Line #67 Main/StockUnsolvedMysteries


1	->'''Mobius:''' I can't believe you were D.B. Cooper! Come on!\
2	'''Loki:''' I was young, and I lost a bet to Thor.
3	-->-- ''Series/Loki2021''
4
5	The possibility to let your characters witness or even participate in [[BasedOnATrueStory events that actually happened]], is probably one of the most appealing aspects of HistoricalFiction, {{Flashback}}s, TimeTravel stories and the like. But sometimes it can be quite hard to shoehorn your characters in, if you don't want to [[ArtisticLicenseHistory sacrifice too much of historical accuracy]]. Especially if your character doesn't quite fit into the historical setting, because he is a NinjaPirateZombieRobot.
6
7	The solution: Take a famous historical event that is shrouded in mystery, an event of which not many details are publicly known. [[RealEventFictionalCause Then fill the gap of historical records with whatever you want, this way "revealing" what actually happened.]] This adds the bonus that everyone likes a good mystery (and its eventual solution).
8
9	Depending on the tone and genre of your work, your "explanation" can range from [[ScoobyDooHoax mundane]], over [[HistoricalInJoke humorous]], to [[ETGaveUsWiFi absolutely]] [[AncientAstronauts fantastic]].
10
11	The BeenThereShapedHistory person likes to cause these events. Of course {{Historical Domain Character}}s as well as fictional {{Public Domain Character}}s may be involved too. Perhaps they did even use a PublicDomainArtifact.
12
13	Anyway, in the end you can proudly claim that your story is VeryLooselyBasedOnATrueStory.
14
15	Closely related to HistoricalInJoke. Can also overlap with BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy, when the focus lies on specific historical individuals. Often happens at, and tightly involves, a LandmarkOfLore through AlternateLandmarkHistory. Also, at least one of this events is a must-have for any ConspiracyKitchenSink story worth its salt.
16
17	Note that sometimes mysteries get solved, or even debunked as not having been that mysterious in the first place. In this case the work either [[DatedHistory was written in a time before the solution/debunking]], or the writer didn't get the memo, or they're just using ArtisticLicense. For [[RuleOfCool obvious reasons]], solutions that are perceived as "boring" are the most likely to be disregarded by writers.
18	----
19	!!Stock Unsolved Mysteries that have their own pages:
20	* [[CausedTheBigBang The cause of the Big Bang]]
21	* [[PhlebotinumKilledTheDinosaurs The extinction of the dinosaurs]]
22	* [[PyramidPower How (and why) the Ancient Egyptians built the pyramids]]
23	* On a similar note, what happened to Art/TheSphinx's nose
24	* The legend of {{Atlantis}} and whether it might still exist.
25	* The [[JesusTheEarlyYears lost years]] of UsefulNotes/JesusChrist (the consensus among actual Biblical scholars is that they were left out simply due to [[LawOfConservationOfDetail not being that interesting or important]].)
26	* [[LostRomanLegion The disappearance of Roman legions, especially the Legio IX Hispana]]
27	* TheFateOfThePrincesInTheTower
28	* UsefulNotes/TheLostColonyOfRoanoke
29	* UsefulNotes/FermatsLastTheorem ([[ScienceMarchesOn now proved]])
30	* The identity of the entity known as SpringHeeledJack
31	* The murders and true identity of UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper
32	* The UsefulNotes/LizzieBorden case
33	* TheTunguskaEvent
34	* [[DidAnastasiaSurvive The purported survival of]] [[UsefulNotes/AnastasiaNikolaevnaRomanova Grand Duchess Anastasia of Russia]] ([[DatedHistory now disproved]])
35	* The disappearance of UsefulNotes/AmeliaEarhart
36	* [[RoswellThatEndsWell The Roswell incident]]
37	* Ships and airplanes disappearing within TheBermudaTriangle
38	* SuperSargassoSea
39	* TheMenInBlack
40	* [[WhoShotJFK The assassination of]] UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy
41	* {{Area 51}}
42	* The murders and true identity of the UsefulNotes/ZodiacKiller
43	* The locations and abilities of miscellaneous {{Public Domain Artifact}}s
44	* UsefulNotes/NikolaTesla and his inventions he DIDN'T reveal to the public (and is sometimes connected to the Tunguska Event listed above)
45	* Is the Art/VenusOfWillendorf a LoveGoddess? MotherGoddess? Masturbation Aid? A portrait of a real person?
46	----
47	!!Stock Unsolved Mysteries without their own pages, and examples thereof:
48	[[foldercontrol]]
49
50	[[folder:Mysterious Disappearances]]
51	* The case of Benjamin Bathurst, who disappeared from his hotel one day in 1809. (The actual truth is quite prosaic: Contemporary documents make it clear that he was almost certainly just mugged. Some of his personal belongings were even found during the search for him. It only became a mysterious mystery because of one particular account that made it sound like he'd disappeared into thin air in front of witnesses.)
52	** Creator/HBeamPiper, Creator/RobertBloch, Creator/LionelFanthorpe, and Creator/AvramDavidson, among others, have written stories in which Bathurst was transported to the future or to an AlternateUniverse.
53	** Simon Hawke's ''Literature/TimeWars'' series has a line in passing attributing his disappearance to somebody changing the past out from underneath him.
54	** In "Literature/TheGypsiesInTheWood", occult investigator Charles Beauregard mentions Benjamin Bathurst as a case where his organization failed to find the explanation.
55	* The disappearance of Nana Saheb, who led the Siege of Cawnpore during the Indian Rebellion of 1857. What happened to him after he escaped British capture is still unclear.
56	** Creator/JulesVerne, a lifelong sympathizer of the Indian fight against British colonisation, comes up with a fanciful explanation (complete with steam-powered elephant-shaped CoolCar) in ''Literature/TheSteamHouse''.
57	** And speaking of Jules Verne: ''Captain Nemo'', a 1975 Soviet TV adaptation of ''Literature/TwentyThousandLeaguesUnderTheSea'', posited that Nana Saheb became Captain Nemo himself.
58	* The unknown fate of author, journalist and satirist Creator/AmbroseBierce, who vanished somewhere in Mexico in 1913 after time spent accompanying Pancho Villa's army as an observer.
59	** In ''Manga/DanceInTheVampireBund'' he turns up as a vampire, although the circumstances of his transformation and how he became a confidant of [[VampireMonarch Mina Tepes]] remains unknown.
60	** The third ''Film/FromDuskTillDawn'' film attributes his disappearance to a run-in with vampires.
61	** Creator/RobertAHeinlein's novella "Lost Legacy" has Bierce surviving into the future and participating in a war to control humanity's nascent psychic abilities.
62	** Creator/CarlosFuentes's novel ''Literature/TheOldGringo'' is a fictionalized account of Bierce's disappearance which was later adapted into the film ''Old Gringo'' (1989).
