mystery

Stories 141 - 160 | << Prev   Next >>

Philly PD Admits Its SUV Was Masked as Google Maps Vehicle

SUV decked out with technology to spy on drivers (and fake Google decal)

(Newser) - The Philly PD has a "mystery" on its hands, and it involves one of its own vehicles. On Wednesday, a University of Pennsylvania professor spotted an SUV near the Philadelphia Convention Center, souped up with two high-tech license-plate readers and a placard linking it to the Pennsylvania State Police—...

Prof Solves 300-Year-Old Math Mystery, Wins $700K
 Prof Solves 300-Year-Old 
 Math Mystery, Wins $700K 
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Mar 20, 2016 6:51 AM CDT

Prof Solves 300-Year-Old Math Mystery, Wins $700K

Oxford professor had been trying to crack Fermat's Last Theorem since he was a boy

(Newser) - An Oxford professor is now $700,000 richer for solving a 300-year-old math mystery, the Telegraph reports. In 1994, Andrew Wiles, 62, cracked Fermat's Last Theorem, which was put forth by 17th-century mathematician Pierre de Fermat. Wiles will be traveling to Oslo, Norway, in May to collect the 2016...

Mystery of Man Who Killed Himself in 2001 Still Intrigues

Who was Lyle Stevik?

(Newser) - On Sept. 14, 2001, a 20something man calling himself Lyle Stevik got a room at the Lake Quinault Inn , a rundown motel on Washington's Olympic Peninsula. Three days later, the inn's maid discovered the man dead in his room. He had used a leather belt to hang himself...

Mystery of Elisa Lam Still Haunts Internet Sleuths

Clear-cut to some, others are not convinced we have all the facts

(Newser) - When 21-year-old Canadian college student Elisa Lam checked into the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, she never checked out. With known bouts of depression that kept her from completing much course work at all in her first three years of college, the Canadian also left behind traces of inner turmoil...

Thousands of Possum Tails Mysteriously Dot NZ Roads

No one has a clue how they got there or why

(Newser) - Thousands of possum tails turned up mysteriously scattered across roads large and small in the Auckland and Northland regions of New Zealand over the weekend. Travelers who've counted them as frequently as every few hundred yards have been posting about them on Facebook, reports the New Zealand Herald , but...

Woman's Fingers Returned to Her 80 Years After Death

New Zealand is repatriating the remains of 37 individuals

(Newser) - When New Zealand educator Jessie Marguerite Fendell was found in a dry creek bed at the bottom of a cliff near the school where she worked in 1933, her family didn't believe that her death was an accident. So investigators exhumed her body three months later, sent her fingers...

Woman 'Murdered' in 1984 Found Very Much Alive

She won't say what prompted her mysterious disappearance

(Newser) - A German woman assumed to have been murdered more than 30 years ago was found alive by police earlier this month, NBC News reports. But far from solving the mystery of her disappearance, her unexpected return is only deepening it. According to the Daily Express , 24-year-old Petra Pazsitka left her...

Millions May Still Be Out There From '70s Murder

FBI agent investigating heiress's murder may have lifted cash: reporter

(Newser) - During the last few months of her life, Marjorie Jackson became wary of keeping her inherited fortune in the bank, so she withdrew $8.6 million and stashed it in garbage bags, drawers, and toolboxes all over her Indianapolis home, the Indianapolis Star reports. And she may have had even...

Boy Still Missing 4 Years After Mom Killed Herself
Boy Still Missing 4 Years After Mom Killed Herself
in case you missed it
Sep 5, 2015 11:38 AM CDT

Boy Still Missing 4 Years After Mom Killed Herself

'You'll never find him,' said suicide note left by Timmothy Pitzen's mother

(Newser) - An Illinois mom who killed herself four years ago after going on the run with her 6-year-old son left an ominous suicide note behind that, so far, has proven true. "You'll never find him," Amy Fry-Pitzen wrote of little Timmothy, whom she had taken out of kindergarten...

Linguist Claims He's Solved Gulliver's Travels Riddle

Irving Rothman says he's solved the centuries-old mystery

(Newser) - Long have scholars debated the origins of the "nonsense" language in Jonathan Swift's most famous novel, Gulliver's Travels, though Isaac Asimov once said making sense of it is a "waste of time" because "I suspect that Swift simply made up nonsense for the purpose."...

