crashed to the floor. Police, media and parapsychologists descended on the scene.

Some suspected that a teenage employee, said to possess psychic powers, was causing the disturbances.

"Poltergeist incidents, with few exceptions, have usually involved adolescents experiencing physical or emotional turmoil in their lives," writes Carlson.

Whatever the explanation, when the youth was fired the activities ceased.

Florida's mascot

The late comedian Jackie Gleason, reportedly a UFO buff, also receives mention in the book. Back in 1973, Carlson writes, Richard Nixon supposedly took Gleason "to see the preserved remains of space aliens at a secret facility at Homestead Air Force Base. According to the story, the aliens were recovered from a crashed flying saucer back in 1953."

More persistent than reports of space aliens are stories of encounters with skunk apes.

"I got stories all over Florida from people who would believe anything, and from anthropologists, archaeologists and good credible people telling me the same type of story about a big, hairy beast that looks half man and half animal."

Carlson admits he doesn't know what to make of the alleged sightings. "Somebody is seeing something and I don't think somebody is running around the Everglades -- as hot as it is -- in a gorilla suit."

Despite the lack of any hard physical evidence of the skunk ape's existence, Carlson notes, the Legislature in 1977 considered a bill to protect "the elusive man-ape."

It didn't pass.

The way Carlson sees it, the state is overlooking a remarkable opportunity. He proposes the skunk ape be declared the state's paranormal mascot. He envisions signs on the border proclaiming, Welcome to Skunk Ape Country.

"Yes," he says, imagining it all with deep satisfaction, "it'd be a proper mascot for strange and weird Florida."

Source

[edit: I can't find the book mentioned but I did find:

Weird Florida
Eliot Kleinberg (1998)
www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/15635 ... ntmagaz-21
www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1563524 ... enantmc-20

It gets mixed reviews but........

ah I did some digging and found this by the author mentioned above:

Strange Florida: The Unexplained and Unusual
by Charlie Carlson (1997)
www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/18776 ... ntmagaz-21
www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1877633 ... enantmc-20

and a related one:

Oddball Florida: A Guide to Some Really Strange Places
Jerome Pholen (2003)
www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/15565 ... ntmagaz-21
www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1556525 ... enantmc-20

still digging.... ]
 
Sea monster had a face like a human

-- Margo Harakas
Posted April 25 2005


A typical tale from Charlie Carlson's Weird Florida:

Imagine a penguin 15 feet tall -- on Clearwater Beach. In 1948, beachcombers and boaters claimed to have seen the creature. Others said it left huge tracks in the sand. Local papers carried stories, but no one ever determined what the creature was.

More unnerving than a giant penguin was the strange half-human monster Emily L. Bell encountered in the Fort Pierce area in the late 1800s. In her memoirs, she tells of going ashore at the Jupiter Inlet and trekking along the coast for eight miles. Hearing a rustle in the bushes, she called her husband over to investigate. Together, they watched as a green-black-yellowish creature, 30 feet long, reared up and, turning a human-like face toward them, slipped into the surf. Locals later told them the creature appeared in the area a couple of times a year.

Henry Flagler died in Palm Beach in 1913, but his body was taken to St. Augustine and put on display in the rotunda of his elegant Ponce de Leon Hotel. As Flagler's body was being moved to the burial site, the massive doors of the rotunda suddenly swung shut for no obvious reason. Later in the day, a janitor discovered in a small floor tile the image of Flagler's face. It's said that observant visitors can still find the image.

In Geneva lies the skull of Lewis Powell, a co-conspirator of John Wilkes Booth. This son of a Live Oak minister attempted to stab to death Secretary of State William Seward the day Booth shot Lincoln. Seward survived, and Powell was arrested three days later and hanged on July 7, 1865. Powell's body was never claimed, but his skull surfaced years later at the Smithsonian's Museum of Natural History. The skull was laid to rest in 1994 in the Old Geneva Cemetery.

The Seven Dwarfs never lived on Spruce Creek, though their house is there on property once owned by James N. Gamble, son of the founder of Proctor & Gamble. Daughter Maude inherited the property and when she died, her heartbroken husband, Alfred K. Nippert, busied himself with the construction of a replica of the dwarf house from the Disney movie, complete in every detail.

