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We're Hitting the Road for a 12-City Book Tour Across America
Atlas Obscura is celebrating the launch of its very first book: Atlas Obscura: An Explorer’s Guide to the World’s Hidden Wonders!This fall, we're kicking off the book's publication with a 12-city book...
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Meissen Crematorium Tour in Meissen, Germany
If you've ever been curious about how they get the right ashes into the right urn, or are just looking for something free to do in this charming town on the Elbe river, check out the Meissen...
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Election Fraud in the 1800s Involved Kidnapping and Forced Drinking
A depiction of politicians trying to buy votes from an 1857 Harper's Weekly. (Photo: Library of Congress/LC-USZ62-118006)This summer Donald Trump stoked fears that rampant voter fraud could hurt his...
View ArticleWatch These Daredevils Take a Spin on 55-Foot Windmill Sails
In 1908, San Francisco built two large windmills, the southern Murphy Windmill and the northern Dutch Windmill—structural oddities in a bustling port metropolis. The windmills’ massive four vanes, or...
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Horned Madonna of Portinari Chapel in Milan, Italy
Located inside the Basilica of Sant'Eustorgio, Portinari Chapel is an outstanding example of Renaissance architecture in Milan, replete with a handsome dome, an ornate marble sepulcher adorned in...
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Penny Lane in Liverpool, England
On the corner of Liverpool’s Church Road and Smithdown Place there is an abandoned building that was once a bus shelter. It was here that a young Paul McCartney changed buses to go visit John Lennon,...
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Drake Well Museum in Titusville, Pennsylvania
In 1859 Edwin L. Drake drilled the oil well that launched the modern petroleum industry. The Drake Well Museum in Titusville, Pennsylvania tells the story of this little well where the great big oil...
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Bob Dylan, a Musician, Is Set To Drop A New Welded Gateway Later This Year
The artist at work. (Photo: MGM National Harbor/Used With Permission)Against all odds, Bob Dylan is still making music, but even stranger, he is also still creating huge, welded gateways. As noted on...
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This Cryptozoologist Thinks Trump Might Be Behind America's Clown Hysteria
Clowns! (Photo: Frank Behrens/CC BY-SA 2.0)As everyone who cares about America is probably aware, clown hysteria has taken over the Carolinas. The big-shoed menaces are allegedly lurking in the woods...
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Memorial to Japanese-American Patriotism in World War II in Washington, D.C.
On February 19th, 1942, three months after the attacks on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, calling for the relocation of approximately 120,000 people of...
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Lindsay for Mayor Billboard in Brooklyn, New York
Hiding away on Flatbush Avenue, one of Brooklyn’s oldest and busiest streets, is an old billboard. It had been covered up by an advertisement for many years, until it was recently rediscovered when the...
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International Women's Air & Space Museum in Cleveland, Ohio
On Cleveland's north coast, where downtown meets the waters of Lake Erie, lies a strip of land considered by many Clevelanders to be a huge waste of prime real estate. The Burke Lakefront Airport—a...
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The Persistent Racism of America's Cemeteries
A view of Greenwood Cemetery in Waco, Texas. (Photo: © Google 2016)Earlier this summer, the city of Waco, Texas issued an order to remove a fence in the city’s public burial ground, Greenwood...
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The Brilliant MI6 Spy Who Perfected the Art of the 'Honey Trap'
Betty Pack on her wedding day. (Photo: Churchill Archives Center, Papers of Harford Montgomery Hyde, HYDE 02 011/Courtesy Harper Collins)These days the “honeypot” is a popular trope in espionage...
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The First Robot 'Motherships' Are Coming ... And They're Minivans
Bow down to the future of package delivery. (Photo: Starship Technologies)The future of robot transportation is here, and it has arrived in the form of a soccer mom’s dream vehicle. As reported in the...
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There's New Evidence in the Mystery of Neil Armstrong's Missing 'A'
Armstrong on the moon. (Photo: NASA)When Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969, he uttered a series of words. “One small step”…but for whom? Most famously, the quote is “One small step for man, one...
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Tomb of Rudaki in Panjakent, Tajikistan
Nestled in the Fan mountains in the northwest of Tajikistan is the resting place of the man known as the father of Persian poetry. Born around 859, Rudaki is one of the primary historical figures of...
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Grave in the Road in Hearne, Texas
The town of Hearne is known as "The Crossroads of Texas" because it sits at the intersection of several highways and railroads. The little town used to be a hub of transport and commerce, but is now...
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Florida Man Fends Ten Sharks Off With Fishing Pole
Sharks! (Photo: US Fish and Wildlife Service/CC BY 2.0)There are good fishing trips, where you pull in something big and photo-worthy. There are sad fishing trips, where you don't get much of anything....
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