World Of Mysteries

Giant Graffiti Animals by ROA (113 Pics)

2012-02-27T08:41:00.002-08:00

After 30 Years, Black Sea froze in Ukraine

2012-02-27T08:31:00.001-08:00

1939 Pontiac Plexiglass Ghost Car

2012-02-26T08:56:00.002-08:00

Unveiled at the General Motors Highways and Horizons pavilion at the 1939-40 World’s Fair in New York, the Pontiac ‘Ghost Car’ was buit on the chassis of a 1939 Pontiac Deluxe Six. In collaboration with Rohm & Haas, a chemical company that had recently developed Plexiglass, the concept for a transparent car was conceived and it was the first one ever built in America.

- The highlight of the 1939-40 World’s Fair in New York and the first transparent car ever built in America
- Series 26. 85 bhp, 222.7 cu. in. L-head six-cylinder engine, three-speed manual transmission, coil spring independent front suspension, live rear axle with semi-elliptic leaf springs, and four-wheel hydraulic drum brakes.
- The structural metal underneath was given a copper wash, and all hardware, including the dashboard, was chrome plated. Rubber moldings were made in white, as were the car’s tires
- Cost a reported $25,000 to build (using Consumer Price Index to estimate inflation, it is approx. $388,000 in 2010 US dollars)
- Car still rides on its original white tires with odometer reading of 86 miles (138 km)
- Does not have a conventional vehicle identification number

A completely renovated first apartment

2012-02-25T08:56:00.001-08:00

Kimberley Big Hole

2012-02-24T07:07:00.001-08:00

Apparently the largest ever hand-dug excavation in the world, this 1097 meter (3,599 fett) deep mine yielded over 3 tons of diamonds before being closed in 1914.

Boreray, an uninhabited island in the North Atlantic

2012-02-24T07:01:00.001-08:00

Boreray is an uninhabited island in the St Kilda archipelago in the North Atlantic. Boreray's cliffs are home for various seabirds. In 1959, 45,000 pairs of gannets were counted on the island. There are also over 130 different varieties of plants on the island. An extremely rare breed of sheep, called Boreray, lives here.

The island is part of St. Kilda archipelago, was inscribed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 1986.

Riddle of the Day. What is This? (2 pics)

2012-02-23T07:42:00.001-08:00

A woman carries a 20 ft (6m) long plastic bag filled with natural gas on her back in Bingzhou, northern China's Shandong Province. Local villagers pump the natural gas from a nearby oil field into their home-made plastic bags in order to take it home and use in the kitchen. According to one local a 'bag' of gas lasts for around five days when connected up to her stove.

Simon Beck's Snow Art

2012-02-22T09:18:00.001-08:00

Artist Simon Beck creates these amazing pieces of snow art by walking in the snow wearing raquettes (snowshoes).

Horrifying Yet Spectacular Abandoned Iron Ore Mine

2012-02-22T09:16:00.001-08:00

Mugshots of women prisoners from 1920s Australia

2012-02-21T08:25:00.000-08:00

Vera Crichton, 23 conspired with two other women to 'procure a miscarriage on a third woman'. She was 'bound over to appear for sentence if called upon within three years'.

While nothing is known of E. Walker who was believed to be a vagrant from her scruffy appearance

Elizabeth Singleton had multiple convictions for soliciting and was described in police records as a common prostitute. She was imprisoned at Long Bay but the details of her sentence have been lost

By the age of 24 Alice Adeline Cooke had amassed a number of aliases and at least two husbands

Janet Wright, 68, nearly killed a teenage patient during an illegal backstreet abortion

Emily Hemsworth killed baby son but could not remember details and was found not guilty due to insanity

Harry Crawford, above looks like a man but her real name was Eugenia Falleni . She spent most of her life masquerading as a man. In 1913 she married widow, Annie Birkett, whom she later murdered. The case whipped the public into a frenzy as they clamoured for details of the 'man-woman' murderer. , her full file photos

Legendary undercover policeman Constable CJ Chuck, or 'The Shadow' as he was known within the criminal milieu, was responsible for the arrest of Jessie Longford, 30, a well-known shoplifter

Little is known of this older criminal Annie Matthews - criminal record number 634LB arrested on 3 July 1924

Doris Poole appeared before the Newtown Police Court charged with stealing jewellery and clothing. She had previously been convicted on a similar charge in North Sydney and so received a six-month sentence with light labour

Jean Wilson, 23, had numerous convictions for housebreaking and theft. She preferred stealing jewellery as it could be easily pawned for money. She also robbed her employer and served a 12-month sentence

