Have you ever heard a story about the four-legged girl from Texas?
Please meet Josephine Myrtle Corbin, an incredible American lady,
who had two private parts and four legs. Yes, we're not joking.
She was born in Lincoln County, Tennessee, in 1868 with a medical condition known as dipygus.
Myrtle joined Barnum Circus at the age of 13
and her mounting popularity rewarded her with a lucrative weekly salary.
When she appeared on stage, nothing gave away her unusual condition. Apart from
the particularly large hips and a clubbed right foot, Myrtle was an attractive girl
and had an altogether normal figure. But when she lifted her gown, the public was left speechless.
She married James Clinton Bicknell when she was 19 years old and had 4 healthy children.
Unfortunately, she developed a skin infection in 1928, and it had left
her completely unable to heal, especially due to the lack of antibiotics at the time.
As a result, Josephine Myrtle Corbin-Bicknell died at age 59 in Cleburne, Texas.
There has never been another four-legged woman since.
During 1990s, photographs of another woman with four legs appeared on news tabloids,
who ironically died 1996, in a skiing accident.
She was known as Ashley Braistle, but this has since been proven as a hoax.
Jacob Miller was a Union soldier and Civil War veteran, who miraculously survived a bullet to
his forehead. He is seen here photographed in his later years, donning his Grand Army of the
Republic medal. Miller was born in Indiana in 1833 and enlisted in the Union Army's 9th
Indiana Volunteer Infantry in 1861. He saw a lot of action during the Civil War, several skirmishes
and battles, including the Battle of Chickamauga, in September 1863. This was the first major battle
of the war fought in Georgia, the most significant Union defeat in the Western Theater, and involved
the second-highest number of casualties after the Battle of Gettysburg. It was during this battle
that on the 19th September 1863, a Confederate musket ball struck Jacob right in the forehead. He
fell unconscious and on retreat, Union forces left him behind for dead. Miller came to his senses
several hours later and slowly walked back to his own side. He was so covered in blood, that no one
noticed his Union uniform. He did eventually receive medical help but carried fragments of
the bullet for 31 years and lived the rest of his life with an open bullet wound in his forehead.
He described the whole ordeal in an interview with Joliet Daily News in 1911. Jacob Miller
was truly the most remarkable survivor of the American Civil War, a true "son of a gun".
Please be aware that there is another Union soldier with the name Jacob Miller,
who was a recipient of the Medal of Honor and their names are often mixed on the Internet.
Annie Edson Taylor was an American schoolteacher from Michigan, who on her 63rd birthday became
the first and oldest person to survive a trip over Niagara Falls, in a barrel.
Yes, believe it or not, in a moment of unquestionable courage and dubious
decision-making, she crawled into a white-oak barrel of her own design on the afternoon of the
24th October 1901. She plummeted nearly 160 feet to the cauldron of rocks and raging water below,
all in the hopes of securing fame and fortune. Though sales of her memoir and publicity images
temporarily improved her wealth, her fame and financial security were brief.
She eventually fell into poverty and died on April the 29th, 1921,
in relative obscurity. As a final insult, her barrel was also stolen.
Princess May was a steamship built in 1888 that is best known for having grounded on rocks off
the coast of Sentinel Island, Alaska, in August of 1910. The ship remained intact,
thrusting straight out of the sea and aiming skyward. Photographer William Howard Case
captured this image, which went on to become one of the most famous shipwreck images of all time.
The ship was eventually rescued and whilst undergoing repairs, it was converted from
coal to oil fuel. In 1919, the ship was sold to a Caribbean-based company. In the early 1930s the
ship was ingloriously scrapped and deliberately sunk. However, its famous images still remain.