63	* D.B. Cooper, also known as Dan Cooper, who vanished on November 24, 1971 with $200,000 after hijacking a 727 and parachuting from the stairs in the tail. The most likely hypotheses are a) he died in the parachuting attempt (which is the official opinion of the FBI, who suspended the investigation in 2016 after 45 years of searching), or b) he survived the jump and simply went back to his old job and old life as if nothing had happened--Cooper was certainly [[TheNondescript nondescript]] enough to escape notice. It should be noted that every single copycat attempt that made it as far as parachuting from the plane -- often in very similar conditions to the Cooper jump -- saw the hijacker survive. Over the decades, many have searched his projected landing site for traces of him. It is widely believed that the March 1980 eruption of nearby Mount St. Helens may have obliterated any remaining physical evidence, as none has been found since then. The most intriguing evidence is how some of the marked banknotes were found buried in the sand of a beach miles from the projected landing site just ''weeks'' before the eruption, by a young boy... but not only was the flow of many nearby rivers running in the ''opposite'' direction of the proposed landing site (making it unlikely they had simply floated on the waters to the beach before being buried in the sediment unless the FBI messed up the projected landing site), the rubber bands that bound them couldn't have lasted even a year in open air or water for the time it would sediment to build up over them naturally, suggesting they had been deliberately buried possibly only a few years earlier. In 2019, the FBI revealed that, three hours after Cooper jumped, a burglary was reported at a grocery store within the projected landing radius, with the only items stolen being survival gear such as beef jerky and gloves.
64	** In an episode of ''Series/{{Leverage}}'', appropriately titled "The D.B. Cooper Job", a federal agent hires the team to solve the case. The agent's father, a retired agent himself, is dying of cancer, and the D.B. Cooper case is the only one of his career he was unable to solve.
65	** ''Film/WithoutAPaddle'' involves a group of friends who decide to fulfill their childhood fantasies of locating D.B. Cooper's loot after one of their number dies unexpectedly.
66	** ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' [[http://xkcd.com/1400/ satirically suggests that]] he is none other than Creator/TommyWiseau, the maker of ''Film/{{The Room\|2003}}''. Others have offered this theory, with varying degrees of seriousness.[[note]]This appears to be stemmed from the fact that for years, Wiseau's entire background before he made ''The Room'' [[MysteriousPast was a complete mystery]], not know even by his friends who participated in the film. We only know his birth name, birthdate, and birthplace ''now'' thanks to Canadian documentarian Rick Harper's 2016 film ''Room Full of Spoons'' and the lawsuit that Wiseau filed, supposedly in defense of his privacy, and which [[StreisandEffect spectacularly backfired]], revealing Wiseau to have been born as Tomasz Wieczorkiewicz in Poland in 1955; Website/{{Wikipedia}} even accepted this information for a while, but they have now removed all this information (save for the lawsuit) from their article on him out of a belief that the film isn't reliable enough as a source. And even all that still didn't clarify how exactly he made his way to California by the time he made ''The Room''.[[/note]] For the record, Wiseau denies that he is D.B. Cooper.
67	** [[https://xkcd.com/2498/ Another xkcd strip]] has Cooper [[ParachuteInATree stuck in a tree]] on [[CloudCuckoolander Beret Guy's]] land. Every day, Beret Guy drops by to chat: Cooper demands help getting down, Beret Guy asks if he's going to return his loot, Cooper refuses, and Beret Guy shrugs and continues his daily walk.
68	** In one ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}'' comic, [[http://dilbert.com/strip/1991-01-17 Dogbert claims to have Cooper's remains]]. "He learned that you should never get your parachutes from the same people you're robbing."[[note]]The FBI actually ''did'' consider sabotaging the parachutes, but Cooper seemed to have anticipated this as it's believed he specified four parachutes (two back and two front) in the ransom to make them think he planned to take a hostage, which made them backpedal over the risk. Indeed, Cooper would only use two of them (a back and front set) and leave the other set in the plane, with it believed he used the front reserve parachute to secure the money when he made the jump.[[/note]]
69	** ''ComicStrip/TheFarSide'' suggests in one strip that Cooper ended up parachuting into the midst of a [[AngryGuardDog rottweiler]] farm with predictable results.
70	** In ''Series/NewsRadio'', it is heavily implied that millionaire Jimmy James may be Cooper--it is implied hard enough that a cold-case investigation of the heist [[PutOnABus forces him to go the run for the better part of a season]], endangering the station's finances. Ultimately, [[spoiler:Jimmy proves his innocence by identifying and eliciting a confession from the "real" Cooper: '''Creator/AdamWest'''.]]
71	** ''Series/PrisonBreak'': It turns out that D.B. Cooper was never found because he was arrested (and sentenced to life) for a different crime shortly afterwards in his real identity, [[spoiler:elder Fox River convict Charles Westmoreland]]. An important sub-plot of the second season was the gang hunting down his buried loot in order to fund their getaway from the country.
72	** One of the legends investigated in the "Heists" episode of ''Series/WhiteRabbitProject''.
73	** In ''Webcomic/KevinAndKell'' (which takes place in a FunnyAnimal parallel dimension to the human world), D.B. Cooper is the true identity of Douglas Squirrel, Dorothy's now husband. While for years he evaded being connected to the hijacking due to losing the money as he escaped (which was found by LD and used to create Herd Thinners), he was eventually discovered by a journalist. Douglas promptly sent his manuscript to every publisher in New York. By the time they caught him, the statute of limitations passed for most of the charges, so he only served a short time in prison (with Dorothy's ex-husband as a cellmate, to boot!).
74	** In the Creator/RolandSmith book ''Sasquatch'', Cooper is revealed to have been an alias for Buckley "Buck" Johnson; the hijacking was so Buck could get money to pay for his son's cancer treatments. Unfortunately, Buck broke his leg when he landed after jumping out of the plane and is unable to return home before his son dies; ever since then, he's lived alone and done his best to avoid FBI agent Steven Crow, who's convinced Buck is Cooper but has been unable to prove it.
75	** In the monologue that opens ''Podcast/MysteryShow'' Starlee mentions D.B. Cooper as a mystery that fascinates her, and one she hopes to "work [her] way up to."
76	** Referenced in ''Series/TwinPeaks'', where the hero's name is '''D'''ale '''B'''artholomew Cooper. Unsolved mysteries were a theme of that show; in one scene, for example, Cooper idly wonders "[[WhoShotJFK who really pulled the trigger on JFK]]".
77	** In the first episode of ''Series/Loki2021'', it turns out that the title character himself was Cooper, who collected the $200,000 due to losing a bet with Thor and used the Bifrost to return to Asgard and pay up.
78	** In the ''Scandal Sheet'' webcomic, Phil, aka Bigfoot, reveals that [[http://scandalsheet.comicgenesis.com/d/20030207.html he learned English from D.B. Cooper while nursing him back to health]] after finding him hanging from a tree with two broken legs.
79	** A throwaway gag in ''Series/ThirtyRock'' implies that he is Kenneth's father.
80	** The mystique of Cooper as an outlaw who apparently committed ThePerfectCrime and how his disappearance attracts (both in jest and seriousness) the ConspiracyTheorist circle was explored in the 2022 Netflix documentary miniseries ''"D.B. Cooper, Where Are You?"''
81	* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder Colony collapse disorder]]. The sudden vanishing of worker bees from their hives across the world (leaving even their queens behind), first reported in 2006. No conclusive explanation has yet been found, and most scientists now believe that [[http://time.com/3821467/bees-honeybees-environment/ a combination of factors are at work]].
82	** ''Series/DoctorWho'' used it as a running joke throughout New Who series 4. It ends with the revelation that [[spoiler: the vanishing bees were actually aliens who became aware of what the Daleks planned to do to Earth]].
83	** ''VideoGame/TheSecretWorld'' trailers contain the ArcWords "The Bees Are Returning" (among other things), which is currently believed to have to do with the CCD.
84	** ''Film/TheXFilesFightTheFuture'' uses the bees as an integral part of the GovernmentConspiracy's EvilPlan ([[spoiler:to spread the deadly alien virus]]), about a decade before the CCD was first reported. However, the feral bee population across the world has been rapidly diminishing since 1972... and incidentally, said GovernmentConspiracy was founded in 1973.