Source
Link is dead. The MIA article can be accessed at:
https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-2005-04-25-0504220620-story.html
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I would have to say that Florida is easily the weirdest state in the US. Any state that was home to Ed Leedskalnin has got to be full of craziness.
 
This is a very weird state!! I moved here in 89 (from southern Calif) and from day one its been a trip! That book Weird Florida , I'll have to check that out! One thing about Florida its alot cheaper than California ! You can still buy property her without being a millionaire!! and miles of beaches to party on! and the skunk ape is just down the road!! ( I could write a book-but I'll stop here) :_pished:
 
This state has been portrayed as weird in almost all movies and TV-shows there is, including Married With Children!
 
Weirdness all around you

By RAY WEISS
Staff Writer

Last update: May 01, 2005

EDGEWATER -- Funny thing about time.

The Dark Ages decor of Joe Grabowski's yard and house wouldn't have turned an armored head in 13th-century Europe. But in sun-drenched and suburban 21st-century Florida, well, even Grabowski admits his living fantasy is, well, downright weird.

His King Arthur-like dwelling is so strange that it found a prominent spot in the pages of fellow Edgewater resident Charlie Carlson's new book, "Weird Florida."

Glued together props made of "garbage rescued" salt shakers, wine bottles and even bowling balls, sprinkled with blocks, bricks and catalog-bought gothic period pieces, give Grabowski's grass-challenged front yard the look of a set from a Shakespearean play.

Everything outside the modest one-story "castle" is spray-painted silver and black with a hint of mold green, helping provide an aged and authentic look.

"My big thing is I like to bring the inside out," said the soon-to-be-80-year-old Grabowski, a retired New York City department-store window decorator at the old Gimbels. "Everything is a fantasy. I will never be a millionaire. But why not live like one? This is my castle. My mansion."

In his book, Carlson, a 10th-generation Floridian, compiled "local legends and best-kept secrets" such as Grabowski from all across the state. Many recommendations came from fans and readers of his 1997 book, "Strange Florida," a collection of unexplained and unusual phenomena that included UFOs.

"That book was such a success. I hit on a formula," said Carlson, a retired Army man who refuses to disclose his age. "A lot of what is in this book is little known except to locals."

Florida's transient population and ever-changing landscape is fertile ground for the weird, a place where a skunk ape lurking in the swamplands can coexist with giant lobster sculptures. Carlson's task was tough.

"We have a healthy share of weirdness in this state. It's fun, though," he said. "You see something out of the ordinary and it pops out at you. A roadside oddity. A roadside marker. Things that don't fit into a box."

That's what drew Carlson to the 14 weird people and places in Volusia County in his book.

One of the most bizarre stories involves the mysterious life and death of 44-year-old John Maeder of greater New York City. In the mid '60s, he built a beachfront fortress on what was then a remote part of New Smyrna Beach. The house had double-paned bulletproof windows, armor-plated doors, 10-inch-thick steel-reinforced concrete walls, a helicopter pad on the roof and a shooting range below.

There were also two electrically operated drawbridges.

Rumors spread that Maeder was a mobster, oil-company executive or son of a wealthy doctor. His legacy grew on April 20, 1970, when he was found dead in the steep sand dunes. His tractor had tipped over and crushed his head. A pistol was found by his side, and an ammunition cache was discovered inside the house that included artillery shells, adding to the story.

Ironically, the Silver Sands house is almost impossible to spot now, secluded among a continuous row of condos. In fact, "the Mafia house" now is Unit 145 at Ocean View Towers.

David McCallister, 77, of New Smyrna Beach, helped build Maeder's house and shared some beers with him on occasion. He found the tanned and tall New Yorker quite eccentric, but not shady.

"The gossip was he was an antique gun dealer. He just seemed like a fun-loving guy. He had an easy, contagious laugh. He'd walk around in cut-offs and old Brogans without shoe strings," McCallister recalled. "I liked him myself."

McCallister said Maeder's fondness for alcohol might have contributed to his death, after losing control of the open-cabined tractor he often drove along the beach. As for any ties to organized crime, McCallister said: "I just think it's somebody's fantasy. He would have been amazed and surprised by it."

Carlson's "Weird Florida" provides a wide assortment of these kinds of odd legends, tales and people.

Among others in the book from this area are the tacky concrete dinosaurs of Port Orange's wooded and historic Sugar Mill Gardens, a roadside drive-in church among the motels and condos of Daytona Beach Shores, a beer-can car in Samsula and Brownie the Town Dog buried in Daytona Beach's Riverfront Park.

