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X-FILES

The Max Headroom Hijacking

What do you think about this?

On the night of November 22, 1987, television signals in Chicago were hijacked. Twice. First during a sports broadcast, then later during an episode of Doctor Who on the public station, the picture cut out and was replaced by a figure in a plastic Max Headroom mask, bobbing in front of a sheet of corrugated metal, laughing and rambling for nearly a minute and a half before the signal snapped back.

Pulling this off meant overpowering a station’s own signal at the receivers on top of the city’s tallest towers, which took real equipment and real technical skill. Where the hijacker transmitted from has never been established. The FCC investigated. Engineers were baffled. And in nearly forty years, in front of a citywide audience of witnesses, no one has ever been caught or even reliably identified.

Makes you wonder how someone pulls off a stunt in front of an entire city and then simply disappears.

A prank by insiders who covered their tracks, or something stranger going on? What do you think was behind the Max Headroom hijacking?

KEEP DIGGING

The Varginha Incident

What do you think about this? On January 20, 1996, three young women in Varginha, Brazil, saw a four foot creature with oily skin and red eyes crouched by a wall. The army was in town that morning. A policeman said to have handled it died a month later. Cover story, or Brazil’s Roswell?

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The Conneaut Giants

What do you think about this? In 1800 settlers at Conneaut, Ohio, opened a four acre burial ground in rows and reported skeletons over seven feet, jaws that fit over a man’s face, double rows of teeth. The graves were plowed under within a generation. Tall tale, or a people buried twice?

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The Iron Pillar of Delhi

What do you think about this? The Iron Pillar of Delhi is six tons of forged iron from around 400 AD. It has stood outside through 1,600 years of monsoons and never rusted, thanks to a protective film from phosphorus rich iron nobody made again. Lucky recipe, or knowledge lost on purpose?

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Doggerland

What do you think about this? North Sea trawlers pull up mammoth teeth, flint tools and a carved harpoon from 120 feet deep. Until 8,000 years ago that seabed was Doggerland, a forested land the size of Britain, drowned by rising seas and a tsunami. The lost land of every old story?

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The Betz Mystery Sphere

What do you think about this? In 1974 a Florida family found a polished 22 pound steel ball in burned brush. It hummed when a guitar played, rolled across rooms on its own and changed direction. Navy X rays showed objects inside, origin unknown. Valve ball, or something that landed?

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The Whaley House

What do you think about this? The Whaley House in San Diego was built in 1857 where a man was slowly hanged five years earlier. A baby and a daughter later died inside. Visitors report footsteps in empty rooms and a pressure on the throat where the gallows stood. Old house, or long memory?

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