Throughout the history of the United States, a lot of weird and bizarre things have happened. We’ve all heard of Roswell, Bigfoot, and even the Zodiac Killer. On the other hand, do you remember reading about the mysterious Dighton Rock, the fearful Momo, or the unsolved Gypsy Hill Murders?
To find out more about these odd enigmas, read on to discover some of America’s more interesting yet less famous mysteries.
10 Henry Starr And The Stevens County Treasure
Of the many famous outlaws who roamed and terrorized the Wild West, Henry Starr stands out as one of the most interesting, yet few people today remember him. From a young age, Henry was exposed to a life of crime in his native Oklahoma. The so-called “Cherokee Bad Boy” was the last in a long line of thieves and criminals, which also included the famed Belle Starr, one of his close relatives. He began his career as a small-time bandit by stealing[amazon asin=0792267265&template=*lrc ad (right)] and taking horses, eventually escalating to murder when he gunned down a Deputy US Marshal in 1892. He was imprisoned for these crimes but later released on a technicality.
Starr returned to his criminal ways after his release, eventually deciding to take up the highly profitable pursuit of bank robbing. He wound up in jail a few times, but he went on to hold up close to 21 banks in the early 1900s, expanding his criminal ventures into Kansas and Arkansas. This would end badly for Starr—he was blasted through the chest with a shotgun during one bank heist in Harrison, Arkansas.
During his long run as a criminal, he claimed to have stolen over $60,000 by the time of his death in 1921. None of this is a mystery, though—the real mystery pertains to the large stash of loot he supposedly buried somewhere near the Cimarron River in Stevens County, Kansas. Starr reportedly told others that he hid his secret cache in a spot where nobody would find it “in a million years.” So far,no one has come forward with the loot in the 95 years since the outlaw’s death, so maybe his prediction will stay true.
9 Levelland UFO Sightings
One of the most incredible UFO sightings in ufology occurred on November 2, 1957, when dozens reported strange things in the skies over Levelland, Texas. The sheriff’s office and on-duty Patrolman A.J. Fowler were flooded with calls from scared citizens reporting bright lights in the sky. Shortly after 11:00 PM, Pedro Saucedo and Joe Salaz called in when their pickup truck suddenly rolled to a stop, as they watched a 61-meter (200 ft) cigar-shaped object fly overhead. Moments later, their truck started back up again, as if nothing happened. For the time being, Fowler shrugged off the report.[amazon asin=B000E0OBJM&template=*lrc ad (right)]
Later, however, more reports came in from others claiming that their vehicles had stalled while either watching a UFO in the sky above or encountering bright objects just sitting in the road. Fowler wrote down that the sheriff’s office took over 15 calls on these strange lights. At 1:30 AM, Sheriff Clem and Deputy McCullough left the station to track down the lights in the sky. Just outside of Levelland, they witnessed a “large, glowing object” fly over the highway ahead of them.
For about three hours, the skies over Levelland and the surrounding area were filled with strange lights. Dozens of witnesses came forward, and the Air Force conducted a brief investigation. They said the UFOs and lights were nothing more than ball lightning, a natural weather anomaly. While lightning was spotted hours later in nearby Lubbock, many still claim something truly paranormal was over Levelland on that odd autumn night.
8 Meriwether Lewis’s Death[amazon asin=B005S28ZES&template=*lrc ad (right)]
Meriwether Lewis, who led the famed Lewis and Clark Expedition alongside William Clark, returned to St. Louis, Missouri in 1807, after his long trek through the vast Pacific Northwest. For a year or so, he dabbled in politics and was appointed governor of the Upper Louisiana Territory by his friend, President Thomas Jefferson. On September 3, 1809, he set out for Washington, D.C. to settle some business matters. However, he never made it there alive.
Lewis decided to take the Natchez Trace route, a rugged trail going east to Washington, D.C. He stopped at Grinder’s Stand, a small inn on the trail, to rest for the night of October 10. That evening, the innkeeper’s wife, Priscilla Grinder, reported that Lewis was behaving erratically and kept pacing around the inn’s dining area. Shortly after dinner, he retired to his bedroom. In the early morning hours of October 11, Priscilla said she heard a couple of gunshots and watched Lewis drag himself out of his room, crying out for help. It is unclear why she didn’t aid him, which also casts doubt on her story. Servants in the inn found Lewis on the floor, suffering from a gunshot to the abdomen and another to the head. He died shortly after sunrise that morning, at the age of 35.
In the history books, Lewis’s death remains a suicide. Many experts cite his alcoholism, his financial situations, and his failure to find the fabled Northwest Passage as motives for the suicide. Some scholars, and his family, contend that the explorer was murdered, highlighting the two gunshots from the single-shot, high caliber pistols of the day (which also took quite a while to reload, especially after you just shot yourself).
