Haunting Museums

Front Cover
Macmillan, Apr 27, 2009 - History - 272 pages

The spectacularly successful move A Night at the Museum was a fantastic look at the off-hours wonders of the American Museum of Natural History. However, some of the real behind-the-scenes stories are more fantastic than anything a screenwriter could dream up. Haunting Museums covers these overlooked bits of history including curses, mistaken dinosaurs, conspiracy plots of the founding fathers, spectral evidence of the afterlife, and other unsettling matters on full display.

Contents include: The Carnegie Sauropods, Or Bring Me the Head of Apatosaurus Louisae – the story of a dinosaur on display for close to a half a century with the wrong head.

What's on that Broad Stripe with Those Bright Stars? – the quizzical mark on the flag that is known as the Star Spangled banner.

The 1897 Living Eskimo Exhibit – where living people were put on display and turned over to the taxidermist for "preservation" after they died

Man-eaters at the Museum: The Lions That Stopped a Railroad – the story of the Maneless lions made legendary by the movie the Ghost in the Darkness

So Where is Amelia Earhart? – the exhibit at the Smithsonian Air and Space museum of the most famous missing aviatrix of all time.

Along with many other entertaining and fantastic stories.

 

Selected pages

Contents

Introduction
9
History and Natural History
15
The Uncanny
157
Acknowledgments
271
Copyright

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About the author (2009)

JOHN SCHUSTER is a scout and development editor for the Literary Group International. He divides his time between New York and California.

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