For Carlson, history can be found in everyday life, even in a quiet Edgewater neighborhood where an eccentric older man lives out his childhood fantasy. Like the Dark Ages, Joe Grabowski and his castle will not be around forever.

"The fabric of Florida is always changing. People like Joe need to have a legacy," Carlson said. "They need to be known."

Where it's weird

Charlie Carlson's catalog of the weird and the weirder in Florida includes at least 14 locations in Volusia County. They're colorful, kitschy and full of local folklore. They are:

1. "The Haunt Oak," often called the Fairchild Oak, at Bulow Creek State Park, off Old Dixie Highway in Ormond Beach.

2. "New Smyrna's Mysterious Ruins," the coquina block structure in Old Fort Park, across from City Hall, on Riverside Drive.

3. Cassadaga, home to many spiritualists, and the so-called "Devil's Chair of Cassadaga" at the Lake Helen Cemetery, off Cassadaga and Kicklighter roads.

4. "Tomoka's Carnivorous Pink Cloud in the Woods," the "mystery lights" along the Tomoka River.

5. "The Mafia House," an oceanfront home in New Smyrna Beach built like a fortress, whose owner died a mysterious death.

6. "Grabowski's Gothic Garden," the Edgewater home of Joe Grabowski, former New York City window designer.

7. "The Seven Dwarfs House," part of Gamble Place, the Spruce Creek property built by an heir to the Procter & Gamble Co.

8. "Wooden Chiefs," a collection of wooden carvings by Peter Wolf along U.S. 1 between Edgewater and Oak Hill.

9. "What Happened to Bongoland?," a collection of dinosaurs from an early tourist attraction that is part of the Dunlawton Sugar Mill Botanical Gardens in Port Orange.

10. "Beer-Can Car," a life-sized car resembling a beer can that is parked outside Sopotnick's Corner, a biker hangout in Samsula.

11. "The Weirdest Mailbox in Florida," a motorcycle mailbox adorned with a skeleton outside the home of biker Glen Bailey in New Smyrna Beach.

12. "Drive-In Church," the former movie theater along State Road A1A in Daytona Beach Shores that now allows churchgoers to stay in their cars and listen to the sermon.

13. "New Smyrna's Old Connor Library," the oldest public building in the city thought by some to be home to a ghost. The structure is at Sams Avenue and Julia Street.

14. "Brownie the Town Dog," the granite memorial to Daytona Beach's favorite canine, who died in 1954, in Riverfront Park.

Source
 
I came across this a couple years back but I'm new to these forums so I'll post this out here. How did he DO IT?? good stuff, have a skim!

He moved all these coral rocks to create the structures singlehandedly, and no-one knows to this day for sure how those enormous rocks could have been moved.

Coral Castle in Homestead, Florida, is one of the most amazing structures ever built. In terms of accomplishment, it’s been compared to Stonehenge, ancient Greek temples, and even the great pyramids of Egypt. It is amazing – some even say miraculous – because it was quarried, fashioned, transported, and constructed by one man: Edward Leedskalnin, a 5-ft. tall, 100-lb. Latvian immigrant.

Many men have single-handedly built their own homes, but Leedskalnin’s choice of building materials is what makes his undertaking so incredible. He used huge blocks of coral rock, some weighing as much as 30 tons, and somehow was able to move them and set them in place without assistance or the use of modern machinery. And therein lies the mystery. How did he do it?

It’s estimated that 1,000 tons of coral rock were used in construction of the walls and towers, and an additional 100 tons of it were carved into furniture and art objects:

Ed150.jpg


An obelisk he raised weighs 28 tons.
The wall surrounding Coral Castle stands 8 ft. tall and consists of large blocks each weighing several tons.
Large stone crescents are perched atop 20-ft.-high walls.
A 9-ton swinging gate that moves at the touch of a finger guards the eastern wall.
The largest rock on the property weighs an estimated 35 tons.
Some stones are twice the weight of the largest blocks in the Great Pyramid at Giza.
Leedskalnin on
Magnetic Current

Coral_Castle24.jpg


Ed Leedskalnin wrote several booklets which he sold to tourists as they marveled at his structure. One of them, called “Magnetic Current” is available to read online at the above link. In it he reveals the results of two years of experiments with magnets. Perhaps he reveals his secrets of levitation when he writes: “The real magnet is the substance that is circulating in the metal. Each particle in the substance is an individual magnet by itself, and both North and South Pole individual magnets. They are so small that they can pass through anything. In fact they can pass through metal easier than through the air. They are in constant motion, they are running one kind of magnets against the other kind, and if guided in the right channels they possess perpetual power.”