85	** In ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS20E8TheBurnsAndTheBees The Burns and the Bees]]", Lisa creates a bee sanctuary to combat CCD, which Groundskeeper Willie says is caused by loss of habitat.
86	** In the ''Series/{{Elementary}}'' episode "Absconded", a symposium on CCD is used as part of a ''really convoluted'' plot to kidnap a member of a royal family from the United Arab Emirates and ramsom him.
87	** In the ''Series/BlackMirror'' episode "[[Recap/BlackMirrorHatedInTheNation Hated in the Nation]]", robotic bees who are exact duplicates of real bees are used after the general decrease in population of natural bees, which becomes a problem when someone is able to hack their system.
88	** ''{{Series/CSI}}'': Entomologist and night shift lab supervisor Gil Grissom studies the phenomenon in season 7.
89	** ''Series/CloakAndDagger2018'' [[Recap/CloakAndDagger2018S01E10ColonyCollapse named an episode after the phenomenon]], using it as a metaphor for the possible destruction of New Orleans during the episode.
90	* The disappearance of the American labor union leader UsefulNotes/JimmyHoffa in 1975. It's generally accepted that Hoffa was murdered by organized crime, but the location and precise circumstances of his death remain unknown, and his body was never found. The FBI are still looking for his body.
91	** In ''Series/TheAdventuresOfPeteAndPete'', when Little Pete is tunneling under his house to escape from being grounded, he finds a wallet, looks at it and exclaims, "Hoffa!"
92	** In ''Film/BruceAlmighty'', Bruce uses his godlike powers to find the body in order to advance his journalistic career.
93	** The movie ''Film/{{Hoffa}}'', starring Creator/JackNicholson, suggests that he was [[spoiler:assassinated by one of his mob allies after Hoffa threatened to reveal their connections]].
94	** In ''Film/NothingButTrouble'', it is discovered that Hoffa ended up in the town of [[TownWithADarkSecret Valkenvania]], a likely victim of the rather cruel, unusual, and deadly punishments meted out by the local justice system there.
95	** ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS4E17LastExitToSpringfield Last Exit to Springfield]]" makes a nod to the mystery with Mr. Burns and Smithers mentioning that the previous head of the power plant's union "mysteriously disappeared" after vowing to clean up the union. A CutawayGag depicting a football player tripping over a man-shaped mound of dirt on the field references Hoffa's alleged burial under Giants Stadium (which ''Series/MythBusters'' even tested and busted).
96	** Elevated to a minor RunningGag in ''ComicStrip/PiranhaClub''. In one storyline, Ernie gets lost in the Himalayan mountains and discovers that there is no such thing as a [[BigfootSasquatchAndYeti Yeti]], it was just Jimmy Hoffa's frozen corpse all along. In a different storyline, Jimmy Hoffa's ShrunkenHead is [[Film/TheGodfather left in Uncle Sid's bed]] after some South American natives kidnapped Sid's pet piranha. Yet another storyline has Ernie and Arnold find Jimmy Hoffa frozen inside a glacier while scaling Mount Bayonne.
97	** The ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' episode "[[Recap/MysteryScienceTheater3000S04E24ManosTheHandsOfFate Manos: The Hands of Fate]]" has Tom Servo quip "Jimmy Hoffa -- the last known photo" towards of a shot of the film's protagonist laying unconscious.
98	** In ''Series/MadAboutYou'' whilst Paul and Ira are making a hole in the ground in Central Park:
99	--->'''Ira''': What if we find Hoffa?
100	--->'''Paul''': We bury again and tell no one.
101	** ''Film/TheIrishman'' uses the claim that mob associate Frank Sheeran murdered Hoffa for threatening to reveal secrets about the Mafia. Unlike the more fantastic or conspiratorial stories, Hoffa's body is simply burned in a crematorium so he'll never be found.
102	** Jokingly referenced in the movie ''Film/HighwayToHell'', with a BadGuyBar in Hell called Hoffa's. Someone calls to ask for Jimmy, but is told that he "ain't here".
103	** The Music/RayStevens song "I Saw Elvis in a UFO" claims that Hoffa, among others, [[ElvisHasLeftThePlanet was abducted by aliens]].
104	** ''ComicBook/{{Preacher}}'' suggest he ran afoul of a CannibalClan.
105	* The disappearance of the so-called "Jewels of Helen" excavated from the ruins of Troy was the subject of the Elizabeth Peters novel ''Trojan Gold''. (The mystery has since been solved, but that was after the novel's publication).
106	* The disappearance of the British peer Lord Lucan in 1974, shortly after his children's nanny was murdered. The nanny wasn't supposed to be in the house that night but had changed her night off, and it's believed the intended victim was Lady Lucan, the nanny being attacked by mistake when she entered the darkened basement. The two most common theories are that he committed suicide following the murder or that he's still alive somewhere (the most common candidate being Australia). Nevertheless, in 2016 he was finally declared legally dead.
107	** A 2013 TV miniseries starring Creator/RoryKinnear posits the theory that he was shot dead and dumped into the English Channel on the orders of John Aspinall.[[note]]Aspinall was a zoo and casino owner who was one of the defenders of the theory that Lucan committed suicide, though ironically other theories have him making implications pointing towards Lucan still being alive.[[/note]]
108	** In Jake Arnott's ''The Long Firm'', [[LondonGangster Harry Stark]] is strongly implied to have been involved, but no details are revealed.
109	** ''Series/SpittingImage'' has a puppet of Lord Lucan (whom some viewers confused with Music/FreddieMercury) have a cameo in almost every episode as a RunningGag.
110	** According to screenwriter Robert Wade, one draft of ''Film/CasinoRoyale2006'' would've (re-)introduced Bond backpacking in Madagascar, where "he's playing chess with an old drunkard called Two Fingers who may or may not be Lord Lucan."
111	* The mystery of the sailing ship ''Mary Celeste'', whose entire crew did vanish in 1872 somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean. The [[http://www.cracked.com/article_18718_6-famous-unsolved-mysteries-that-have-totally-been-solved.html current favourite]] realistic theory involves an alcohol explosion. It is often listed as one of the stories from TheBermudaTriangle, despite having been discovered outside of the Triangle as it is normally defined.
112	** The 1935 ''Mystery of the Mary Celeste'' with Creator/BelaLugosi posits that the crew was murdered by a serial killer.
113	** In the First Doctor ''Series/DoctorWho'' serial "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E8TheChase The Chase]]", the crew were killed by Daleks. In the {{novelization}} of the Third Doctor serial "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS11E2InvasionOfTheDinosaurs Invasion of the Dinosaurs]]", the Doctor refers to the mystery of the Mary Celeste and states (with the confident finality that only a time-traveler who has seen the future can possess) "No one ever discovered what happened to the people on that ship, and they never will." In the Twelfth Doctor story "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS36E10TheEatersOfLight The Eaters of Light]]", Nardole claims that the crew were eaten by an alien ambassador, because that was how they communicated. The ExpandedUniverse has also claimed the crew were abducted by aliens and then killed by a sea serpent after the Doctor rescued them (the short story "The Mystery of the Marie Celeste" in the 1970 [[TheChristmasAnnual annual]]), they abandoned ship because they mistook the TARDIS for a time bomb (the comic strip "A Stitch in Time" in ''TV Comic'') or they all became Cybermen somehow (''Literature/FactionParadox: The Book of the War'').
114	** In ''Radio/TheGoonShow'' episode "The Mystery of the Marie Celeste (solved)", Neddy Seagoon investigates in order to claim a reward offered for the solution to the mystery, only for the man offering the reward to mysteriously disappear himself.
