These articles and episodes are ©2019-2024 by their respective authors, and published by the Ancient and Esoteric Order of the Jackalope. They are licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 License. All rights reserved, all wrongs reversed.
Designed by #13 at Lodge #777.
Because the function of art is to hold a mirror up to nature there can be no art because the Universe is infinite which means there simply isn’t a mirror big enough.
Did James Mellaart stumble across a treasure that challenges everything we know about archaeology... or did he make it all up?
Categories: Arts & Culture, Hoaxes, Frauds & Forgeries, Intriguing & Unsolved Mysteries, Series 16, The Quest for the Past
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Does writing a blog post about an international trip retroactively turn it into a business expense? Guess we'll find out next April!
Categories: Supplement
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I suppose I should actually show you what George Gray Barnard's sculpture groups for the Pennsylvania State Capitol actually look like, huh?
Categories: Arts & Culture, Supplement
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In August 2023, my cousin Tim and his fiancee Bonnie were getting married in Lancaster. As #7 and I made our travel plans, we realized that even though she has spent a large chunk of her adult life in Pennsylvania she had never visited many of its most famous historic sites. We decided to make […]
Categories: Arts & Culture, Feats of Building & Engineering, Series 14
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The Countess di Frasso was the most famous hostess in the world, who threw parties for kings; actors, athletes and aviators; Nazis and mobsters.
Categories: Arts & Culture, Biography, Eccentrics & Prophecies, Entertainment & Media, People & Places, Series 13
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A small gallery of some of William H. Mumler's best spirit photographs. (By which I mean "aesthetically pleasing", not "genuine.")
Categories: Arts & Culture, Footsteps into the Unknown, Hoaxes, Frauds & Forgeries, Supplement
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In 1862, William H. Mumler took the first known photograph of a ghost. Maybe. What unfolded next was an epic story of fraud and self-deception...
Categories: Biography, Footsteps into the Unknown, Hoaxes, Frauds & Forgeries, People & Places, Series 13
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This one has it all: sibling rivalry, country club politics, adultery, duels, the Civil War, Spanish colonial policy, and three giant piles of bird poop.
Categories: Arts & Culture, Daring & Epic Journeys, Series 13
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Rowena spent two decades building a career as a top fantasy artists... and then two of her paintings were found hanging in Saddam Hussein's "love nest."
Categories: Arts & Culture, Bonus Episodes
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In which two Irish art students commit a daring daylight museum heist with virtually no planning, and somehow get away consequence-free.
Categories: Arts & Culture, Least Popular, Series 7
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Why, exactly, was there a statue of a Viking explorer in Philadelphia? And why isn't it there now?
Categories: Arts & Culture, Daring & Epic Journeys, Series 5
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Is Constantin Brâncuși's "Bird in Space" a masterpiece, or just a hunk of polished bronze? Why not let the courts decide?
Categories: Arts & Culture, Series 1
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