Winchester Mystery House

It certainly looks out of place surrounded by modern buildings and parking lots. It certainly is big, almost unbelievably large. It certainly is strange, full of mystery, and seems to have no rhyme or reason to its random layout. The house, built by a woman named Sarah Winchester, was an attempt to attract good karma. Her husband was the second president of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company. The gun that won the west, was stained with the blood of angry spirits, according to Sarah. Sarah felt the deaths of her husband William Wirt Winchester in 1881 and baby girl Annie Pardee Winchester in 1866, were the result of the angry spirits who were killed by the riffle.

Sarah suffering from the loss of her baby girl and husband consulted a physic. The physic told her to appease the spirits. The physic said that she lost her loved ones because the people who were killed by a Winchester were angry and vengeful. She must move west, and build a house that must never be completed. If the building stopped, Sarah would die. So Sarah, moved from New Haven to San Jose, California and hired workers to began construction on her house in 1884. Night and day workers toiled with the sound of hammers and saws in the background. It didn't stop until Sarah died on September 5, 1922.

Sarah had inherited a fortune from her husband's company, and used it to furnish and build the house. You can find Tiffany glass, hand carved wood, modern indoor plumbing, hand pushed gas lighting, and three elevators inside the manison. The cost to build was well over 5 million, an amazing sum especially for the late 1800s. The house covers 4 acres, has two basements, 467 doorways, 47 fireplaces, 40 bedrooms, 40 staircases, and 5 kitchens.

Part of the house's purpose was to confuse the angry spirits and keep Sarah safe. To do this, there are countless stairways that lead into walls, doors open to the lawn outside, stair posts that are upside down, skylights that are designed to be one above the other, and bathrooms with glass doors. It's wonderfully strange.

Today, the house is a California Historical Landmark and is registered with the National Park Service as "a large, odd dwelling with an unknown number of rooms." Several different tours of the house are available, including flashlight tours at night on dates around Halloween and each Friday the 13th.

You can find out more about the mansion at WinchesterMysteryHouse.com

Cremated remains part of fireworks show

INDIANAPOLIS - One of the fireworks bursting above the city this year will contain a bit of cremated remains — a fitting tribute, organizers say, to the man who ran the annual event for 40 years.

Meredith Smith died in February at age 74. About a half-teaspoon of his ashes will be in a fireworks shell that will create a white burst in the sky for the finale of the show, set for Thursday night.

"I can't think of a better way," said family friend Kevin Moss.

He also will be memorialized through hundreds of T-shirts referring to the tribute as "the last shot."

Smith, a school maintenance worker, was a trained pyrotechnician. His widow, Charlotte, said they started the fireworks shows as a community service and sometimes paid for them themselves.

"Meredith felt like the people in this area didn't get the opportunities that other people got, and so he wanted to give them the opportunity," she said.

The release of the ashes shouldn't harm public health, said John Althardt of the Health and Hospital Corp. of Marion County.

"I think that whatever a family can do to remember their loved one ... is great," he said.

The fireworks will be shot over the White River.

According to Indiana law, cremated remains may be disposed of on the property of a consenting owner, uninhabited public land or in a waterway.

Yahoo News

Do You Know What It's Like To Miss New Orleans

I miss New Orleans tonight. I'm missing the smell of the air, the sticky slightly sweet aroma that hit me when I walked out of the airport for the first time. I miss the history I found when ever I turned a corner. I miss the cobblestone streets in the quarter and the rot iron balconies above with the hanging flower baskets. I miss the mix of cultures, and the flavor of the New Orleans people and it's food. Every where you looked though, something was affected by Katrina. The hurricane was well past over but the devastation is still there and New Orleans is feeling the after effects everyday.

I feel a sense of guilt and remorse because of that. I was able to visit and take the good things of New Orleans with me. I was a tourist and have no idea of the struggles that survivors of Katrina went through and continue to. I came saw the usual sites, got a post card or two and flew home. I wasn't there when the levees broke, when contaminated water came in and took my home, and all my possessions. I wasn't there in the super dome waiting, for help, salvation, something, in filth, like so many others.

There was a documentary done by Spike Lee entitled When the Levees Broke. It helped me to understand not only how Katrina affected New Orleans but the way government agencies handles, or didn't handle the situation. I have posted the first ten minutes of the documentary here. The original post is on youtube.com and you can check out the rest there.

New Orleans will never be the same but the people continue to rebuild, and regroup to get as close as possible to the former glory New Orleans was. It seems an act of god, such as a hurricane can't stop the determination and pride of the people of New Orleans.

Medgar Evers

In July of 1963 civil rights activist Medgar Evers was shot in the back while exiting his car in the drive way of his Mississippi home. Ironically, his wife and children were inside watching President Kennedy's famous speech against segregation. Medgar staggered, bleeding to his front door as his wife and children ran out of the house trying to aid him. He died close to an hour later at an area hospital.

Medgar was born in July 2, 1925 in Decatur, Mississippi. He enrolled in Alcorn State University in 1948 and married fellow student Myrlie Beasley in 1951. His increasing roll in fair treatment in the black community made him a target of death threats and violence.