115	** "J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement", a short story by Sir Creator/ArthurConanDoyle, invented a number of details to make the event more mysterious which have subsequently been frequently included as fact in accounts of the real event (for instance, misspelling the name ''Marie Celeste''). The story claims that the ''Celeste'' was hijacked by a group of black radicals who murdered the crew and sailed the ship to Africa, leaving one white survivor (the titular Jephson). The article, originally published pseudonymously by Doyle, was widely mistaken for a true account of the incident at the time, leading to denunciations from the ship's owner and investigators of the incident.
116	** ''Series/SapphireAndSteel'' referred to the ''Mary Celeste'' affair as a past assignment, in Assignment 1. Sapphire, Steel, and Lead were apparently involved.
117	** In 1990, the Gibraltarian author Sam Benady published ''Franchise/SherlockHolmes in Gibraltar'', a set of two short stories set in the pre-Watson days. In the first one, ''The Abandoned Brigantine'', Sherlock Holmes solves the mystery of the ''Mary Celeste''.
118	** In "Literature/TheGypsiesInTheWood", Literature/DiogenesClub agent Charles Beauregard tells a junior colleague that the Club has solved the mystery of the ''Mary Celeste'' but chose to keep quiet about it because revealing the truth would cause a major international diplomatic incident.
119	** The ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' novel ''Literature/{{Pyramids}}'' has a list of things that Nature abhors and therefore makes disappear which includes "ships called the ''Marie Celeste''".
120	** One of Creator/OgdenNash's dreams in the poem "I Can Hardly Wait For the Sandman" involves finding a ''Mary Celeste'' life preserver in the middle of a desert. He firmly believes that if he hadn't woken up at that moment, he'd have solved the mystery.
121	* The Princes in the Tower, Edward V and Richard of Shrewsbury, were the children of UsefulNotes/EdwardIV whose uncle and Lord Protector UsefulNotes/RichardIII had them declared illegitimate to clear his way to the throne. (If you think you've spotted a likely suspect already, you're not alone, although "Ricardians" point the finger at his successor, Henry VII or argue the boys survived, at least for awhile.) The case has its own page: TheFateOfThePrincesInTheTower.
122	* Michael Rockefeller, son of New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller, disappeared in New Guinea in November 1961 after his rowboat capsized. After spending some time adrift on the wreckage with his partner, Rockefeller decided to try swimming to shore and was never seen again. Theories range from headhunters to crocodile or shark attack to simple drowning. There are even claims that Rockefeller survived and joined a local tribe. Most recently, a 2014 book claims that natives killed and cannibalized Rockefeller, but met with considerable controversy.
123	** The 2007 [[FoundFootageFilms found footage film]] ''Welcome to the Jungle'' is about a group of modern tourists in New Guinea investigating stories that Rockefeller is still alive. As is par for the genre, the search doesn't end well for them...
124	** The novel ''The King of America'' is a RomanAClef based on Rockefeller's disappearance.
125	* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theft_of_the_Jules_Rimet_Trophy Jules Rimet Trophy]], which was stolen twice. The first time was in the UK in 1966, where a dog named Pickles found it and became famous. The second time was in Brazil in 1983; this time, the trophy was never recovered and said to have been melted into gold bars. Ironically, a replica was in a safe, but the original was in public exhibition. There are non-fictional and fictional works about it, often showing the trophy still intact.
126	* Judge Joseph Force Crater, an Associate Justice of the New York State Supreme Court, was last seen exiting a restaurant in Manhattan on August 6, 1930, stepping into a taxi cab and vanishing. Crater had recently been criticized for selling city property to a private investor for a fraction of its worth, leading to charges of corruption; he was also rumored to have several mistresses and ties to organized crime. Police suspected Robert Cook, a DirtyCop connected with Murder, Inc. of killing Crater based on letters from Cook's wife, but investigations both then and later never corroborated her story. Crater's disappearance became a stock punchline in comedy routines and inspired several novels and short stories, though he's since been overshadowed by Jimmy Hoffa.
127	* Harold Holt, Prime Minister of Australia from 26 January 1966 until 17 December 1967, when he went out for a swim at Cheviot Beach, Victoria... and was never seen again. The most widely-believed story (repeated by his biographer Tom Frame) is that he overestimated how good a swimmer he actually was and drowned after getting caught in a rip current in waters that was already known for being very dangerous to even the most experienced swimmer; other theories include suicide, a hit by the CIA, [[FakingTheDead faking his death]] to run off with a mistress, or (most outlandishly) that he was a spy for RedChina and was picked up by a Chinese submarine. Regardless, the disappearance of Howard Holt has become a legendary bit of Australian folklore, not least because few other modern nations can claim that their head of government one day simply ''disappeared without a trace''.
128	* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident]] was an event in which nine Russian hikers died in the northern Ural Mountains between 1st and 2nd February 1959, under uncertain circumstances.
129	** It's a central theme in the Polish videogame ''VideoGame/{{Kholat}}''.
130	** Investigations between 2019 and 2021 concluded that an avalanche (probably a slab avalanche) caused the hikers to suddenly leave their camp in low visibility conditions with inadequate clothing.
131	* In 1949, a young actress named Jean Spangler went missing in Los Angeles. She left her daughter with her sister in law one evening, saying she was going to meet her ex-husband to pick up a child support check then to work a night shoot. She was seen waiting on someone at the farmer’s market for several hours but the last time anyone spoke to her was later on that night when she called home to tell her daughter good night and her sister in law that she was going to work longer than expected and to not wait up on her. However, from there everything else becomes fuzzy. None of the studios even had movies filming that night and she was reportedly at a restaurant and a gas station later on that morning. 70 plus years on, no one has ever managed to find her body or even a prime suspect. Two days after she was reported missing, her ripped purse was found in Griffith Park with a note written to a Kirk about going to see a Dr. Scott for a procedure while her mother was out of town. Her family and friends didn’t know who Dr. Scott was but her mother said someone named Kirk had picked her up at home a few times but he’d stayed in the car. She’d been working on a movie with Creator/KirkDouglas and when the police questioned him, he admitted that he’d talked to Spangler a few times on set but didn’t know her personally and they believed his story about being out of town when she disappeared. All doctors named Scott in Los Angeles county were questioned but none of them had seen her under her maiden name or married name. Her ex-husband became a suspect as well but he said they hadn’t met that day and his wife backed up an alibi. However, they’d been through a very contentious custody case in which she won custody from him before her disappearance and he later fled from authorities when he was ordered to go to jail for contempt of court when he refused to cooperate when her mother tried to get custody. The leading theory is that she may have died in a botched illegal abortion (she had told a friend she was pregnant right before she went missing) and her body was dumped in an undisclosed location but that theory also has some major holes in it. Other theories range from her being the victim of a serial killer to running away with the mob to being killed by a man she was dating.
132	* Over in the Sinosphere, we have the disappearance of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jianwen_Emperor the Jianwen Emperor]], after the successful coup by his uncle Zhu Di, the later Yongle Emperor. The official narrative during the Yongle era was that the Jianwen Emperor perished in a fire. However, during the second year of the Wanli era (about 150 years after Zhu Di's death), the young Wanli Emperor asked Zhang Juzheng (then the Senior Grand Secretary) about the Jianwen Emperor; Zhang then claimed that the Jianwen Emperor survived the coup, but became a monk, and even returned to the capital (Beijing) to have his identity verified when he was in his 70s or 80s, during the Zhengtong era [[note]]1436-1449. Zhu Yunwen was born in Dec 1377; this meant that he would have been 60-73 years old during the Zhengtong era (by East Asian reckoning).[[/note]]. Even so, the final fate of the Jianwen Emperor is still debated.
