stuff you can't make up

[dispatch]

I've been talking with family and friends alot lately and I've heard a couple of stories that prove real life events are stranger than fiction.

One of my mom's high school friends decided that her life's calling was to be a nun, so after high school she made arrangements to enter a convent. In order to enter the convent there was a very specific list of items that she needed, this included socks, blouses, shoes, etc. and they would not let her in if she didn't have these things upon her arrival.
She took the bus to the town where the convent was, her bags were packed with everything from the list, save the shoes because she didn't have the money for them. After looking around town trying to come up with a way to get these shoes, and she came up with a rather interesting solution. She danced at a strip club to get the money to buy the shoes she needed to enter the convent.
Amazingly enough she decided after awhile in the convent that it wasn't the life for her.

My brother and I were able to get apartments not only in the same building but right across the hall from eachother, so in case of a grand feat of absent mindedness we exchanged spare keys. A couple of weeks ago my brother went on vacation and left me with his mailbox key and car key in case I should need to move his car, I left both on a seperate key ring in my mail basket when I wasn't using them.
While my brother was gone Omaha got hit with it's first real blizzard in almost 10 years, and when the snow is that deep it's not hard to find a motorist in need of a push or a cell phone, and i'm happy to help since I've gotten out of several snowdrifts with the assistance of passing motorists. Somehow, while pushing cars through the snow, I lost my apartment key. Not all of my keys, not even the little ring with my front door, mailbox, and apartment keys on it, JUST the apartment key :confused: , so as luck would have it my brother kept my spare in his apartment, not on his keyring, and I was able to get in since I had the key to his apartment.
A few days later when my brother returned I still hadn't made a replacement key for the one I'd lost and I was at work when he got home, I called him on my break to ask how his trip went and that's when he informed me that since the car key he had given me was his ONLY car key and that was locked in my apartment that he no longer had a key for because I took it when I lost mine he was stranded at home until I got off work. I just thought it was interesting.


I know some of you have stranger than fiction stories, please discuss.

[NightAngel]

My family history is full of weirdness.

I believe it was my great, great aunt who was outside washing laundry (you know, the good old days-with a scrub board) one afternoon- she was pregnant at the time. They lived within sight of the factory her husband worked in, she looked up from her scrubbing and saw the factory was on fire.

She was terrified that her husband might be dead and without thinking she ran her lye soap covered hand up the side of her face.
Coincidently, her daughter was born with a red birthmark up the same side of her face. They say she carried the mark of fire. (Oh, and he lived.)

Another odd tale from my family is about a young mother who abandoned her daughter to relatives and went off to who knows where to do who knows what. No one had heard from her for years- they had no idea where she was or what had happened to her.

Her daughter fell deathly ill and there wasn't much the doctors then could do. The family cared for her at home the best they could.

Not too long after they brought the daughter home the front door opened one night and the mother walked in. She did not say a single word to any of them- she just went up to her daughters room. None of them ever heard the girl's mother utter a single word. She stayed almost completely in her daughter's room. They would leave a dinner plate on the table and she would go down and eat after the rest of the family had gone to bed. This went on for several months.

After the funeral she walked away and they never saw her again.

[Plaidman]

That's a sad story Nightangel :(

I have a family of semi-famous people. My great aunt was a second cousin by marrage to Babe Ruth.
A cousin of mine father is Joe Dougherty. (A favorite story of mom's that didn't make it in the movie about him and Terry was they were captured by cops one time, and manage to get the cops guns. They got away, and mailed the guns back to the police).
My mom's ex-boyfriend new girlfriends son is Chris Leben. He isn't as much of an ass as he acts, and he liked Zelda: Link to the past.

A cousin of my mom is the Ultimite in SC though. He is the one that helped set up the system so Customers can push a button and have a worker come help.

[MystyGlyttyr]

I have some cousins who are identical twins. However, something went screwy in their make-up, so when they were born, one of them was born with only one kidney, and the other was born with three.

