Wikipedia's List of Unusual Deaths . . . Interesting Reading

Wikipedia's List of Unusual Deaths

In 458 B.C., an eagle clutching a tortoise mistook "a bald head for a stone" and dropped its catch on the shiny cranium—which, unfortunately, topped the body of the Greek playwright Aeschylus. Thus did the great bird bring to a close the life of the legendary philosopher-scribe. But what an ending! This tale and others like it may, just may, "be apocryphal." But that doesn't diminish the enjoyment to be found in reading through Wikipedia's list of outlandish historical deaths (or the rumors thereof). From burial by book to drowning by wine, the famous fatalities recounted here are sure to amaze you. We all know Isadora Duncan departed this life thanks to her overreaching scarf, but how many culturally literate folk know of Frank Hayes, the jockey who suffered a heart attack, but still won the race? Or that Henry I loved lampreys that much? Read, enjoy, and keep an eye out for large birds of prey toting reptiles and winging overhead.

Where the Stars Died ... A Map

Interesting site . . . "Where the Stars Died." Over the years, Hollywood stars have often made the headlines by being involved in a wide variety of scandals, murders, suicides, accidents and controversial deaths - even occasional acts of celebrity heroism.

From Del Shannon to George Reeves, these incidents have gripped the imagination of the American public. And many of them happened in Los Angeles.Where did Marilyn Monroe die? How about Janis Joplin and John Belushi? Where was Phil Hartman murdered? Where did Freddie Prinze commit suicide? Where did "Superman" die?

Where can you find the scene of the crimes for such infamous L.A. cases as The Menendez Brothers, the Black Dahlia, Patty Hearst, the Manson Family, the Robert Blake case, and the Nicole Simpson murders? It's all at this site . They list the actual locations of the Hollywood stories which made the news. The locales are listed by decade, and include street addresses and links to interactive online maps for your convenience.

Where Vehicles are Left to Diec

Here are some examples of vehicle cemeteries around the world, areas on earth that have unwittingly become the home to rusting, unused machines - remember, this is just a selection of the many boneyards on earth and while they often look stunning and make for a great photo, the environmental costs far outweigh the view. Check out this guys blog "Where Vehicles are Left to Die." Interesting blog post. He has planes, trains, automobiles and even nuclear subs that are dead in the water! It's a little sad to look like even if they are inanimate objects.

20 Things I Bet You Never Knew About Death

Just what you wanted to Read: 20 "INTERESTING" Things You Didn't Know About Death ..... might not want to read this over breakfast..... (I found #7 to be interesting)

09.01.2006

20 Things You Didn't Know About... Death

Newsflash: we're all going to die. But here are 20 things you didn't know
about kicking the bucket.

 1 The practice of burying the dead may date back 350,000 years, as evidenced by a 45-foot-deep pit in
Atapuerca, Spain, filled with the fossils of 27 hominids of the species Homo heidelbergensis, a possible ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans.

2 Never say die: There are at least 200 euphemisms for death, including "to be in Abraham's bosom," "just add maggots," and "sleep with the Tribbles" (a Star Trek favorite).

3 No American has died of old age since 1951.

4 That was the year the government eliminated that classification on death certificates.

5 The trigger of death, in all cases, is lack of oxygen. Its decline may prompt muscle spasms, or the "agonal phase," from the Greek word agon, or contest.

6 Within three days of death, the enzymes that once digested your dinner begin to eat you. Ruptured cells become food for living bacteria in the gut, which release enough noxious gas to bloat the body and force the eyes to bulge outward.

7 So much for recycling: Burials in America deposit 827,060 gallons of embalming fluid—formaldehyde, methanol, and ethanol—into the soil each year. Cremation pumps dioxins, hydrochloric acid, sulfur dioxide, and carbon dioxide into the air.

8 Alternatively . . . A Swedish company, Promessa, will freeze-dry your body in liquid nitrogen, pulverize it with high-frequency vibrations, and seal the resulting powder in a cornstarch
coffin. They claim this "ecological burial" will decompose in 6 to 12 months.

9 Zoroastrians in India leave out the bodies of the dead to be consumed by vultures.

10 The vultures are now dying off after eating cattle carcasses dosed with diclofenac, an anti-inflammatory used to relieve fever in livestock.

11 Queen Victoria insisted on being buried with the bathrobe of her long-dead husband, Prince Albert, and a plaster cast of his hand.

12 If this doesn't work, we're trying in vitro! In Madagascar, families dig up the bones of dead relatives and parade them around the village in a ceremony called famadihana. The remains are then wrapped in a new shroud and reburied. The old shroud is given to a newly married, childless couple to cover the connubial bed.

13 During a railway expansion in Egypt in the 19th century, construction companies unearthed so many mummies that they used them as fuel for locomotives.

14 Well, yeah, there's a slight chance this could backfire: English philosopher Francis Bacon, a founder of the scientific method, died in 1626 of pneumonia after stuffing a chicken with snow to see if cold would preserve it.

15 For organs to form during embryonic development, some cells must commit suicide. Without such programmed cell death, we would all be born with webbed feet, like ducks.

16 Waiting to exhale: In 1907 a Massachusetts doctor conducted an experiment with a specially designed deathbed and reported that the human body lost 21 grams upon dying. This has been widely held as fact ever since. It's not.

17 Buried alive: In 19th-century Europe there was so much anecdotal evidence that living people were mistakenly declared dead that cadavers were laid out in "hospitals for the dead" while attendants awaited signs of putrefaction.

18 Eighty percent of people in the United States die in a hospital.

19 If you can't make it here . . . More people commit suicide in New York City than are murdered.

20 It is estimated that 100 billion people have died since humans began.

(Source: Discover Magazine)