133	* College student Maura Murray disappeared on February 9th, 2004 after leaving the University of Massachusetts at Amherst for what appeared to be an unplanned trip away and crashing her car in the small town of Woodsville, New Hampshire. According to witnesses, Murray was unhurt in the crash but declined aid, falsely claiming to have called AAA. Murray's history of of credit card fraud and erratic personal behavior became fodder for online sleuths, who created a cottage industry of books, podcasts and websites about the case. Theories rage from her having faked her disappearance to being the victim of a random attack to having wandered off into the woods and frozen to death.
134	[[/folder]]
135
136	[[folder:Mysterious Documents]]
137	* The [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript Voynich manuscript]], a manuscript dated to the 16th century, of unknown origin and written in an unknown script. There have been many claimed translations of it, all of which have been debunked.
138	** Rather bizarrely, the writing from the manuscript appears in an obscure casual video game called ''[[http://www.bigfishgames.com/download-games/8440/blood-oath/index.html Blood Oath]]''. It seems to imply that [[BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy whoever created the manuscript was a vampire]], because in the game vampires write letters to one another with these letters, even though one might suspect it was used because the developers didn't want to create a new alphabet and borrowed one to which no one held the copyright.
139	** In ''[[VideoGame/BrokenSword Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon]]'', one of the characters deciphers the Voynich manuscript [[spoiler:and promptly gets killed, since it contains the key to waking the Sleeping Dragon]].
140	** ''Literature/CodexSeraphinianus'', created by Luigi Serafini in the 1970s, was inspired by the Voynich manuscript. Written in an indecipherable script, it appears to be an encyclopedia of an alien world. It was created in order to inspire in its readers the feeling of impenetrable mystery.
141	** ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' posits that the Voynich Manuscript is actually... [[http://xkcd.com/593/ the manual for a centuries-old tabletop RPG.]]
142	** In Book 4 of ''VideoGame/DreamfallChapters'', the Voynich alphabet makes an appearance in notes and books that belong to one of the secondary characters. Said character lives in the world of magic parallel to "our" world, world of science, so the implication may be that the manuscript somehow got across the divide.
143	** ''Series/AncientAliens'', in its quest to link every mystery in human history ever to the so-called "[[AncientAstronauts ancient astronaut theory]]", claims that the Voynich Manuscript is in an alien language.
144	** There are pages from this document in the archives of ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedIVBlackFlag'', but interestingly does NOT state outright that they are of Precursor origin.
145	** In ''Koudelka'' and the ''VideoGame/ShadowHearts'' trilogy, the Voynich Manuscript is actually a rework of a partially deciphered translation of the [[TomeOfEldritchLore Émigré Manuscript]], created by [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dee John Dee]] and [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Kelley Edward Kelley]].
146	** In ''Manga/LupinTheThird'', the Dream of Italy (and the StoryArc centering around it) is connected to a highly encrypted book Rebecca had spent many years attempting to decrypt, whose pages highly resemble that of the Voynich Manuscript. After [[UsefulNotes/SecretIntelligenceService MI6]] takes Rebecca away for interrogation regarding its contents, the book falls into Lupin's hands, who immediately starts working on cracking it himself.
147	[[/folder]]
148
149	[[folder:Mysterious Fires]]
150	* UsefulNotes/{{Hamburg}}, 1842
151	** A [[GermanMedia German novel]] called ''Der Funke des Chronos'' deals with TimeTravel, alchemists, and the Great Fire of Hamburg.
152	* UsefulNotes/{{London}}, 1666
153	** The Great Fire of London is a plot point in ''Literature/TheBaroqueCycle'' by Creator/NealStephenson. While it isn't exactly presented as something mysterious, one character (the father of Daniel Waterhouse) [[MistakenForApocalypse firmly believes that this is the Apocalypse]]. [[spoiler:He dies in the fire and thus never learns his error.]]
154	** The ''Series/DoctorWho'' serial "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS19E4TheVisitation The Visitation]]" ends with the Great Fire of London being accidentally started during a showdown with aliens planning to wipe out humanity.
155	** Ra's Al Ghul claims credit for the London fire on behalf of the League of Shadows in ''Film/BatmanBegins''. The British Empire was getting too big for its britches, you see. Which is bizarre, since the British Empire had barely started in 1666.
156	** ''Series/WizardsVsAliens'' "The Cave of Menla-Gto": Moon mentions that the Great Fire was caused by a dragon who thought that there were actual puddings in Pudding Lane.
157	** The first ''[[Series/BigFatQuizOfTheYear Big Fat Quiz of Everything]]'' had the schoolchildren of Mitchell Brook Primary School act out the Great Fire of London for a question. Mass destruction never looked so adorable.
158	** In ''Literature/TheHauntingOfDrearcliffGrangeSchool'', the Great Fire of London was started by a fire elemental summoned by a mage with a grudge.
159	** In ''VideoGame/Vampyr2018'', the fire was started by [[BeethovenWasAnAlienSpy vampire champion William Marshall]] who was fighting the witch responsible for the Black Death from the previous year. He was forced to lock her inside St. Paul's Cathedral and set it ablaze to make sure she was dead.
160	** In ''WebAnimation/RedVsBlue'', the fire originated when a time-travelling Caboose taught some cavemen how to make fire, then accidentally stepped on the fire, setting himself alight and running through several time portals in a panic, ending up in the library of Alexandria, London in 1666, and finally the Hindenburg.
161	* The Reichstag (UsefulNotes/{{Berlin}}), 1933
162	** In ''Webcomic/IrregularWebcomic'', the Reichstag fire was neither set by the [[DirtyCommies Communists]], nor the [[ThoseWackyNazis Nazis]] in order to [[RedScare frame said Communists]], but instead [[spoiler:by an Italian who merely wanted to sabotage the electric lighting, and [[EpicFail grossly overestimated his electrotechnical competence]]]].
163	* UsefulNotes/{{Rome}}, 64 (the one during which Emperor UsefulNotes/{{Nero}} supposedly [[WhileRomeBurns rocked out on the fiddle]])
164	** In the ''Series/DoctorWho'' serial "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS2E4TheRomans The Romans]]", Nero hires arsonists to set the fire so he has an excuse to embark on some major building works he has planned. He gets the idea when the Doctor accidentally sets fire to a map of Rome by focusing sunlight through his reading glasses.
165	** The ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000'' episode "[[Recap/MysteryScienceTheater3000S08E20SpaceMutiny Space Mutiny]]" ends with [[ItMakesSenseInContext the crew finally escaping Ancient Rome]], with [[TheDitz Professor Bobo]] [[ItMakesJustAsMuchSenseInContext knocking over a candle while stealing a cheese wheel]] moments after we're told that "The emperor is ready to give his violin recital." [[Recap/MysteryScienceTheater3000S08E21TimeChasers The next episode]] begins with Mike confirming that [[MikeNelsonDestroyerOfWorlds the fire burned down the rest of Rome]].
166	* UsefulNotes/SanFrancisco, 1906
167	** In ''[[Recap/DoctorWhoNewAdventuresAllConsumingFire All-Consuming Fire]]'', the fire is started during a showdown with invading aliens.
168	[[/folder]]
169
170	[[folder:Mysterious Monumental Damage]]
171	* How did the [[Art/TheSphinx Great Sphinx of Gizeh]] lose its nose?