Trillions of Glow-in-the-Dark Fanged Fish Live in Ocean

Bristlemouth is most numerous vertebrate on Earth, though it remains mysterious

(Newser) - What's believed to be the most numerous vertebrate on Earth is also one you've probably never heard of or seen—yet scientists say the bristlefish, a fanged creature that glows in the dark and lives deep down in the ocean, likely numbers in the thousands of trillions, reports...

Car Crash Solves 40-Year-Old Mystery 10K Miles Away

 Car Crash Solves 
 40-Year-Old Mystery 
 10K Miles Away 
in case you missed it
Jun 27, 2015 8:29 AM CDT

Car Crash Solves 40-Year-Old Mystery 10K Miles Away

Raymond Grady Stansel Jr. disappeared in 1974 right before drug-smuggling trial

(Newser) - When an elderly man in north Queensland, Australia, died in a car crash in May, the local paper ran a story that described an "outpouring of grief" in the town where he ran his crocodile-cruise company for almost 30 years. But as the Tampa Bay Times details in a...

Is This the 20th Century's Most Baffling Cold Case?

We don't know who the Somerton Man was, or how he died

(Newser) - It’s a mystery as maddening as it is intriguing: Who was the still-unidentified Somerton Man, a suit-clad, 40-something man who was found dead on an Australian beach near Adelaide—possibly by poison—on the morning of Dec. 1, 1948? Graeme Wood boils 66 years of sleuthing, developments, twists, and...

Weird Battery Still Runs 175 Years Later

The Oxford Electric Bell has rung about 10B times

(Newser) - Like scientific mysteries? Then check out the Oxford Electric Bell, a battery-powered device that's still ringing 175 years after it was made, the Smithsonian reports. Sitting in the Clarendon Laboratory at Oxford University, it makes a little metal ball move swiftly back and forth between two bells. How its...

UN May Look Into 'Great Political Mystery' of 1960s

What happened in plane crash that killed Dag Hammarskjold?

(Newser) - For more than 50 years, the death of Swedish diplomat Dag Hammarskjold has remained one of the era's biggest mysteries. The UN secretary-general's plane plummeted out of the skies in September 1961 in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) as he flew to orchestrate a ceasefire between Congo's government...

Why Rubber Blocks Keep Appearing on Europe's Beaches

They come from shipwrecks—including, perhaps, the Titanic

(Newser) - From Britain to Spain to Denmark, rubbery blocks have recently washed up on beaches, all bearing the same word: Tjipetir. It's still not certain where each block comes from, but a woman who found one while walking her dog in England has a pretty good idea, the BBC reports....

'Something Chemical' May Have Killed Utah Family

Authorities say it could take more than a month for answers

(Newser) - There are still more questions than answers in the case of the family that died mysteriously Saturday in their home in Springville, Utah. "There was no blunt force trauma, no stab wounds, no gunshot wounds," a local police lieutenant tells KSL . "Nobody went in the house and...

Mystery Donor Offers $30M Reward for MH17 Culprit

German investigative firm says offer is legit, with funds held in Zurich

(Newser) - Everyone wants to know who shot Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 out of the skies over Ukraine in July, but one unknown entity really wants to know—and is apparently willing to pony up $30 million for the answer. Wifka, a German private-investigation firm, says it has a client who's...

'Woman in Black' Ends Mystery Journey in Va.

Social media sensation reportedly ID'd, but no one knows what her mission was

(Newser) - The enigmatic "Woman in Black" on a six-state journey that attracted fierce interest on Twitter and Facebook unceremoniously ended her odyssey yesterday in Winchester, Va., reports NBC Washington . For weeks, the woman, wearing a black robe and veil, has been spotted trudging along highways and through small towns in...

Mystery Solved: Neighbor Left 'Creepy' Porcelain Dolls

Police say woman meant it as a 'goodwill' gesture, though families were rattled

(Newser) - Glassy-eyed porcelain dolls have long played important roles in the creepiest of American horror stories. Which is why at least eight families in San Clemente, Calif., got exceedingly freaked out when someone started leaving such dolls on their front steps—dolls that resemble actual girls about the age of 10...

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