Amy Lee, 41, was described in court as a 'good looking girl until she fell victim to the foul practice' of snorting cocaine. Her dry, blotchy skin is testament to the drug use

Dorothy Mort, 32, shot her young lover, Dr Claude Tozer, dead on December 21, 1921, after he tried to end their romance. She was arrested after a failed suicide bid

Clara Randall reported to police that her Bondi flat had been broken into and a quantity of jewellery stolen. It was later discovered she had pawned the jewellery for cash. Randall was sentenced to 18 months with light labour

Edith Ashton, 37, was a backyard abortionist who also dabbled in theft and fencing stolen goods. Described in the media as a 'social somebody' she was suspected of contributing to the deaths of at least two women during abortions

Mother Ada McGuinness , age unknown, was called the 'most evil woman in Sydney' by a police witness when she appeared in court on charges of cocaine possession.

Her daughter Hazel also appeared in court at the same time, on similar charges, but was released on a bond. A judge heard how McGuinness senior, who occupied a terrace house in Hargreave Street, was one of the city's most active cocaine dealers

Fay Watson is listed in the New South Wales Police Gazette from 1928. She was arrested in a house in Crown Street, Darlinghurst, and subsequently convicted for being in possession of cocaine for which she was fined ten pounds.

34-year-old Alma Smith was jailed for five years for performing an illegal abortion on a young woman who later died

Haiku Stairs

2012-02-19T08:31:00.000-08:00

The Ha'iku Stairs, also known as the Stairway to Heaven or Haiku Ladder, is a steep hiking trail on the island of Oahu.

The trail began as a wooden ladder spiked to the cliff on the south side of the Haiku Valley. It was installed in 1943 to enable the construction of antenna cables that would be strung from one side of the cliffs above Haiku Valley to the other. A building to provide a continuous communication link between Wahiawa and Haiku Valley Naval Radio Station was also constructed at the very peak of Puukeahiakahoe, elevation at about 2800 feet. These extraordinary antennas transmitted very low frequency radio signals from a 200,000-watt Alexanderson alternator located in the center of Haiku valley. The signals could reach US Navy submarines as far away as Tokyo Bay even while the submarines remained underwater.

When the Naval base was decommissioned in the 1950s the United States Coast Guard used the site for an Omega station. In the early 50s, the wooden stairs were replaced by sections of metal steps and ramps — by one count, 3,922 steps. The station and trail were closed to the public in 1987.

Are you afraid of heights Come to Preikestolen, Norway!

2012-02-19T08:20:00.000-08:00

Preikestolen or Prekestolen, also known by the English translations of Preacher's Pulpit or Pulpit Rock, and by the old local name Hyvlatonnå (“the carpenter-plane’s blade”), is a massive cliff 604 metres (1982 feet) above Lysefjorden, opposite the Kjerag plateau, in Forsand, Ryfylke, Norway. The top of the cliff is approximately 25 by 25 metres (82 by 82 feet) square, almost flat, and is a famous tourist attraction in Norway.

Street Art – Scratching the Surface

2012-02-18T07:00:00.001-08:00

Alexandre Farto aka vhils is a Portuguese creative street artist who does variety of modern art by scratching the surface of the walls, billboards, Metals, paper, and woods.

Made from shattered CDs

2012-02-18T06:58:00.000-08:00

By Sean Avery

Escape 3D Art by Yuki Matsueda

2012-02-17T01:47:00.000-08:00

‘While most designers are busying adding more and more elements into their artworks, Japan-based Yuki Matsueda has, however, managed to let some elements escape from his art pieces. The result seems quite amazing… A vivid 3D image is successfully created and all the elements are believed to be more shocking than those stay still on paper.’

How People See Me And What People Think I Do

2012-02-16T07:33:00.000-08:00

Friends - 1940s

2012-02-16T07:26:00.000-08:00

Inside the abandoned 'ghostscrapers'

2012-02-15T07:07:00.000-08:00

MCS Book Depository: Designed by Albert Kahn, originally as a Post Office for the city of Detroit, this large, four-story structure later served as storage for the Detroit Public School System

Derelict: Abandoned Sattler Theatre in Buffalo, New York, was built in 1914 and used as a church in the years before it became abandoned

The 'Belvedere': The eagles at the top of the abandoned Pacific Telephone Building, in San Francisco, which was once the tallest building in the city

Lifeless: Vacant and abandoned Lee Plaza Hotel Living Room in Detroit, Michigan. Constructed in 1929 and deserted in the early 1990s