When my cousin Greg was killed when I was 11, me, my brother and my sister all saw the accident he was in, but didn't realize it was him until we arrived home and got the call about it. After that, there was a bizarre amount of paranormal activity around our house...a clock that had been broken for months suddenly began working again, things in my room would be knocked over or ripped off the walls, there were strange sightings of lights and other things, etc. It let up after a while but it still happens now and then.

There's probably a ton more but I can't think of it at the moment. Our family's always been surrounded by weirdness.

[blas]

My great-great grandpa was friends with Al Capone, and actually helped in the building of Al Capone's hideout in Courte Oreilles, WI. If anyone is ever traveling in that general area, I recommend a pit stop there, it's a very fun tour with lots of facts about Al Capone's life.

Great-great Grandpa died 6 years before I was born (he was getting close to 100). He never said a word to anyone about the things he knew about Al Capone or what they talked about. He took it all to the grave. Given all that is historically known about Al, keeping your mouth shut is probably the best idea, but on the other hand......can you imagine the stories great-great grandpa could have told?

[Cia]

Zita, the landlady of the apartment building that my Uncle Carroll, his wife and kid lived in was widowed and decided that she wanted Carroll for herself. Aunt Zita got what she wanted.

My Grandpa had an affair with my Grandma's bestfriend, who was living with them at the time, and produced a child. Grandpa immediately ran off and joined the Navy so Grandma couldn't kill him. Grandma offered to take the baby but Viv refused and left. Grandpa eventually gave up his rights and Uncle Jim was adopted by Viv's new husband. My Dad was 7 at the time and knew what was going on. I didn't find out until 1993 that I had an extra Uncle, Aunt and cousins. Grandma stayed friends with Viv even after Jim was born - never did understand that.

[NightAngel]

That's a sad story Nightangel :(

Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to be a downer.

My Great Grandfather was a barber and owned a barbershop.
The shop was also a front for a speakeasy. There's no real story other than that- I just think it's cool. ;)

On the more demented side:
My Great, Great, Great Grandmother and Grandfather were quite a pair- they hated eachother. She'd iron his shirts for him so he'd look nice when he went out on dates. She kept hoping he'd finally meet someone and leave her.
He'd get drunk and sit on the front porch sharpening a knife wondering if today would be the day he'd finally have the courage to kill her.

Both died of natural causes- still married and completely miserable.

[Giggle Goose]

She'd iron his shirts for him so he'd look nice when he went out on dates. She kept hoping he'd finally meet someone and leave her.




That's hilarious! :lol: Sorry, I'm pretty wrong for thinking that....;)

[Boozy]

A cousin of my mom is the Ultimite in SC though. He is the one that helped set up the system so Customers can push a button and have a worker come help.

He IS the ultimate SC! :lol:
(I can see why you've been keeping your shameful family history a secret from us all this time. ;))

[Geek King]

When my mother was tracing the family tree, she found a story about one of the family branches that told exactly how the family came to the USA. It seems this German fellow was in England on buisness when he met a woman in a bar. They had drinks, and hit it off, so my ancestor went with her to her room above the bar. While in bed together, there was a great noise at the door, and a man began beating on the door. It seems the lady was married, and the bar patrons had told her husband that she had gone upstairs with another man. The husband broke the door down while my ancestor dressed and dove out the window and climbed down the gutter outside the bar. A chase through the town ensued, and my ancestor managed to hide from the husband on board a ship he thought was going back to Germany. As things turn out, the ship was sailing for New York, where the stowaway ancestor was kicked off to make his own way.

[sportsmom]

Apparently my huuby's great-grandfather got here in a somewhat similar fashion, only he skipped school and didn't want to go home and get in trouble so he hopped on a boat to America. He was 15 and alone.

Gee, my family must be pretty boring, though. I only have a married aunt and uncle who are step-siblings. His mother and her father got married when they (the aunt and uncle) were teenagers, and they ended up getting married themselves.

The same uncle was on the USS Arizona during the attack on Pearl Harbor and my aunt was still in San Diego. When she heard about the attack, she jumped on a train with her 6 week old son and went home to North Carolina. After she got home, my great-grandfather looked at her and said "D, do they know where you are if they need to find you?" When she told him that she had just jumped on the train and not told anyone he said "Then I suggest you get back on that train and go back to California. Your husband is going to need you." She did and he did. I've never asked him about the attack, but I have always wanted to. I just don't want to bring up those horrible memories for him. My mom still remembers how old that cousin is by remembering how long it has been since the attack.


