Conspiracy Theories

In 1888, Jack the Ripper stalked the streets of Whitechapel, England. Officially, he killed five women, brutally mutilating some of them beyond recognition. But perhaps the most unsettling part of his tale is how, to this day, we still don’t know his true identity. They say it’s because the police failed to catch him. However, some believe his identity was kept secret by Scot...

If you’ve heard of the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California, you’ve surely heard the rumors about its famous owner, Sarah Winchester. Like the claims she was an eccentric hermit who never left her 24,000-square-foot mansion. Or that she demanded construction crews work on her home night and day, year after year, because she believed when the work stopped, she woul...

Beginning in 1632, a convent of young Ursuline nuns made startling claims – from seeing dead priests, to being possessed by a horde of Satan’s demons. A team of priests presided over daily exorcisms – some of them public – for months…until the blame was directed toward one man: Father Urbain Grandier, a controversial figure who’d made a number of foes. Despite his claims of i...

On Halloween Eve, 1938 Orson Welles' The War of the Wars aired on CBS radio. It detailed an alien invasion so realistic that, according to legend, it caused widespread panic among listeners. People really believed aliens were invading Earth. The mass hysteria is an important part of media history. However, some believe that there was never actually any panic at all. So why do...