The Los Angeles export terminal coal processing and sorting tower, which readied coal for shipment off to Japan

Sterick Building: Once the tallest building in the southern United States, the original 'Queen of Memphis' is a ghostly skyscraper, boarded up and decaying from the inside

The Sathorn Unique, left, was a skyscraper that grew like many others all over Bangkok in a display of Thailand's new-found economic prominence during the tiger economy of the 1990s, but it never completely grew up - and the Atlas D Launch Crib

America's first intercontinental ballistic missiles, 576-A Launcher, between San Francisco and Los Angeles

Hospital: Psychiatric Ward of Kings Park Psychiatric Centre in New York, which operated from 1885 until 1996

Abandoned: Michigan Central Station which was operational from 1913 to 1988

All at sea: Colberg Boat Works began operations in the Stockton Port, California, in the late 1890s and continued for almost a century. It produced small military craft and pleasure boats

California: Inside the Vandenberg Tracking Station, the $60million common-user satellite ground station which replaced a 35-year old antenna and associated electronics nearing obsolescence

Glenwood Power Generating Station in Yonkers in New York: Built in conjunction with Grand Central Terminal, it has stood abandoned since the 1960s. In 2006 a developer proposed incorporating it into a large-scale residential complex

Norwich State Hospital in Connecticut: Opened its doors in October, 1904, and though the number of patients and employees were drastically reduced, it remained operational until October, 1996

Trains: The Buffalo Central terminal has been looted for artefacts, vandalised by bored delinquents, used for art exhibitions, explored by ghost hunters, and sold for $1

Steel Factory Computer Controls: This steel factory outside of Detroit was the first to use computer controls

Drawings Made with Graphite and Chalk

2012-02-15T06:58:00.000-08:00

Paul Cadden is a Scottish-born hyperrealist artist who creates painfully realistic artworks using only graphite and chalk.

Before and After D-Day Rare Color Photos

2012-02-13T07:28:00.003-08:00

1906 vintage color photos of Europe (119 Pics)

2012-02-13T07:28:00.001-08:00

Eleven months after the tsunami ravaged Japan

2012-02-12T08:15:00.000-08:00

Houses crumbled either side of this main road in the tsunami-hit area of Ofunato, Iwate but ongoing efforts have cleared the debris - and despite the nearest homes on either side being pulled down, many of the other buildings were salvaged

Residents of the tsunami-hit area of Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture seen last March, and this January

The city of Kesennuma is seen after the clear-up last month

A hill overlooking the city of Kesennuma and the same area on January 14 this year

In Ishonomaki, Miyagi a boat washed up in to the middle of this street bringing down pylons and buildings and although the building nearest to the camera on the left needed to be pulled down all the other buildings were repaired

Cars are able to come and go through this bridge in Hishonomaki, Miyagi less than a year after a washed up boat prevented anyone from using the road

A number of areas like this site Natori, near Sendai required large scale operations to clear them of the debris which seemed never ending

In March four people take to the area of Rikuzentakata, Iwate unsure where to begin after it was devastated by rubble but 11 months on the whole area has been cleared leaving just a cross roads in the centre

Amazing transformation after a road is cleared of debris in Tagajo, Miyagi prefecture

In March, Yuko Sugimoto was photographed wrapped with a blanket standing in front of debris looking for her son in the tsunami-hit town of Ishinomaki. Below, the same housewife stands with her five-year-old son Raito at the same place

Collapsed buildings and rubble in Kesennuma in Miyagi had made this corner impossible to get through but the impressively swift clean up has left the same corner accessible to traffic

Pile up: cars had piled up in front of the airport control tower in Sendai on after the tsunami but has since been totally transformed

The scene in Tagajo, Miyagi prefecture before and after the rebuild operation

All change in Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture, as seen on March 22, 2011 and January 15, 2012

Rebuild: Cars and even a plane cluttered up the Sendai Airport in Natori, Miyagi but after an intense clean up the fenced off airport is now back in service

More work to do: Back in March last year a rescue worker wades through rubble in the tsunami hit area of Minamisanriku, Miyagi, and although the area has largely been cleared tyres and gas canisters have since been dumped there

Before and after clean-up shots of Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture

Perseid Meteor Shower

2012-02-12T08:09:00.002-08:00

Blair Athol coal mine spontaneous combustion

2012-02-11T06:34:00.000-08:00

The Blair Athol coal mine is well known for its spontaneous combustion problems. Here's some photos from a particularly bad spon com event.

Abandoned 1968 Futuro House, Pennsylvania

2012-02-11T06:32:00.000-08:00