The Book of the Bizarre: Freaky Facts and Strange Stories (32 page)

“Black widow” is the slang term for women who use poison to kill their victims. People have used this silent but deadly method of murder for hundreds of years, but one of the better known black widows from modern times was Nannie Hazel Doss, also known as “the Giggling Grandma” for her sweetly nervous disposition. Over the course of thirty-four years, Doss killed eleven of her family members—including four husbands and two children—using arsenic.

SOLE SURVIVORS

On December 5, 1664, the first event in the greatest series of coincidences in history occurred. On this date, a ship in the Menai Strait, off north Wales, sank with eighty-one passengers on board. There was one survivor—a man named Hugh Williams. On the same date in 1785, a ship sank in the Menai Strait with sixty passengers aboard. There was one survivor—a man named Hugh Williams. On the very same date in 1860 in exactly the same area, a ship sank with twenty-five passengers on board. There was one survivor—a man named Hugh Williams.

OUIJA MAGIC

A wealthy Connecticut woman named Helen Dow Peck believed messages she received from Ouija boards.

One day in 1919, the board spelled out that she should leave her entire estate to a man named John Gale
Forbes. That she did—the only problem was that she didn't know anybody by that name. In fact, after she died in 1956, her lawyer did a search throughout the world and discovered that, despite what the all-knowing spirits had said, there was nobody with that name.

BROTHERLY FATE

In Bermuda, in 1975 and 1976, two brothers were killed in strikingly similar accidents. The first was riding a moped when he was struck and killed by a taxi. One year later, the man's brother, riding the same moped, was struck by the same taxi driver who had killed the first man, and the taxi was carrying the same passenger.

TWIN SHIPWRECKS

In 1922 the
Lyman Stewart
was wrecked off the coast of Lands End, San Francisco's rockiest and most treacherous section of coast. In 1937, the
Frank Buck
was wrecked on the exact same rock where the
Lyman Stewart
had gone down. The odd thing? Both ships were built as twin ships, side by side in the shipyard of their origin.

You can still see the ruins of the shipwrecks. If you visit Lands End, now part of the Golden Gate National Park Conservancy, take the stairs that lead from the Merrie Way parking lot and head onto the Coastal Trail between the Vista Point and the Palace of the Legion of Honor. At low tide you can often spot the
Lyman Stewart
's steam engine and the
Frank Buck
's stern post and steam engine sticking up out of the waters off the shore.

THE THREEFOLD LAW

In Louisville, Kentucky, three family members died in the same spot, on separate dates. A woman was hit by a car—an accident that she survived but that killed her six-week-old daughter. A few years later, the same woman was killed about two blocks away as she jumped from a moving vehicle for an undisclosed reason. But the cruel coincidence continued when twenty years later, the woman's nineteen-year-old son died on the same street when his motorcycle hit a car full of college students.

THE OL' SWITCHEROO