Working alone, Leedskalnin labored for 20 years – from 1920 to 1940 – to build the home he originally called “Rock Gate Park” in Florida City. The story goes that he built it after being jilted by his fiancée, who changed her mind about marrying him because he was too old and too poor. After wandering around the U.S. and Canada for several years, Leedskalnin settled in Florida City for health reasons; he had been diagnosed with tuberculosis. He began building his coral home in 1920. Then in 1936, when a planned new subdivision of homes threatened his privacy, Leedskalnin moved his entire home 10 miles to Homestead, where he completed it, and where it still stands as a tourist attraction.

How Leedskalnin managed this feat of engineering has remained a mystery all these years because, incredibly, no one saw him do it. A secretive man, Leedskalnin often worked at night by lantern light. And so there are no credible witnesses to how the small, frail man was able to move the huge blocks of rock. Even when he moved the entire structure to Homestead, neighbors saw the coral blocks being transported on a borrowed truck, but no one seems to know how Leedskalnin got them on and off the vehicle.

Lots of weird stories have been told and bizarre theories proposed to explain Coral Castle. And since no witness can dispute any of them, they are all worthy of consideration.
The Theories

One story says that some curious neighbors did see how Leedskalnin moved the stones. They say he placed his hands on the stone to be lifted... and sang. Somehow this levitated the great rocks.
According to an article in Fate magazine, “some teenagers spying on him one evening claimed they saw him ‘float coral blocks through the air like hydrogen balloons,’ but no one took them seriously.”
Frank Joseph, in the Fate magazine article, also writes, “Alternative science investigators suggest that Leedskalnin somehow learned the secret of the ‘world grid,’ an invisible pattern of energy lines surrounding the Earth which concentrates points of telluric power where they intersect. It was here, at one of these intersections of Earth energy, that he was supposedly able to move his prodigious stone blocks using the unseen power of our planet.” Yet that still does no explain how Leedskalnin was able to tap this power, and others cannot.

Entrance270.jpg


Coral Castle quotes J. Cathie, a captain flying with National Airways Corp. of New Zealand, as saying: “Measurements from the Coral Castle position to the zero-degree and 90-degree longitude lines, when they passed through the equator, also yielded harmonics related to light and gravity. The final check of the distance between Coral Castle and grid pole A in the north, dispelled any doubt about the site being in an ideal position to allow Leedskalnin to erect the huge blocks of coral with relative ease. Measurements from all major points gave the geometric harmonics necessary for the manipulation of anti-gravity.” Cathie also believes that this energy grid is also responsible for many UFO sightings.
In an article by called "The Coral Castle Mystery" in Atlantis Rising, author Christopher Dunn asserts: “What if there’s no such thing as gravity? And the natural forces we already know about are sufficient to explain the noted phenomena we have labeled as gravity? Perhaps Leedskalnin’s means of working with the Earth’s gravitational pull was nothing more complicated than devising a means by which the alignment of magnetic elements within his coral blocks was adjusted to face the streams of individual magnets he claims are issuing forth from the Earth with a like repelling pole.”
When he was personally asked how he managed the feat, Leedskalnin replied only that he understood the laws of weight and leverage. He is quoted as saying, “I have discovered the secrets of the pyramids. I have found out how the Egyptians and the ancient builders in Peru, Yucatan, and Asia, with only primitive tools, raised and set in place blocks of stone weighing many tons.”



According the The Enigma of Coral Castle, “Ed flatly disagreed with modern science, and claimed that the scientists were wrong, ‘that nature is simple.’ He believed all matter consisted of individual magnets, and it is the movement of these magnets within materials, and through space, that produce measurable phenomena, magnetism, and electricity. These concepts ‘involved the relationship of the Earth to celestial alignments.’ He claimed to see beads of light which he believed to be the physical presence of nature’s magnetism and life force, or what we term today, chi.”
Was Leedskalnin being deceptive when he talked about magnetism and electricity, trying to make his accomplishment more mystical and mysterious than it actually was? Had he merely found a very clever way to manipulate the great stones with levers and pulleys? We may never know the answer. Leedskalnin took his secrets with him to his grave in 1951... secrets that await to be rediscovered.