Nothing too strange with my family, I feel so alone. :)

[Ackee]

She danced at a strip club to get the money to buy the shoes she needed to enter the convent.



Sounds like she really liked the idea of worship? Why pray to one "man" when you can have many men praying to you

[BookstoreEscapee]

I am semi-related to a Nobel Prize winner...does that count?

My dad's sister's ex-husband won the Nobel in Chemistry in 1996, along with 2 other guys, for discovering Buckyballs (Buckminsterfullerenes, or Carbon 60). I never met him, as they were in Texas by the time I was born and they've been divorced for as long as I can remember, but it's pretty cool. Whenever I see a book on nanotechnology, I look in the index for his name. My cousin and my aunt got to go to Sweden for the ceremony and everything (they gave him 10 tickets, and he gave 2 to my cousin, who decided to bring his mom). Sadly, he passed away last October.

Funny story (or, How to Impress a Bunch of Tech Geeks): My dad worked for Bell Labs (AT&T, later Lucent), and my uncle came up to give a talk sometime after winning the Nobel. My dad snagged one of the fliers and put it on his bulletin board with all the family pics and other personal stuff. People would see it and be all awestruck and ask "How do you know him?" and my dad would say, "Oh, he was the best man at my wedding." :eek:

[BlaqueKatt]

If anyone is ever traveling in that general area, I recommend a pit stop there, it's a very fun tour with lots of facts about Al Capone's life.

oooo been there got pics of me standing by the<ahem> "lookout tower"-yes I know what it really is:p , the tour guides won't tell you though.


the Half-Sicilian BlaqueKatt

[ArenaBoy]

Hilariously, my great uncle was a bootlegger back in the 20s who had connections to the Purple Gang and Capone. My great-aunt was also somewhat of a famous painter, not Picasso famous but famous in certain art circles. She painted fine china and traveled all over the world. When we were cleaning out her condo we found all this priceless artwork (We didn't know that it was priceless at the time) and decided to get it appraised. The stuff was worth about $4,000-$11,000. She got it all from fleamarkets. Had quite a laugh about it too. We also have a Nazi Lutwaffe Officer's dagger in our house from my great-aunt. We had thought that her husband brought it back home from Germany and we decided to ask her and she laughed and said flea market.

Both my parents made food for bands before I was born. My mom cooked food for U2 and she knew who they were before they became big. They always requested her whenever they were in town.

Looking back on it, I've got somewhat of a strange yet awesome family. :lol:

[Becks]

I have a memory from when I was approximately one and a half. I remember my mommy being pregnant with my younger sister.

I think it's pretty cool to remember something from when I was that young.

[Writer Cath]

Back in Egypt when he was still an apprentice, my grandfather was one of the people photographing King Farooq's wedding. My grandmother later threw out the pictures, knowing full well what they were. :eek:

[TruthHurts]

A couple of years ago my Mom wanted to introduce me to her new beau. She tells me (before I met him) that he was a bi-polar former drug addict who lives in a houseboat with no electricity/water and that he had a lot of money. How'd he get the money you ask? Well apparantly he let a 14 year old runaway girl stay with him and when the police came he attacked an officer. They beat him so badly that he sued and actually got a settlement. I remember looking at Mom and saying "S%$t I can't even make something like this up.

Also my cousin J. was playing with a stun gun and somehow managed to stun himself in the groin. Nuff said.

[April]

My grandparents were married for 50 years before my grandfather died of Cancer.

When he proposed to my grandmother she was 15 and he was 17. She told Him NO. He persisted and eventually made her so mad she through his class ring into a lake.

He went around her and asked her mother for permission to marry. She granted it and that's how my grandparents got married lol

[Mr B Rabbit]

Not really weird stuff, but possibly interesting all the same:

My father helped develop the first MRI machine, I still have a print of the first successful scan taken with it. The stem of a daffodil. He also worked on CERN while they were building it.

