On this day in 1953 Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first people to climb to the summit of Mount Everest.
What an achievement it was at the time. Many had tried the same feat and all, until then, had failed; some losing their lives in the attempt.
Once at the top they only got to spend fifteen minutes at the summit as they were low on oxygen. Hillary took some photos and Norgay buried some Buddhist offerings before making the careful climb down.
I wonder if Norgay and Hillary suspected at the time that their names would be inextricably linked with the mountain from then on?
One morning in January, 1953, the men of Ranchi, India, woke up to find that their beards and moustaches had unexpectedly vanished…..
The mythical Chardeva was blamed for this unusual event. Apparently the Chardeva was a small rat-like creature which had not been seen for the previous 10 years. Being licked on the head or face by this creature while sleeping is believed to cause baldness.
Being licked by a rat and then having your hair disappear? I wonder if all the hairy-legged women waiting for their wax to heat would prefer to be gently licked in their sleep, and the hair to fall out painlessly, rather than suffering the riiiiiip of waxing? Doubtful.
Interestingly, my searching didn’t give me any other results for the term Chardeva and vanishing beards. Brace yourself people, this may the only reported ‘sighting’ of this creature… At least we are forewarned, time to stock up on the Ratsak guys!
As much as I would like to believe in a depilatory rat I wonder what was really going on here? Did the affected men wake up in a nest of unattached hairs, or had the face fur just vanished?
Sounds a bit like the traditional drunken shaving prank gone wrong in the course of an out of hand bucks night, but on a village-wide scale!
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It is not unusual to see similar stories about men in some communities having problems with unexpectedly and drastically reduced ummm…. family jewels…. You might be interested in this link to the Fortean Times if you haven’t heard of this phenomenon before.
I know that there was a possibility that the world would end today, on the 21st of December, but assuming that little event didn’t go to plan I am scheduling this post anyway 😉
I bet you didn’t all go out and do things that you would regret, assuming that there would be no tomorrow to wake up and feel regretful in did you?
No, neither did I.
In late October 1953 the religious leader from the town of Muerzzuschlag, Austria, informed his people that the end of the world was nigh, and, unfortunately for neighbourhood peace, they were a little less sceptical that we are.
In the expectation that the time for repercussions was ending those villagers went on a doomsday spree, borrowing money they were unable to repay, dumping their wives for their girlfriends, giving away their belongings or dancing the night away.
Probably the most popular person in the village was the local publican who served free drinks to all comers.
I wonder what those villagers who weren’t members of the sect thought of the gullibility of those end-of-the-worlders?
Apparently there were a lot of regretful people when the world continued on. The authorities were called in to sort things out, and I guess for a few people their own personal little world had ended.
I am using this as an excuse to add a clip of my favourite end-of-the-world movie scene, the start of Armageddon.
“It happened before, it will happen again. It’s all a question of when…”
Last time we peeked at Ray it was 1948 and she was pushing a panicked lion into a taxi after a street parade went wrong. (A taxi drivers surprise and a photo)
This time it is 1953 and she was having an even worse day than that one on the street. Today she is in a more traditional circus setting but the lion is even more annoyed.
Witnesses say that the lions had seemed surly when the act began and this report tells that during the performance the lion jumped straight at her, knocked her down and severely mauled her.
I’m not sure if a circus audience is really a reliable reporter of the lions state of mind, but clearly at least one of them just wasn’t in the mood that day.
Two attendants rushed to her assistance and, prodding the lion with long poles, managed to save her. Another man was outside the cage with a revolver at the ready but, luckily for the lion, didn’t use it.
She was operated on and her condition was described as ‘fairly comfortable’.
Wow. What an exciting life this woman had.
Unsurprisingly this time she didn’t make the next performance.
I loved this picture of the classic little Green Man alien and just had to share it with you. The caption reads;
The figure walked into the circle of light thrown by my lantern. It was a man about four feet in height. His head shone with a kind of green luminosity.
It is the header picture of a short story, not so short that I can reproduce it here though!
I really hope that this bee story is true, even if it is a little sad.
I know bees can fly quite far, but two miles without the enticement of a yummy flower at the end sounds a bit unbelievable.
I wonder how the bees knew where their late beekeeper was buried? Perhaps the old custom of ‘telling the bees’ was taken a little too far this time, clearly it didn’t settle them down!
Maybe they weren’t happy with the person who was to be the new keeper…
If you wish to use any images or text from my blog be sure to ask permission and include a link back to Buried Words and Bushwa, and full credit to it.
Trove.
The newspaper articles here come from the National Library of Australia (trove.nla.gov.au). Get on there and do some text correcting! You never know what you might find...
Buried words and Bushwa. 
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