PolarisTelescope480.jpg
 
Here's a nice love story for you. I remember first encountering the story in the Miami Herald Sunday magazine supplement.


source : http://www.voltini.com/id43.htm (has pics)
In 1927, the 50 year old Karl Tanzler arrived in Key West, Florida.
Originaly from Dresden, Germany, and having recently abandoned his wife and two daughters, he now called himself 'Count Carl Von Cosel' and claimed to have nine university degrees.

He found employment as an x-ray technician and bacteriologist at Marine Hospital; in his spare time he built an airship, tinkered with curious electrical devices and played music on his home-made organ.
Then, at the hospital in April 1930, he met the woman of his dreams. Her name was Elena Milagro Hoyos, a beautiful twenty year old Spanish Cuban. She was dying from tuberculosis

From this moment on Von Cosel was obsessed. Convinced he had dreamed about her for decades and that she was destined to be his bride, he lavished her with gifts (which she accepted), proposals of marriage (which she rejected) and set about trying to cure her with electric shock machines and potions of his own devising, which included specks of gold amongst their ingredients.

Elena died in October 1931, aged just 22.
The heartbroken Von Cosel paid for a lavish funeral for his beloved, and she was buried.

However, unable to stand the thought of his darling Elena rotting underground, Von Cosel designed and built for her an ornate mausoleum. Her body was disinterred, placed in a new metal coffin and housed in the crypt. Night after night, Von Cosel sat next to her coffin and began, he believed, to communicate with Elena. She begged him to release her from her 'prison' so they could be together.

Unable to resist, one dark night in April 1933, Von Cosel stole Elena from the crypt and took her to his airship (which he had christened 'Countess Elaine' - one day, he planned to fly with Elena to the stars). Here, he began the job of resurrection. For the next seven years, he held her body together with piano wire, put glass eyes where her real ones used to be, made a wig of her own hair and, piece by piece, strenthened her skin with wax and silk. He treated her with lotions and potions and electrotherapy. Amongst his ressurection tools was a million volt tesla coil. He serenaded her with his home-made organ and slept beside her.

By 1940 the rumours could no longer be ignored. Elena's sister confronted Von Cosel and found the body. The Count was arrested and imprisoned to await trial for 'malicious and wanton disfigurement of a grave'.

Public interest in the case was huge. The local funeral home spotted an opportunity and put Elena's corpse on display. Over 6000 peaple came to view her body in three days.

Incredibly, the public were largely sympathetic. Many people thought that what the Count had done was marvelously romantic. He had many visitors to his cell offering gifts and support. At one time, a gang of giggling Cuban prostitutes turned up, offering their services to him for free. Two local friends posted the $1000 bail and he was released.

In court, the grand jury found no law under which Von Cosel could be tried which was not limited by the statute of limitations (two years was the statutory limitation for molesting a grave, and Elena had been with the Count for seven years). Having been declared 'sane' he was released without charge.

After declaring him 'sane', the same doctors performed the autopsy on Elena. What they discovered remained secret till 1972, when Dr. DePoo made his confession.

"I made the examination in the funeral home. The breasts really felt real. In the vaginal area, I found a tube wide enough to permit sexual intercourse. At the bottom of the tube was cotton, and in an examination of the cotton, I found there was sperm. Then I knew we were dealing with a sexual pervert."

Elena's body was buried in a secret, unmarked grave.
Facing financial difficulties, the Count left Key West to live with his sister in Zephyrhills, where he spent his days writing his memoirs and telling his story to tourists, selling them mementoes and showing them a wax replica of Elena he had made using her deathmask.
In July 1952 Von Cosel was found dead, slumped over the effigy of his beloved Elena.

In a final twist, evidence has come to light that one of those responsible for the secret burial of Elena's corpse made a switch, burying a weighted box and returning Elena to Von Cosel, which means the image of Elena he proudly displayed to tourists was not a replica at all...