My grandfather designed the air intakes for the Harrier jet plane, as well as the canopy for the two seater Hawker Hunter aircraft.

Supposedly I have a relative of some sort (second uncle twice removed or something) who invented a golf club, and is a millionaire. Two years previously he had a huge argument with his father and decided he wanted nothing more to do with the family. Dammit.

A much more distant ancestor of mine was a blacksmith, and the story goes that he invented metal framed windows. One of his customers came in and asked about them, and my ancestor sadly told him how to make them and what they were. The customer then went off and made a fortune out of mass producing them.

[MystyGlyttyr]

Hmm, well, so far as ancestors, I have mentioned before that I am a direct descendant of Sir William Wallace. I'm pretty sure he didn't moon anyone in battle, but I think he did skin some guy and wear his flesh as a belt. Pretty cool, if you ask me.

One of my school classmates bragged that he was related to OJ Simpson...up until about 1994 or so...*snickers* Then we never heard another peep about it.

My brother is also an orchid breeder and has already invented at least one new species. I don't know much more about it or I'd post more information, heh.

If someone were going to get very, very technical (and I do), I have a Bacon number of 3. I have appeared twice on the news with local personality Ron Young, who appeared in Steel Magnolias with Julia Roberts, who was in Flatliners with Kevin Bacon. Who wants to touch me? :lol:

[thegiraffe]

Oh my...I have quite the family history.

My ancestry has been traced (quite directly, I may add) to Welsh Royalty. Not just any Royalty though, King Henry VIII. Yeah, that was quite shocking.

Also, my Great Great Great Grandfather was good friends with Alexander Graham Bell, and a co-founder of National Geographic in 1888. I always thought that was pretty cool.

Ever hear of Luray Caverns in Virginia? My Great Great (I think it's two Greats, maybe three) uncle and friend, or uncles - I'm not quite sure - accidentally discovered them.

I don't have the entire story on this, but on my mom's side, one of my ancestors founded Birds Eye - y'know, the frozen vegetables?

My Maternal Grandmother's maiden name is also Campbell. I don't know of a connection there (though it wouldn't surprise me).

I'm sure there's more...this is all I can think of right now though.

[Rapscallion]

Who wants to touch me? :lol:

Form an orderly queue, chaps.

Rapscallion

[BookstoreEscapee]

Oh my...I have quite the family history.

My ancestry has been traced (quite directly, I may add) to Welsh Royalty. Not just any Royalty though, King Henry VIII. Yeah, that was quite shocking.

Also, my Great Great Great Grandfather was good friends with Alexander Graham Bell, and a co-founder of National Geographic in 1888. I always thought that was pretty cool.


Maybe you should have HauntedHead's Wives of Henry VIII avatar :)

What was your G-G-G Grandfather's name? I recently read a history of National Geographic called Explorer's House: National Geographic and the World it Made (well, not so recently, probably a year ago)

[TruthHurts]

I was talking to my Aunt this morning when she informed me that my Great Grandfather is Peter Kirk. He founded the city of Kirkland in Washington State. It's amazing that for 29 years no one ever thought to inform me of that. :rolleyes:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kirk_%28businessman%29

[Primer]

Apparently my huuby's great-grandfather got here in a somewhat similar fashion, only he skipped school and didn't want to go home and get in trouble so he hopped on a boat to America. He was 15 and alone.

Sportsmom, are we related??
I heard that he was playing on the docks and fell in...but the rest is the same!
Wait...you're not my mom or sister-in-law, and my uncle passed away in '87... I do have some male cousins you might be married to...

[thegiraffe]

What was your G-G-G Grandfather's name? I recently read a history of National Geographic called Explorer's House: National Geographic and the World it Made (well, not so recently, probably a year ago)

Henry Gannett (I'm almost positive it's 2 n's and 2 t's, but I may be wrong).