He was an active member of the RCNL (Regional Council of Negro Leadership) Medgar helped to organize boycotts against gas stations that wouldn't allow black to use their restrooms. The night Medgar was shot a gun was found at the scene which was traced back to a man named Byron De La Beckwith, a man with known ties to the Ku Klux Clan and White supremacist organizations. Beckwith evaded justice twice when both court trails resulted in a hung jury. In 1994 Medgar's widow, Myrlie, helped to reopen the 30 year case and retry Beckwith. Bobby B. DeLaughter was the prosecutor and later wrote a book about the case entitled Never Too Late: A Prosecutor's Story of Justice in the Medgar Evers Case.

Medgar's body was exhumed by Dr. Michael Baden. Dr. Baden commented in his book Dead Reckoning and on his series Autopsy that Medgar's body was in remarkable condition. So good in fact, that Dr. Baden called Medgar's son to come view the body. Medgar's son was just a little boy when his father was murdered and barely remembered him. Dr. Baden set up the autopsy room like a funeral parlor and was able to reunite father and son. It was an incredible touching and powerful moment. Beckwith was convicted of murder on February 5, 1994. Beckwith appealed several times without success and died in prison on January 21, 2001.

A movie was made about Edgar's Murder entitled Ghosts of Mississippi directed by Rob Reiner. An excellent movie starring Whoopie Goldburg, as Myrlie Evers and Alec Baldwin as Bobby DeLaughter.

Dr. Carl Von Cosel

Here is the bizarre and quite macabre story of Dr. Carl Von Cosel and his obsession with a beautiful young girl named Elena Hoyos. Elena's father worked in a tobacco factory rolling cigars. During the 1930 tuberculous was quite rampant and factories with many works in a small space provided the perfect opportunity for the disease to spread. Elena's father and mother succumbed to the disease and Elena soon became infected and went to Von Cosel for medical treatment. Von Cosel immediately fell in love with her but Elena didn't return his affection. Von Cosel did all he could to save her from death but in the end was unable to. Elena died on October 25, 1931. Von Cosel struck with grief gained permission from Elena's remaining family to build her a large above ground mausoleum.

It was said that Von Cosel visited her mausoleum every night. Soon simply visiting her wasn't enough. He stole her body late one night and brought it back to his home. Using, piano wire, and silk cloth soaked in wax patched Elena's body together as it decomposed along with perfume, disinfectants, and preserving agents to cover the smell. Elena's sister heard strange rumors that Von Cosel was sleeping with Elena's body and went to his home to confront him when she stumble upon her sister's body. Horrified she contact the Key West authorities and Von Cosel was arrested. He stood trail on the grounds of wantonly and maliciously destroying a grave and removing a body without authorization but the case was eventually dismissed due to the statue of limitations.

Elena's body was examined and put on display at Dean-Lopez Funeral Home where over 8,000 people filled past it. She was eventually reburied in a secret location. Von Cosel moved to a different part of Florida and wrote an autobiography about Elena's death and his love for her. He died on July 3, 1952. His body was discovered on the floor of his home three weeks after his death. In the room, there was a metal cylinder on a shelf above a table, in it wrapped in silken cloth and a robe was a waxen image of Elena... talk about bizarre..

Lady Dai

The art of body preservation is in most minds mastered by ancient Egyptians. The ancient Egyptians believed in life after death, that life simple continued on as they knew it. So if life continues on, then your body must survive to make the trip. Ancient Egyptian morticians were excellent at their trade. They preserved bodies that are on display thousands of years after they placed the last strip of linen around the body.

However, the Egyptians might need to pass the blue ribbon in body preservation to the ancient Chinese. In 1971 archaeologists came across a tomb and a preserved corpse. The body was in such good shape that a modern autopsy was preformed. The organs were found in tact including the brain. The limbs were flexible and blood was still found in the veins.

The body belonged to a woman name Xin Zhui, the Lady of Dai. She died, between 178 and 145BC and was a woman of wealth and privileged. She was married to the marquis of Han, and lived during the dynasty of Han.

Her tomb was full of treasures literally reflecting her tastes. It was apparent she loved to eat since her tomb included artifacts related to food including bamboo baskets containing soy beans, pears, and the bones of game, including swans, pheasants, pigs, and oxen.

There were also copies of her favorite recipes and lacquer dinnerware. There was also a beautiful hand woven funeral banner placed over her coffin. It featured the Lady Dai making her way to the afterlife with cane in hand.

Her love of food became her demise. The autopsy reveled extensive heart disease, a fused disc in her spine, and gallstones. It seems a gallstone blocked one of the gall ducts and caused her already weakened heart to fail.

There was a reddish liquid found in the coffin and scientists can't decided wither the liquid was place there for preservation purposes or was simple water leaking through the tomb and casket.

The corpse is on display at the Hunan Museum in Changsha. Her postmortem story was also featured on Diva Mummy on the National Geographic Channel.

Funeral horses stampede, overturn hearse

Fri Feb 8, 11:41 AM ET

A hearse overturned when the horses pulling it to a south London cemetery stampeded, dragging the carriage and coffin past appalled relatives and sending floral tributes flying.
"It was dreadful," a mourner told the South London Press. "The horses dragged the carriage to the cemetery on its side, tossing the coffin all over the place and destroying all the flowers inside.
"Some people got very angry and had to be restrained by other mourners... It is understandable given the circumstances. I'm horrified that something like this could happen."
Police were called to calm angry mourners so that the funeral last month could go ahead.
The carriage appeared to have clipped a mini-roundabout as it entered Lambeth Cemetery for the funeral, the local council which administers the graveyard said Friday.
(Reporting by Peter Apps, editing by Tim Pearce)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/stampede_dc