See also : the book "Undying Love: The True Story of a Passion That Defied Death"
 
Just thought of this - Fark.com (a 'news of the weird' site) keeps track of goings-on in Florida. Look for the 'Florida' tag.
florida.gif
 
How weird is Florida? Enough to fill book after book after book

By BRENDAN FARRINGTON
Associated Press Writer

TALLAHASSEE. Fla. -- How weird is Florida? So weird that not one, not two, but three different books have been titled "Weird Florida."

The first, written by Palm Beach Post reporter Eliot Kleinberg, hit stores in 1998 and detailed years of strange news stories. Charlie Carlson published his "Weird Florida" in 2005 documenting unusual sites around the state. Now Kleinberg is coming out with a "Weird Florida II" in January with more true, offbeat stories.

"I'm already putting together a file for book three," Kleinberg said of his works. "If I thought for a second that Florida was going to stop being weird, I'd be worried. There's no signs of abatement."

Florida did indeed have scores of weird stories in 2005, from the woman who concealed a stolen parrot in her bra to a beagle puppy that was trained to sniff out pythons to a Key West man who robbed a bank with a pitchfork.

The beagle, which was put to use in the Everglades, probably wasn't such a bad idea after the number of snake incidents last year. One Burmese python swallowed a Siamese cat, another slithered into a poultry shack and ate a turkey before getting stuck inside because of the bulging bird and yet another tried to devour a 6-foot alligator before the ambitious effort caused the 13-foot snake to burst.

Other animals also met unusual ends.

A Collier County woman was afraid her neighbor's Chihuahua was going to attack her, so she shot and killed it. In Flagler County, an off-duty reserve sheriff's deputy saved a cat by fatally shooting the dog that was chasing it.

A Jacksonville man, though, learned it's not a good idea to joke about dead pets. He taunted his wife over the loss of their dog. She took an ornamental sword from above the fireplace and stabbed him through his arm.

In another Jacksonville story, a robber swinging a samurai sword sent condiments flying at a restaurant before stealing $32 from diners.

A few dumb criminals made the news.

A man suspected of burglarizing a massage therapy business was arrested after he returned to the scene looking for his missing wallet. Two thieves stole an employee's car at a Pensacola-area gas station then returned an hour later to fill up. They were arrested.

An Ocala area man didn't think through a scheme to end his marriage. He showed his wife a Utah man's wallet and said it was a hitchhiker he picked up and murdered. After a massive search for the body, police learned that the billfold's owner was fine and the suspect confessed he made up the story to get his wife to leave him.

Now here's a tip for parents: If you ask your teenage son to help you steal a dishwasher and stove from the house next door, don't be surprised if he calls the police the next time you get in an argument. That happened in Palm Beach County.

Three teenagers were charged with kidnapping a 15-year-old boy and demanding $50 ransom be dropped off at a Fort Myers Taco Bell.

And while it may not have been criminal, a high school TV journalist in Estero was suspended for deviating from his script. After reporting that the girls' soccer team kicked some booty, he added, "I love booty."

It was booty that caused Tampa area officials to stop construction on a school for emotionally disturbed students. After thinking about it, they decided the site wasn't such a good one, given the adult book stores and strip clubs that surrounded it.

A homeless man obsessed with tennis star Anna Kournikova swam naked across Biscayne Bay in search of her home and got caught in the buff at her neighbor's pool. As police arrested him, he screamed, "Anna! Save me!"

A drunk Monroe County prosecutor thought it would be funny to streak across a parking lot and hop into a friend's car. The problem was he jumped naked into the wrong car and was arrested.

In Tampa, a 40-foot motor home was converted into a strip club, offering alcohol and lap dances outside Tampa Bay Buccaneers games. In another story involving alcohol, sex and football, two Carolina Panthers cheerleaders were arrested after one punched another woman in a Tampa nightclub's bathroom. Other customers said the women were having sex in a stall, which the cheerleaders denied.

Alcohol was at the root of a Jacksonville Halloween night arrest. A partygoer in a Belligerent Drunk Man costume consisting of a blue sweat suit, a belt made out of beer can pop tops and a Superman-style "BDM" emblem on this chest got a few laughs until he actually became a belligerent drunk man and started a fight with the Green Hornet.

Among 2005's most unusual drug arrests: Police checking to make sure no one was hurt after a tornado ripped the roof off a Palm Bay home said they found 54 marijuana plants growing in a bedroom, 750 pounds of cocaine were hidden in fake plantains being shipped to Miami and a man left a half-gram of marijuana as a tip at a Jacksonville Starbucks and was arrested when he returned the next day.