[Becks]

There are two streets in a small WI town named for my great grandfather and at least one named for one of his sons. :D

[jnd4rusty]

I don't have the all the stories of my ancestry but on my mom's mother's side: My great, great, great, great grandfather fought in the War of 1812 and was a plantation owner and slave owner( a fact that I am not proud of), my great great, great grandfather fought in the Civil War with the Confederates. From what I gather they were pretty wealthy people but somehow it missed my grandmother, there has to be some story there but I don't know what it would be. My mom worshiped the ground my grandmother walked on but my Auntie Mabel hated her mom and said grandma was a drunken slut. I never knew my grandma since she died when I was four and I was in a foster home at the time. Now on my mom's dad's side of the family: I know my great grandfather came here from Germany and my great grandma came from the Netherlands. My grandpa was a medic in WW1 and his brother own a mechanics garage in Fairview SD. I had a great uncle who had polio as a child and was confined to a wheelchair but he went on to own and operate a newspaper in Iowa. That is all the history I know. I am still trying to get some stuff on the Hartson side of the family but I am not getting very far, all my aunties that are still alive are pretty old and not forthcoming with information.

[powerboy]

I have an aunt that used to be married to the uncle of "Jan Brady" in the Brady Bunch Movies, which I am too lazy to look up right now, but I will add later.

I once made a group of wrestling fans mad at me. I got out of the car with my brother, and a group of them came running up, yelling John Cena, and when they reached me, they got mad because, I was not John Cena

[sportsmom]

Sportsmom, are we related??
I heard that he was playing on the docks and fell in...but the rest is the same!
Wait...you're not my mom or sister-in-law, and my uncle passed away in '87... I do have some male cousins you might be married to...

I don't think he has any family in TX, we're in IN.

[Cia]

My Grandpa claimed that one of our ancestors was on the boat with George Washington when he crossed the Delaware River. I personally take that with a grain of salt. Along with a alot of other people we had family on both sides of the Civil War.

[Food Lady]

My mom's side of the family has the more interesting stories.

--Mom had an uncle with a let's say, shady reputation. She remembers meeting a "friend" of his when she was 5 or 6. It turns out later she recognized a picture of the friend in the newspaper. It was Jimmy Hoffa.

--Aforementioned uncle showed up in one of mom's dreams. In the dream--or vision, I don't remember--her uncle was shot. Within a day she got the call that said uncle had been shot and died.

--My mom comes from English stock, specifically, some of the people that travelled to the U.S. on the Mayflower. An enterprising people we are. No wonder my family can be defined by the adage "necessity is the mother of invention." We're good at being poor.

--Speaking of which, my mom's stories of childhood hardship are actually true, unlike those stories some parents make up. ("I used to walk uphill backwards in the snow 10 miles to school everyday....":lol: ) My grandparents were so poor that they couldn't keep Mom and siblings in proper shoes. Mom remembers putting cardboard in hers. Why were they so poor? No college degrees and they spent all of their money keeping the kids in private school (Mt. Pisgah, a seventh-day adventist school.) It was that important to them.

--I tell people I'm half hillbilly. I once asked Mom if great-grandma received a lot of flack for marrying someone of mixed race (white and native american). She said it probably wasn't a big issue because they lived in the remote hills of the southeast, the "backwoods". Oddly enough, if anyone brought up great-grandpa's mixed heritage, great-grandma would say, "My husband tweren't no indian!" A racist married to an indian. Other bigots would blame great-grandpa's deformity on the "mixing of the races" his parents committed. He and some of his brothers had 2 nose bridges each. Some of the other siblings had extra toes or fingers or whatnot. My mom, brother, uncles, and I can all be recognized as being related because there's something recognizeable about the middle of our faces, around the nose and under the eyes. I guess we got it from great-grandpa.

My dad's family, on the other hand...

--My dad's father apparently dated a woman before marrying grandma and produced my aunt. So she's a half-sister to dad and siblings. Her mom left her on grandpa and grandma's doorstep to raise, but they gave my aunt to be adopted. My grandma never got over that incident, was really offended at the whole thing, illegitimate child and all. She hates my aunt, denies that there's any relation, and turned all her kids against my aunt. Well, except my dad. He's the only one who stood up to the family and built a relationship with his half-sister. I'm proud of him.