172	** ''ComicBook/{{Asterix}} [[Recap/AsterixAndCleopatra and Cleopatra]]'' has Obelix accidentally de-nosing Art/TheSphinx while sightseeing. (In the movies, he goes on to deprive the Art/VenusDeMilo of her arms in ''WesternAnimation/TheTwelveTasksOfAsterix'' and knock a great big hole in the Colosseum in ''WesternAnimation/AsterixVersusCaesar'' -- the latter a particularly impressive feat considering that the Colosseum wasn't built until over a century after Caesar's reign.)
173	** In ''WesternAnimation/{{Aladdin}}'', the Sphinx's nose is knocked off when the sculptor applies his chisel too strongly, because he's surprised by Aladdin and Jasmine flying past on their date.
174	** ''WesternAnimation/ThePrinceOfEgypt'' shows the Sphinx getting its nose knocked off. In this case, it's caused when [[DrivesLikeCrazy young princes Rameses and Moses]] hit a scaffolding during a chariot race that happens to be holding the sculptor working on the nose.
175	** ''VideoGame/{{Injustice 2}}'' posits that it was due to the Flash traveling back in time to smash an opponent's face into the Sphinx's nose, shattering it. Granted, he also goes back in time to ''[[GrievousHarmWithABody slap a tyrannosaurus across the face with his opponent]]'', so take the possibility with a considerable volume of salt.
176	** ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'' the nose is knocked off by the time-traveling ducks...only for the builder to decide it looks better that way.
177	** ''ComicStrip/TheFarSide'' had two sculptors on the head of the Sphinx, with one of them berating the other: "'That's fine,' I said. 'Good nose,' I said. But NO, you had to go and hit the chisel one more time!"
178	* What happened to the left eye of the Art/NefertitiBust?
179	** In ''Manga/RedRiver1995'', the bust of Nefertiti only has one eye because the eye was made out of a piece of jewelry that had sentimental value to Nefertiti, and there was only enough material for one eye. When the sculptor points this out, Nefertiti replies "Who cares? It's just a bust, it's not like it's very valuable anyway."
180	* What happened to the rest of the [[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gilbert_Stuart_1796_portrait_of_Washington.jpg Athenaeum portrait]] of UsefulNotes/GeorgeWashington?[[note]]The actual answer is, "Nothing, the painter just never got around to finishing it."[[/note]]
181	** In ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', Jebediah Springfield is responsible for damaging the portrait.
182	[[/folder]]
183
184	[[folder:Mysterious Murder Cases]]
185	* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axeman_of_New_Orleans Axeman of New Orleans]], an unidentified serial killer present in New Orleans in the late 1910s.
186	** Appears in ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryCoven''. The night he threatened to murder anyone who wasn't playing jazz music in their home, he [[MuggingTheMonster attacked a witch coven]] and was killed for his troubles.
187	** In the ''Literature/PresidentsVampire'' series, the Axeman is revealed to have been the first [[DemonicPossession host]] of the [[EldritchAbomination entity]] known as the Boogeyman, whose rampage was brought to an end when [[FriendlyNeighborhoodVampire Cade]] tracked him down and killed him in a fight.
188	* Bible John, unidentified serial killer active in Glasgow in the late 1960s. Many people believe Bible John and the convicted serial killer Peter Tobin are one and the same, but it was never proven at trial and following Tobin's death in 2022, it never will be.
189	** The Creator/GrantMorrison[=/=]Daniel Vallely comic book ''Bible John: A Forensic Meditation'' is a surreal, hallucinogenic speculation on the unidentified SerialKiller's possible motivations.
190	* The death of Mary Rogers, found floating in the Hudson River in 1841.
191	** Creator/EdgarAllanPoe's story "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt" shows his detective protagonist Literature/CAugusteDupin solve a thinly-veiled version of the real-life mystery. [[DatedHistory Most students of the case now accept a different solution.]]
192	* There was some controversy between the police and coroner at the time, but five-year-old [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsie_Paroubek Elsie Paroubek]] was almost certainly murdered. Dredged from the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal a month after her disappearance in the spring of 1911, her killer was never found. Miss Paroubek's story, and her photo, published in the Chicago ''Daily News'', were among the inspirations for Creator/HenryDarger's monumental amateur novel ''Literature/InTheRealmsOfTheUnreal''.
193	* The gruesome unsolved murder of Elizabeth Short, nicknamed "Black Dahlia", 1947 in Los Angeles.
194	** The book ''Literature/TheBlackDahlia'', and [[Film/TheBlackDahlia the 2006 movie adaptation]].
195	** In the '90s adventure game ''VideoGame/BlackDahlia'', it turned out to be part of an ancient magical ritual carried out by [[{{Ghostapo}} Nazis]].
196	** "[[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0608535/ The Black Dahlia]]", an episode of ''Series/{{Hunter\|1984}}'', has Hunter and [=McCall=] investigate after new evidence comes to light; it aired on the anniversary date of the original murder.
197	** Is a major part of the plot in ''VideoGame/LANoire''. (It turns out that [[spoiler:the killer was the half-brother of a very highly-placed politician, so after you find and kill him, the whole matter is sealed up and quieted down]].)
198	** In the ninth episode of ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryMurderHouse'', Elizabeth Short is shown to be one of several victims of the "Murder House".
199	** Used as part of the backstory in ''Film/BestFriends2017'', where Harvey (played by Creator/TommyWiseau) is linked to the murder. We gradually learn that [[spoiler: he was romantically involved with her before her death, the trauma of which drove him insane, but that he is ''not'' the killer. He may have [[ILoveTheDead had sex with her dead body though]].]]
200	** Referenced in ''Film/SpiderManFarFromHome'': MJ was fascinated by the Black Dahlia case, and Peter Parker purchased a black glass flower necklace to give her.
201	** ''ComicBook/CinemaPurgatorio'' #11 is a MusicalEpisode that goes over the media circus around Short's death and the badly, conspicuously mishandled LAPD investigation. The theory is put forth that Short was pregnant with the child of LA Times publisher Norman Chandler, who had her killed via his mob associate Benny "Bugsy" Siegel. Discussed at length is the idea that Siegel made ''such'' an example out of her as a message to west Los Angeles rival Jack Dragna; the letter D was carved into her body, which was found just 300 yards from Dragna's home.
202	* The UsefulNotes/ZodiacKiller, unidentified serial killer active in northern California in the 1960s and 1970s; sent cryptogram messages to the press, some of which remain unsolved.
203	** ''Film/DirtyHarry'' was heavily inspired by the Zodiac Killer; its murderer is named Scorpio (and is never explicitly identified), and shares the real-life Zodiac's penchant for mailing newspapers and even copies some of his threats (eg., hijacking a school bus). Of course, the movie has a happier ending than real life.
204	** David Fincher's film ''Film/{{Zodiac\|2007}}'' strongly suggests that a real suspect in the officially unsolved Zodiac Killings was the guilty party.
205	** ''Film/SevenPsychopaths'' reveal that three serial killers who were never caught (the Zodiac Killer, the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texarkana_Moonlight_Murders Phantom Killer]] and the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cleveland_Torso_Murderer Cleveland Torso Murderer]]) were in fact killed by a couple of {{Serial Killer Killer}}s (one of whom is Creator/TomWaits).