And how can the state cut down on crime? One Jacksonville church called for a citywide ban on low-hanging pants and gold-capped teeth.

In other church news, an Indialantic priest admitted stealing $10,520 from his church. In Port Charlotte, a pastor called police to remove 16 congregants who refused to stop singing as he tried to begin his sermon.

More than a dozen Broward County deputies burst onto the scene of a funeral - reportedly with guns drawn - and arrested the deceased's grandson. It turned out they had the wrong guy.

Also in Broward, an officer pulled over a doctor speeding to the hospital to deliver a baby and quipped "What are you delivering, pizza?" and "If you're a doctor, I'm Mickey Mouse." The doubting officer took the doctor to the hospital in handcuffs, where a waiting woman was giving birth.

A real pizza delivery man in the Tampa area was shot in the leg during a robbery attempt - and then delivered four other pies before seeking treatment.

And in a rather unusual Tampa area traffic stop, a practical joker put a blue-and-red flashing light on a car dashboard. He stopped laughing, though, after two men he pulled over turned out to be undercover officers. The said they found 7 grams of cocaine alongside the flashing light.

Also in the Tampa area, a man apparently became enraged by a Bush-Cheney sticker on an SUV and chased a woman for miles displaying an anti-Bush sign and allegedly trying to run her off the road.

Love, not rage, was on the mind of state Sen. Gary Siplin when a television news reporter asked the Orlando Democrat about a questionable transfer his campaign account. A smiling Siplin hugged the reporter and said "I love you" three dozen times.

The vice mayor of Eagle Lake wanted to pass a rule banning spitting at city council meetings after accusing a former city manager of doing just that. The former official denied having spit and said the proposed rule was "the most asinine and juvenile thing I have heard."

An Orlando-area high school chemistry teacher was arrested after students said gave a lesson on bomb building. In other school news, St. Petersburg police officers handcuffed an unruly 5-year-old girl after she acted up in her kindergarten class.

Once again, O.J. Simpson couldn't stay out of the news. In July, a neighbor called 911 and reported Simpson was being beaten by his girlfriend. Later that month Simpson was ordered to pay $25,000 for pirating satellite television signals.

And finally, an Orlando area shoe manufacturer sued a supplier, claiming that it delivered the wrong chemical for an insole gel. The mixup caused the shoes to make, well, a farting sound with each step. An officer with the shoe maker called them "whoopie cushions for the feet."

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Last modified: December 31. 2005 4:22PM

www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/art ... /512310655
 
Things to do in Florida?

I'm dragging the Eamtribe to Florida to do the themepark thang end of Feb for 3 weeks.

Apart from that, I was wondering what else, less mainstream things, there are to do/see.

I'm definitley going to do Ripley's Believe It Or Not - anyone know of anything?
 
well first thing is to avoid the carjackers coming in from the airports. then be careful about expressing public approval of Castro, a lot of Cuban exiles who seem to have a grudge against him about. Jokes about hanging chads are long past their sell by date, so thats a no-no. do not approach any elderly Jews and ask them if they voted for Pat Buchanan by mistake, you'll be beaten ti death with bagels.
 
http://mdn.mainichi-msn.co.jp/waiwai/www/news/20061228p2g00m0dm030000c.html

TALLAHASSEE, Florida. -- Year after year Florida proves it is a weird state and 2006 was no different.

And that is beyond the headlines made by famous residents like Rush Limbaugh (arrested on a prescription drug charge) and O.J. Simpson (criticized for his supposedly hypothetical story of how he would have killed his ex-wife). The icon of the 2000 presidential recount -- Katherine Harris -- also got into unusual news: she left her U.S. House of Representatives seat only to see the election to replace her end up in a recount.

Weird is just part of Florida, and strange events seemingly happens every day in just about any part of the state: an elderly woman fighting off an alligator, a drug dealer making his pitch to uniformed officers, a state senator convicted of a felony and then filing a bill to restore felons' voting rights.

There was the Port St. Lucie man who was sentenced to 25 months in prison for selling a gorilla skull, among other things, on his Web site, deadzoo.com.

And it seems like in nowhere else but Florida could customs agents find a human skull, complete with skin and hair attached, in the suitcase of a woman returning home from Haiti. She told the agents at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport that it was to ward off evil spirits.

