All of you were warned, and here is the latest installment in our exploration of the unknown and the unexplained. With things in this world getting creepier it is fitting to unleash on the world another edition of Five Creepy Unsolved Mysteries. If you wish, feel free to scroll through and read the previous editions of this series.
Part 2 Part 6
Part 3 Part 7
Part 4 Part 8
1. Melon Heads: The tale of the Melon Heads in northern Ohio, bears more resemblance to a horror film than anything else. According to local lore a man known as Dr. Crow was given government funding to research hydrocephalus in children, a medical condition which causes swelling in the head due to water build-up. As all mad scientists do, he used this as a clearance to begin a series of strange and disturbing experiments on the children he was using as his test subjects. Unfortunately the good doctor had not watched many horror movies (though in most variations of this tale horror flicks had yet to come into existence), and had no foresight into the fact that the children would rebel against his experiments and slay him. These children with freakishly large heads and limited exposure to human contact fled into the forest after killing Dr. Crow and allegedly set out into the forests of the American Midwest. For many years this was chalked up to simply being an urban legend, but sightings of feral people with large heads over the decades in Ohio have persisted. Many have investigated what remains of the records of the time, and discovered there is more truth to the Melon Heads legend than many wish to acknowledge. In recent years sightings of the Melon Heads and their possible offspring have spread outside the borders of Ohio, leading many to wonder if the children of Dr. Crow are growing in numbers.
2. The Forgotten Volcano of Florida: Before any European settlers set foot in the state known as Florida, the Seminole Indians populated the land. They dubbed a portion of their land, north of what is now Tallahassee, Wakulla which was their word for mysterious. This land, which is still sparsely populated, was known for a heavy sulfurous smell, and plumes of fire and smoke emerging from the dense Florida forest. As pirates, escaped slaves, and others ventured into this unforgiving region, they too began to tell tales of mysterious smoke billowing out and above the trees. Unfortunately nobody was ever able to discover its source as an earthquake rocked the southern United States in August of 1886. After the quake, the strange smoke and fire faded away and eventually became a memory. The memory was reawakened in 1949, when the crew building Highway 98 discovered a large hole covered in molten rock. Sadly before any geologists could get out to inspect the site, the chasm was covered up. Without any solid evidence to go on many assume that the Wakulla Volcano may have never existed. But if that is the case, what was the source of the mysterious smoke and fire for over a century?
3. YOGTZE: Gunther Stoll was an average man in Anzhausen, Germany; he had a wife and worked as a food engineer. This is not to say he did not have an eccentric side, he would often talk to his wife about “them” and how “they” were following him. In a frightening turn of events in 1984, this paranoia became more than a quirky delusion.On a quiet October evening, Stoll startled his wife when he unexpectedly began to proclaim “I’ve gotit!”, Stoll quickly scribbled the letters YOGTZE on a piece of paper, scribbled it out and drove to the pub. At his favorite watering hole, he took a terrible fall, but did not seem to be at all intoxicated. Two hours later Stoll ended up at the home of an acquaintance telling her about an oncoming “terrible incident”. Several hours after this chilling encounter, Gunther Stoll’s car was found on the side of the road, and the man himself was naked and barely clinging to life, murmuring about having been with four others who had left. On the way to the hospital Stoll died from his injuries, those aided him in his final moments all independently claimed to have seen a strange man in a brightly colored coat lingering around, but mysteriously vanished. The weirdness of this case does not end here; as investigators looked into his death, they discovered he died from being run over by another vehicle. This has lead investigators and conspiracy theorists alike to puzzle over, who would run over a man only to strip him naked and place him back in his own car and push it into a ditch.
4. The Secret at the Maltese Club: It is one of the greatest set-ups in a mystery story; a murdered man in a locked room, leaving investigators to puzzle over how the murderer got away. But when such a murder occurs in real life it is much more disconcerting. Sam Borg was a businessman who brought the flavor from his homeland to his new home of North Melbourne when he opened a Maltese cafe in the area. In the spring of 1960, Borg had missed many of his prior engagements leaving one of his friends to wonder where the Maltese restaurateur was. The authorities found his place sealed shut, with nails reinforcing the locked doors forcing them to climb through a window to get inside. They discovered Borg’s body under a bed with a handgun under the mattress and lots of cash. It was obvious he was anticipating the intruder who ended up murdering him, but what confused investigators was the fact that the only way out for the killer was through a skylight high about them, making it out of reach for anybody to reach. Many were questioned, but no leads were ever turned up in the case dubbed by many, “The Secrets at the Maltese Club”.
5. The Missing Justice: In 1930, New York Supreme Court Justice Joseph F. Crater was one of the most successful people in the state. Graduate of a prestigious university with wealth and the right connections to play the corrupt political game and ascend the career ladder. While on vacation with his wife during the summer of that year he received a phone call, after he hung up he told his wife he would have to go back to the city “to straighten those fellows out”. The next day he was seen near his New York home, but rather than deal with any business he picked up a call girl and headed to Atlantic City. A few days later he ended up back in his office where he spent two hours researching something and then gave his assistant the rest of the day off. Later that evening Crater bought tickets to a Broadway show, had dinner with a few of his work colleagues and took a cab from the restaurant, and that would be the last anyone would see of him. Naturally such an important person going missing warranted a massive manhunt, amassing 975 pages of written testimony from 95 witnesses. Dubbed by the media as the “missingest man in New York” Crater was suspected on ducking out of a responsibility of some kind, but he left behind a large amount of money which would surely help him in going into hiding.
