The Skeleton Key Chronicles

15 hours ago

Visitors walking through the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History sometimes pause when they notice an unusual pair standing together in the collection: anthropologist Grover Krantz and his enormous Irish Wolfhound, Clyde, posed just like they once appeared in a favorite photograph.

That arrangement was actually Krantz’s own request. When he passed away in 2002, he donated his body to the Smithsonian and asked that his remains eventually be displayed beside Clyde’s so the two of them could remain together.

The story gets even better when you learn what Krantz was known for during his career. He was a respected physical anthropologist who also became one of the first scientists to seriously study reports of Bigfoot, examining footprint casts and comparing anatomy at a time when most researchers avoided the subject entirely.

Oddly enough, the Smithsonian agreed to his request.

Today the pair can still be seen together at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.
I guess you could say that in a roundabout way, Bigfoot actually made it into the Smithsonian.

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The Skeleton Key Chronicles

17 hours ago

Since it’s Alfred Hitchcock Day, here’s a fun little story that’s often told about something that's said to have happened while Hitchcock was looking for visual inspiration for the Bates home.

It was 1959, and the film, which was based on a short story, was gearing up for production. Hitchcock was working out the overall aesthetic and was already known for turning suspense into an art form when he reportedly came across something that made him do a double take. It was a photograph of a cluttered, junk-filled room inside the Wisconsin farmhouse of Ed Gein. The image was part of a series of photos that had been published in Life magazine that had eventually made its way to Hitchcock. The story goes, he looked at it for a moment and then quietly set it aside, reportedly saying, “We’ll never top that.”

And he may have been right. The looming house above the Bates Motel would go on to become one of the most recognizable images in film. But the true story that helped inspire it was apparently something even the master of suspense knew he couldn’t outdo. Proving once again that truth is often stranger than fiction. … See MoreSee Less

The Skeleton Key Chronicles

1 day ago

On March 12, 2003, two different couples in Sandy, Utah noticed something that made them do a double take near a Staples store. They saw a girl who seemed oddly familiar walking with a disheleveled man and woman.

For nine months, the face of a missing teenager from Salt Lake City had been everywhere. Here image had been broadcasted on television shows, flyers, and national news reports as people across the country followed the search for 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart.

Both of these couples had recently seen Elizabeth’s photo during a segment on America’s Most Wanted, and they felt the resemblance was strong enough that they decided to contact authorities.

After those calls came in, police located the girl and the two adults she was with, and it quickly became clear that the girl the couples had recognized was indeed Elizabeth Smart, bringing an end to a search that had spanned across nine months and captured national attention.

In the years that followed, Elizabeth’s story became the subject of several books and films. Most recently, with her memoir Detours and a Netflix documentary that premiered in January, she looks back on the nine months she was away from home, piecing together that time through her own memories alongside archival footage from the early days of the search. The film walks back through the case from beginning to end, allowing Elizabeth to tell the story in her own words.

Today she is married with three children and has spent much of her adult life speaking publicly about her experience while promoting awareness through the Elizabeth Smart Foundation, which works to support families navigating similar situations.

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