Author: Ms. R.

On an unrelentingly hot day in August, I drove out to the borderlands between Maryland and Pennsylvania to see a museum that does not yet exist, devoted to a creature that never has. Sarah Cooper’s day job is as a travel ER nurse, but in her spare time she travels to various festivals and conventions with her collection, what she calls the American Snallygaster Museum—her goal being to open up a permanent site devoted to Western Maryland’s strange cryptid…….

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Earlier this month, we asked readers to help us celebrate Halloween by sharing photos of places they encountered that gave them the chills. At Atlas Obscura, we have always been fascinated by the histories and science that infuse mysterious locations—and some that aren’t so mysterious at first glance, like a haunted grocery store. So we wanted to know: What places haunt you? We were delighted and terrified by the influx of mournful cemeteries, derelict buildings, and shadowy landscapes! A……

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Just outside the pretty Cheshire village of Bollington, you can hike up to the top of the nearby Kerridge Hill. At the summit, visitors are met by a bizarre structure that seems out of kilter with its rural surroundings. This is the White Nancy, a 200-year-old Georgian folly. The Nancy is an 18-foot-tall white cone, topped with a simple black finial. The folly was made from sandstone rubble, which was later rendered and painted white. The local Gaskell family built……

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Wonder is everywhere. That’s why, every other week, Atlas Obscura drags you down some of the rabbit holes we encounter as we search for our unusual stories. We highlight surprising finds, great writing, and inspiring stories from some of our favorite publications. In Search of the World’s Oldest Trees by Jared Farmer, BBC Future There are about 140,000 species of trees, shrubs, and vines on the planet. Of those, about 30 are known to live more than 1,000 years…….

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London is a ghost hunter’s dream, dotted with potentially haunted sites like mass graves of plague victims and the pub where Jack the Ripper’s final victim was last seen alive. But in the early 2000s, one of its most reliably spooky locations was the front room of a ground floor flat in north London. People reported feeling a supernatural presence, dizzying sensations, and even abject terror. The apartment wasn’t the site of anything grisly or nefarious that could explain……

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On a hillside in Utah’s Fishlake National Forest is a tree, and if you listen very carefully, this aspen is talking to us. This one plant actually looks like a forest of 47,000 genetically identical trees, which are effectively branches of the same organism connected by a massive root system. Each stem or ramet is a clone of the original tree, called trembling aspen (species Populus temuloides), all emanating from a single seed that sprouted over 9,000 years ago…….

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McDonald’s is famous for having served billions and billions of burgers throughout the course of the franchise’s history, but until January 24, 1975, no McDonald’s burger had ever been served in quite this way before. It was on that day that the first drive-through opened in Sierra Vista, Arizona, forever changing one’s ability to eat Quarter Pounders in their car. To be clear, drive-through restaurants were not a new innovation–many restaurants have a claim to the first drive-through burger,……

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First given its now iconic orange paint job in 1997, this water tower stands as a symbol of Circleville, Ohio’s gourd obsessions. Circleville is known for its annual Pumpkin Show, a harvest season celebration that includes contenders for the world’s largest pumpkin pie, the world’s largest pumpkin, and other superlative squash.  Since kicking off in 1903, the Circleville Pumpkin Show—an event organized to connect rural farmers with the city’s downtown—has grown to proportions nearly as impressive as their water……

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Standing tall at the intersection of Brambleton Avenue and Church Street, the Martin Luther King Jr Memorial pays tribute to the great civil rights leader.   This site was chosen due to its history as the center of business and culture for Norfolk’s Black community dating back to the early 1900s. Conceived in 1975 by Councilman Joseph A. Jordan, Jr., the monument is designed to inspire future generations to learn about King and live their lives according to his……

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