Pop Culture

Aetosaurs Wars

Wow, if you thought there were fights in Nessie studies and feuds among Bigfooters, you should pull the curtain aside in the serious world of paleontology sometime. Actually, you don’t have to, as Nature did it for you. Paleontology research assistant and fossil preprator ReBecca Hunt, pictured above, notes in her blog that “name-calling” is happening, quite openly, within the field of Aetosaurs studies, as evidenced by an article published today in Nature. “Doctoral students in the United States and Poland are accusing scientists at the Albuquerque-based New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science (NMMNHS) of publishing articles that [...]

Paper Bird Sings “Cryptozoology”

The artist Paper Bird releases her new song “Cryptozoology” today. You can listen to a sample of “Cryptozoology” by clicking on the Juno site. Who is Paper Bird, apparently cryptically captured above? Paper Bird is the one-woman home-recorded musical project of Anna Kohlweis, who lives in Vienna, Austria. She’s been making music under that alter ego since she moved to Vienna in 2003; prior to this, she claims to have been raised in a woodland cave by fierce hobgoblins! She’s released a few download-only EPs via the Paper Bird website, followed by the release of other songs on the Austrian [...]

Thompson’s Sea Serpent Hunt

One thing leads to another. Looking into the new mystery photo postcard has taken me to more of the backstory that involves a Sea Serpent hunt exactly 100 years ago. In 1908, a Little River couple on an outing on Biscayne Bay reported seeing a sea serpent with a 30-foot-long body and a long, slender neck. An intrepid and well-known fisherman, Capt. Charles Thompson, set off after the sea monster. Thompson was certainly the man for the job: He had fished with four U.S. presidents and powerful industrialists such as John Jacob Astor and William Vanderbilt. Even the Miami Metropolis [...]

Still Unsolved: Mystery Fish Postcard Photo

Despite speculations, theories, thoughts, rumors, ideas, hypotheses, and claims, this longest standing mystery at Cryptomundo has never been fully solved. The postcard photo, originally sent to me by Phyllis Mancz of Ohio, has become such an enigmatic icon that it became part of the design on the front of my new edition of Mysterious America: The Ultimate Guide to the Nation’s Weirdest Wonders, Strangest Spots, and Creepiest Creatures. The Mystery Fish postcard, first noted here on November 29, 2005, has never been identified, as to exact location or species. New people sometimes have new ideas. Lots of new readers may [...]