206	** During Ted Cruz's unsuccessful 2016 presidential campaign, internet users opposed to the Texas senator jokingly accused him of being the Zodiac Killer, based on noted physical similarities between Cruz and a police sketch of the killer; the joke became popular enough to be referenced on [[Series/TheDailyShowWithTrevorNoah the Daily Show]] and for Creator/LarryWilmore to openly take part in it during the 2016 White House Correspondents' Dinner. Additionally, Donald Trump suggested (in all apparent seriousness) that Cruz' father might have been involved in [[WhoShotJFK the Kennedy assassination.]] [[labelnote:Note]]Regardless of your opinions on Ted Cruz, note that he is ''physically unable'' to be the Zodiac Killer. The killings occurred during the 1960s and early 1970s; Cruz was born in 1970.[[/labelnote]]
207	** The Zodiac Killer appears twice in American Horror Story. First in ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryHotel'' where the ghost of the killer attends Devil's Night with the ghosts of several other infamous serial killers. Then in ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryCult'' the murders are revealed as the work of Valerie Solanas and her radical feminist cult SCUM. Strangely the two contradict despite the stories supposedly taking place in a shared universe.
208	* The death of King Charles XII of Sweden (a.k.a. UsefulNotes/CarolusRex) from a sudden head wound at the Siege of Fredriksten in 1718 has been investigated multiple times, including three exhumations. He was ''probably'' killed by a musket ball or grapeshot from the Norwegian fortress he was besieging; however multiple conspiracy theories suggest he was murdered. Suspects have included [[UnfriendlyFire his own war-weary soldiers]],[[note]]Sweden had by that point been at war under Charles almost continuously for eighteen years, as well as for much of the preceding century beginning from the reign of Gustaf II.[[/note]] [[AristocratsAreEvil Swedish blue-bloods leery of a proposed tax increase]], or [[TheUsurper his brother-in-law Frederick of Hesse-Kassel]] (who historically took the reins of power from his wife, Charles's younger sister Ulrika).
209	** Music/{{Sabaton}}'s song [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GKCYbvDepY "Long Live the King"]], which is about Charles's last battle, references the mystery surrounding his death with the lines:
210	--->''Killed by his own, or by his foe?\
211	Turned the tide\
212	Three hundred years, still no one knows\
213	The secret remains''
214	* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamam_Shud_case The Tamam Shud Case]]. The body of a still unidentified man was found in the Somerton Park beach, South Australia in 1948. The name comes from the fact that a scrap of paper with the Persian phrase "tamám shud", meaning "ended" or "finished" was found in the back pocket of the man's trousers. Among the man's possession was also found a text that resembled an encrypted message which has yet to be deciphered or interpreted in a way that satisfies authorities on the case. In 2022, Adelaide University professor Derek Abbott who had been investigating the case since 2009 made a breakthrough using the man's hair DNA which possibly identified him as "Charles Webb", an electrical engineer.
215	** ''The Colorado Kid'', a mystery novel by Creator/StephenKing, makes reference to a case that mirrors the Tamám Shud case almost exactly, except it is set in Maine.
216	** In the final series of Julian Simpson's ''[[Radio/PleasantGreenUniverse The Lovecraft Investigations]]'' (based on "Literature/TheShadowOverInnsmouth"), the Somerton Man is revealed to be someone with the "Innsmouth look" (based on the post-mortem picture strongly resembling Lovecraft's description of the fishy Innsmouth folk) that was assassinated by TheMenInBlack.
217	[[/folder]]
218
219	[[folder:Mysterious SCIENCE!]]
220	* The Philadelphia Experiment, allegedly conducted by the US Navy in 1943, involving the destroyer escort ''USS Eldridge'' [[InvisibilityCloak turning invisible]] and being {{teleport\|ation}}ed.
221	** In the novel ''The Astounding, the Amazing and the Unknown'' by Paul Malmont, PulpMagazine sci-fi writers are tasked by the US Government in World War II with creating {{Death Ray}}s and other such [[WeirdScience miracle weapons]]. Creator/RobertAHeinlein creates the experiment as an all-done-with-mirrors (and a model) illusion in order to get an ObstructiveBureaucrat off his back. Meanwhile the crew of the real Eldridge gets drunk, leading the bureaucrat to assume from their vomiting and odd behaviour on their return that the experiment has driven them mad. This gives Heinlein's team the excuse to say that further tests will be aborted until they've fixed the problem.
222	** The [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin appropriately titled]] movie ''Film/ThePhiladelphiaExperiment''.
223	** Part of the backstory of ''ComicBook/{{RASL}}''.
224	** In ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquerRedAlert'', the Philadelphia Experiment is revealed in the Allied campaign to be a test run for the Chronosphere project.
225	** The found footage horror film ''Film/DevilsPass'' connects the experiment with the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyatlov_Pass_incident Dyatlov Pass incident]], as the cast finds photos relating to the ship's supposed failed teleportations inside a secret bunker found under the pass.
226	** Discussed in the [[Creator/{{Syfy}} Sci Fi Channel]] miniseries ''The Triangle'', which connects the events of the Philadelphia Experiment to TheBermudaTriangle; [[spoiler: the strange events in the Experiment were a side-effect of an attempt, in the 21st century, to destroy the time-space distortions in the Bermuda Triangle. It's ultimately found that said attempt had actually caused a ripple effect going back centuries, resulting in the time-space distortions in the Triangle and during the Experiment; stopping the attempt results in a CosmicRetcon that wipes the disappearances and the weird effects during the Experiment from history.]]
227	** The ship appears in [[Recap/LokiEpisode5JourneyIntoMystery Episode 5]] of ''Series/Loki2021'', in which it appears in the void after it is pruned from the timeline.
228	** ''Manga/{{Spriggan}}''. In "The Forgotten Kingdom", ARCAM discover the wreck of the Eldridge among other wrecked ships from throughout history on the Island of Ghosts.
229
230	* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_fire The recipe for]] GreekFire. This likely precursor to napalm was an incendiary weapon used by the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire, and was invented around 670. It was lethal in naval battles, as it supposedly could stay lit while floating in water. Unfortunately, the recipe was such a jealously guarded secret that the Greeks never wrote it down or trusted one man with the whole recipe, and as a result, it seems lost forever, despite the efforts of numerous chemists to recreate it.
231	** The problem is that there are several mixtures that match the description of the original Greek Fire, and it's very possible one of them ''is'' Greek Fire, but without any original document it's impossible to say which one it is.
232	[[/folder]]
233
234	[[folder:Mysterious Thefts]]
235	* The 13 paintings stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990, including most famously Creator/RembrandtVanRijn's ''The Storm on the Sea of Galilee'', have never been found and tend to show up in fiction as part of secret collections or illegal art dealers.
236	** ''Series/CobraKai'': ''Storm'' is seen hanging on the wall of billionaire antagonist Terry Silver. [[spoiler:It is stolen from him by Mike Barnes as compensation for the loss of his furniture store]].
237	** ''Series/IronFist2017'': ''Storm'' hangs on the wall of sinister businessman Harold Meachum's penthouse.
238	** ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'': ''Storm'' is in the possession of the WickedCultured supervillain Phantom Limb, along with several of the other stolen paintings. Limb is attempting to sell it to a mafioso, who wants ''Art/TheMonaLisa'' instead, causing Limb to lament the man's SmallReferencePools.
239	[[/folder]]
240
241	%%Please only add new mysteries when you can also provide examples in fiction. If there are no examples, then it's not a stock mystery.
242	----
243	!!Works dealing with more than one example of this trope:
244
245	[[AC:Fan Works]]
246	* ''Fanfic/MyChoicesTwistedTalesThroughTime'': InUniverse, the disappearance of Blue Star becomes one by the time of the present period -- since the Princesses kept her fall into darkness and transformation into Darklight Star tightly secret, everyone else just knows that she vanished on day and was never seen again. As a result, although no-one ever figured out the how or why of it all, a variety of theories have sprung up among both scholars and amateur historians. Twilight's theory is that she got TrappedInThePast trying to warn the Princesses about Darklight Star.