--My dad had a buddy that knew quite a few members of "The Family," if you know what I mean. They'd hang out and his buddy would say, "F, just be cool." So my dad was hobnobbing with mafia guys saying things like, "nice to meet you" and later on hearing all the crazy stories. He won't tell me the stories. Personally, I would have dropped the buddy. I don't need to be that close to the drama.

Well, if I think of any more....

[Misanthropical]

My grandparents both worked on a military base. I always thought it was weird that people would find out who my grandparents were and start kissing my backside. My grandparents never really did discuss their jobs and they always had money. One of those things that make go "hmmm".

I recently found out that my grandmother had a brother. She never told me, her sister did a few months ago. He died when he was very young, while the family was waiting for their visas to go to Ellis Island.

[ArenaBoy]

My mom's side of the family has the more interesting stories.

--Mom had an uncle with a let's say, shady reputation. She remembers meeting a "friend" of his when she was 5 or 6. It turns out later she recognized a picture of the friend in the newspaper. It was Jimmy Hoffa.


I used to live in the town that Jimmy Hoffa lived in before he disappeared. I think I know where the street his house was on also as I had a few friends that lived on his street.

The town I used to live in was also home to Alice Cooper.

[Food Lady]

Mom was living in Florida or North Carolina at the time and it would have been between 1954 and 1965. (I don't remember exactly how old she was.)

[dispatch]

my great uncle invented the carbite-tipped drill, but he did it in an Army shop, so he never really got credit, however they did send him royalty checks until he died

one of my other ancestors was at the neighborhood bar one night when one of his buddies explained to him how fire insurance worked, after hearing about this great american concept he went home and set his house on fire. The fire department showed up to a house on fire and my ancestor standing on the lawn next to a stack of furniture, clothing, and other valuables that he didn't want to replace.

[Greenday]

Amazing stories:
My grandfather was the only surivior of a plane crash during the Korean War. He was in the bathroom...

One time during WWII, he was lost on a beach and had NO idea where the hell he was. He saw some woman on the beach and asked her for help. She pointed off in a direction and he took a few steps in that direction, but then immediately turned around to thank her. She was gone. He continued in the directing the disappearing woman had pointed in and he found his platoon.

In Korea, he was sent to Korea as an engineer. When he got there, someone managed to screw up and put him on the front lines. When he told his superiors what was up, they told him too bad. As a result, he managed to get shot and was given the Purple Heart. Few years ago he chucked it out, "because he didn't deserve it." I guess I understand, but it's something we as the family would have like to have kept.

He's also been in three fires. He's been hit by a car a few times.

Amazingly crazy stories...:
When my grandfather was a kid out in the middle of nowhere, PA, he used to set out raccoon traps. Well, one day when he went out to check them, an owl was stuck in a trap. So he clubbed it to death. Then he drowned it to make sure it was dead.

He also put bleach in my mom's and my aunt's goldfish bowl just to see what happened. I'll spare you the details of the results.

There's just too many stories to list for the ridiculous stories. We think he should make a book about it. Might take more than one book though.

[sportsmom]

I forgot about this one...

my dad broke his arm when he was in his 40's -- he fell off the wing of a plane.

Luckily the plane was in the hanger at the time and he just fell onto the floor. He was a QAS at the Naval Base in Norfolk, VA and was up inspecting some work and slipped and fell.

[Cia]

My Dad and about 30 other seamen intigrated a couple of New Orleans, LA bars in 1960. The color of the money out weighed the color of a few seamen.

[Caveat Emptor]

one of my other ancestors was at the neighborhood bar one night when one of his buddies explained to him how fire insurance worked, after hearing about this great american concept he went home and set his house on fire. The fire department showed up to a house on fire and my ancestor standing on the lawn next to a stack of furniture, clothing, and other valuables that he didn't want to replace.

Someone obviously didn't explain the concept of "fraud" and "arson..." :rolleyes:

[Caveat Emptor]

My GGGGGRandfather fought on the Patriot side in the Revolution. His son was in an Arty. battery in Staten Island during 1812, and HIS son fought in the War with Mexico in 1848, where he was commissioned a 2LT. My late Gr Uncle found the comm. papers, signed by President James K. Polk!