Mysterious Realms: Probing Paranormal, Historical, and Forensic Enigmas

My reaction to reading this in 1993.

I enjoyed this book as much, if not more, than Nickell’s Ambrose Bierce is Missing.

Nickell is an impressive figure: an investigtor of many varying enigmas and anomalies, a PhD in literature, an ex-private detective, ex-reporter, ex-stage magician. As usual

with most matters hawked by mystery mongerers, conspiracy mongerors, paranormalists, and writers to Fate magazine (though “The Case of the Shrinking Bullet” results from a medical examiner jumping to an honest, but hasty conclusion and calling a suicide a murder), the mystery evaporates when the basic facts (documents, witnesses, physical evidence) are examined, and the engimas turn out to be contradicted by reality or a multitude of facts pointing to a more prosaic reality are brought to light. Perhaps even worse than the hoaxes uncovered are the people who persist in self-delusion. I liked reading about the multitude of investigatory techniques and resources available (from forensic monographs to monographs on how to use a balance beam scale from looking at Lee Harvey Oswald’s ears to positively verify the dead assassin’s identity. I particularly liked the detailed stylometric analysis of the forged MJ-12 documents and comparing them to an identical Harry S. Truman document lifted from another government document. Facts in alleged cases of spontaneous combustion were examined. A computer analysis shows a suspicious concentration of crop circles in Hampshire County England. I liked the many odd tidbits I picked up besides basic investigatory techniques: ears as ID; why Charles Dawson, discoverer of Piltdown Man, is the best candidate for the hoaxer; keyhole bullet wounds in bone; and the vast bulk of evidence showing crop circles are a hoax.

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