A bit further south at Miami International Airport, there was a different problem. A pirate radio station called Da Streetz was sending rap music into cockpit radios and a radio station directing broadcasts toward Cuba disrupted airport communication with Latin music, Christian programs and programming opposing Castro.

Then there was the man who bucked the popular trend of sneaking into Florida from Cuba. He stole a small plane from a Florida Keys airport and flew his son to the communist island, where they were detained and sent back to the United States.

Reform Party gubernatorial candidate Max Linn made an emergency landing in his small plane on a major highway near downtown Orlando, tying up traffic. It was the most publicity he had received to that point in the struggling campaign.

A 15-year-old boy stole a transit bus in Orlando and drove it about 19 kilometers, picking up passengers, collecting fares, driving the speed limit and making all the right stops before police arrested him. He later told police that he drove the bus better than most of the bus drivers could.

Two St. Lucie County teenagers were charged with stealing a school bus and taking it for a 30-minute joyride before deputies shot out the back tires.

An off-duty Maitland police officer allegedly used his gun in a less constructive manner, shooting two men who refused to let him join a poker game. The buy in for the game was $100 and the officer wanted in for $20, which led to the disagreement.

Ini other incidents involving police, an Orange County sheriff's deputy was in uniform and sitting in his marked patrol car when a man walked up to him an asked if he wanted to buy some cocaine. The deputy said yes, the man pulled out a bag with cocaine. He was arrested.

Another man doubted whether the crack cocaine he bought was real, so he asked two uniformed Tampa police officers to verify. They did. It was. He was arrested.

Here is a reason to say no to drugs: Polk County deputies had to rescue a 45-year-old man who was naked and high on crack from the jaws of a roughly 3.6-meter alligator.

It was one of several strange encounters with gators.

A 74-year-old Punta Gorda woman did a better job of fighting off an alligator. She was bit on the ankle by a 1.5-meter alligator, but she beat it back with a hose. "I just whacked him right in the snout with the nozzle," the woman said. "After that, he took off." She finished her gardening before seeking treatment for the wound.

Among other reptile encounters, a West Palm Beach couple let their 3.6-kilogram rat terrier off his leash only to have a neighbor's escaped 3.3-meter Burmese python attack and kill it.

A man driving in Naples with a pet snake wrapped around his neck crashed his car when the reptile began attacking him. He got out of his car, wrestled with the snake and then drove off, reports said.

Politicians also had their fair share of trouble.

Democratic State Sen. Gary Siplin did his best to run from his problems. After being arrested and charged with grand theft, a television reporter showed up at his office. Instead of a "no comment," Siplin ran out the back of the building and was caught on tape climbing over a fence to reach a getaway car. After his conviction on the felony charges, Siplin filed a bill to restore voting rights to felons.

Another state lawmaker was a crime victim. State Rep. Nancy Detert's bid for Congress hit a bump when her treasurer emptied the campaign account of $94,000 and fled to South America.

In another disappearing act, illusionist David Copperfield used magic to prevent being robbed. He was walking to a tour bus with two assistants after a West Palm Beach show when four armed teenagers demanded valuables. The assistants turned over several hundred dollars. Copperfield had a wallet, passport and cell phone in his pockets, but when he turned them inside out, they vanished.

Two Escambia County middle school teachers faced felony charges after being accused of taking bribes from students to let them skip gym class. The amount per class? $1.

The Lee County school superintendent nearly started a trade war with Britain. He decided to keep a Fort Myers high school band from performing in a London parade, saying the terrorist threat was too dangerous. In response, parade officials released a statement warning British travelers about Fort Myers' crime and homicide rates, Lee County's record number of traffic deaths in 2005 and that the area is prone to "catastrophic hurricanes." The band eventually went to the United Kingdom.

And, in another salute to festivities -- the Easter Bunny was fired after he punched a Fort Myers mall customer who was upset that photo opportunities with the giant costumed rabbit were wrapping up 10 minutes early.
 
Mighty_Emperor said:
Also in Broward, an officer pulled over a doctor speeding to the hospital to deliver a baby and quipped "What are you delivering, pizza?" and "If you're a doctor, I'm Mickey Mouse." The doubting officer took the doctor to the hospital in handcuffs, where a waiting woman was giving birth.


What?!
What kind of place is that!??
No exemptions!!!
wew...
 
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