247
248	[[AC:Films -- Live-Action]]
249	* ''Film/CloseEncountersOfTheThirdKind'' had many mysterious disappearances including [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_19 Flight 19]] and the ''[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Cotopaxi SS Cotopaxi]]'' explained by alien abductions.
250
251	[[AC:Literature]]
252	* Creator/MatthewReilly's ''Jack West'' series of novels do this quite a bit. For example, the plot of the first book revolves around the real life mystery of what happened to [[MonumentalDamage the missing capstone on the Great Pyramid of Gizeh]].
253	* ''Literature/{{Illuminatus}}'' touches on several of these mysteries. Ambrose Bierce is encountered in a strange limbo-space in between worlds, complaining to an equally bemused passer-by that ''I only walked around the bloody horses!'' The shape of the Pentagon is explained as a geometric prison for an otherworldly entity which lives on the energies of death and destruction. Pyramids are meant to be flying machines based on principles of paracosmic science, but the secret of levitating them has been lost since the fall of Atlantis. And so on.
254	* In ''Literature/{{The Missing\|Haddix}}'' series by Creator/MargaretPetersonHaddix, it turns out that [[spoiler:future entrepreneurs went back in time to take many of the most famous missing children of history, such as Princess Anastasia, the Lindbergh baby, or Virginia Dare.]]
255	* The ''Literature/SecretHistories'' series, as befits its [[ConspiracyKitchenSink secret agent]] [[FantasyKitchenSink sorcery-and-superscience]] setting, has this in spades- the being originally known as UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper turns up in several books, while the third book ''The Spy Who Haunted Me'' challenges the protagonist to solve six classic unsolved mysteries: the [[StockNessMonster Loch Ness Monster]]; {{Bigfoot\|SasquatchAndYeti}}; a Russian "science city", not far from Tunguska (although TheTunguskaEvent is covered in another book), in which everyone [[GoMadFromTheRevelation spontaneously]] [[AxCrazy killed each other and/or themselves]]; the Philadelphia Experiment; and [[RoswellThatEndsWell Roswell]].
256	* The ''Series/DoctorWho'' UniverseConcordance ''Ahistory'', dealing with the fact that the series and [[Franchise/DoctorWhoExpandedUniverse its expanded universe]] has at least three Jack the Rippers, two sinkings of Atlantis, two explanations for the princes in the tower, and ''five'' abandonments of the ''Mary Celeste'', proposes that, in addition to "fixed points in time", the Franchise/{{Whoniverse}} has ''unfixed'' points in time; history "wants" these mysteries to remain unsolved, and the timeline is therefore extremely mutable around them, just as long as they happen.
257
258	[[AC:Live-Action TV]]
259	* ''Series/AncientAliens''. Not a spoiler: everything will be aliens, somehow.
260	* The various ''Franchise/StarTrek'' incarnations did a few, be it UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper (''[[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries TOS]]'', "[[Recap/StarTrekS2E14WolfInTheFold Wolf in the Fold]]"), {{Roswell\|ThatEndsWell}} (''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine DS9]]'', "[[Recap/StarTrekDeepSpaceNineS04E08LittleGreenMen Little Green Men]]") or UsefulNotes/AmeliaEarhart (''[[Series/StarTrekVoyager VOY]]'', "[[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS2E1The37s The 37's]]").
261	* ''Series/DoctorWho'' is intimately familiar with this trope. For example, the disappearance of Creator/AgathaChristie is given a supernatural explanation in "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E7TheUnicornAndTheWasp The Unicorn and the Wasp]]".
262	* ''Series/TheXFiles'', being an epic ConspiracyKitchenSink and all.
263	* The ''Series/InSearchOf'' television series hosted by Leonard Nimoy deals with most if not all of the mysteries on this page.
264	* ''Series/TheFortyFourHundred'': In "The Marked", Curtis Peck, who disappeared in 2001, started making films about famous unsolved mysteries and conspiracy theories after he returned. Many of his fans, including Marco and the other NTAC nerds P.J. and Brady, believe that making these films is his ability and that everything that happens in them is true. It turns out that they are correct. His ability manifests itself through his writing and he does not know the whole story until he has finished writing each script. Curtis' films include ''I Dismembered Jimmy Hoffa'', which states that the remains of the former leader of the Teamsters' Union are buried in the UsefulNotes/{{Florida}} Everglades, and ''Dead. Completely Dead.'', which asserts that UsefulNotes/JohnFKennedy was [[WhoShotJFK assassinated by a Marine named Robert Shafto]]. Records indicate that Shafto was in Dallas on November 22, 1963. He also made films about UsefulNotes/JackTheRipper and UsefulNotes/TheLostColonyOfRoanoke, a period drama filmed in his backyard.
265	* ''Series/EerieIndiana'':
266	** In "The Lost Hour", Janet Donner tells Marshall that there was a nice man named Mr. Hoffa in the parallel dimension for a while but that he eventually left.
267	** In "Tornado Days", Howard Raymer believes that the tornado Old Bob is responsible for the disappearance of UsefulNotes/AmeliaEarhart. Marshall recalls that a Lockheed airliner was found in Deadwood Park and suspects that it may be her plane. Simon wonders whether the old lady whom they always see jogging around town is secretly Earhart.
268
269	[[AC:Video Games]]
270	* In ''Franchise/AssassinsCreed'', ''every'' weird event and person from Adam and Eve to Jesus to King Arthur to UsefulNotes/RasputinTheMadMonk to Tunguska are explained by the {{Precursor}} technology left behind which inspired all the religions in the world. The exception is the aforementioned Manuscript.
271	* ''VideoGame/SamAndMax Beyond Time and Space: Moai Better Blues'': Sam and Max run into a number of famous missing persons on Easter Island, including D.B. Cooper, Amelia Earhart, and Glenn Miller... except they've all been turned into babies from drinking too much water from the Fountain of Youth.
272
273	[[AC:Webcomics]]
274	* ''Webcomic/{{xkcd}}'' had a [[http://xkcd.com/950/ strip]] dedicated to this trope, referencing UsefulNotes/AmeliaEarhart, the Roanoke Colony, Franklin's lost expedition, and Jimmy Hoffa.
275	** Both of the ships from Franklin's expedition were [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin%27s_lost_expedition eventually located]], one in September 2014, the other two years later.
276
277	[[AC:WebOriginal]]
278	* ''WebVideo/BuzzFeedUnsolved'' hosts Ryan and [[ThePeteBest Brent]], the latter since been replaced by Shane, have discuss many of the ones listed in the description as part of the True Crime and Supernatural portions of the show, mainly the facts and their theories surrounding them.
279	* ''Website/SCPFoundation'' has a ton of {{Historical Domain Character}}s and {{Public Domain Artifact}}s in storage, including Cain, Abel, and the suitcase that ate D.B. Cooper. Others can't be kept in storage, such as [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia_mine_fire the fire giant Surtr buried underneath Pennsylvania]] [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop or the noisy marine arthropod somewhere between 2,000 and 8,000 kilometers long]].
280
281	[[AC:WesternAnimation]]
282	* In the ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'' short "Space Probed", Yakko, while on an alien cruiser, stumbles on a room containing Elvis Presley, Amelia Earhart, Bigfoot, and Jimmy Hoffa.
283	-->'''Yakko:''' Everyone's been looking for you guys!

Context Main / StockUnsolvedMysteries