photograph by Emanuele 

Beatrice Cenci haunts Rome. Though plenty of tour guides are eager to rehash stories of her headless body wandering the Sant’Angelo Bridge at night, she hardly needs that kind of carnival barking to get inside your head. Instead, you might see her name once, noting her unusual story. Then you notice her name again and again in every corner of the city. As her story unfolds, so does she, at every turn embodying a paradoxical feminine trope. She’s a damsel in distress, a brave heroine, a virgin sacrifice, and even a femme fatale all at once.

Beatrice was born in 1577. She lived in a large palazzo at the edge of the Jewish ghetto just off Via Arenula. Her father Francesco was a wealthy heir and full-time scoundrel who mostly used his huge fortune to buy his way out of prison. Everyone in Rome knew his reputation. He starved his servants until he was ordered by the papal courts to feed them. He took a mistress while married to his second wife, Lucrezia, then beat her until she performed sexual acts against her will (leading to a conviction for “unnatural vice”). Most appallingly, he confessed to molesting young boys in three separate court cases. But while others were burnt alive for less, he always escaped with more fines and a few months in jail.

Palazzo Cenci as it is today (photograph by the author)

While Francesco was paying off the justice system (such as it was), his children were doing their best to get away from him since he always seemed to have enough money for fines, but never enough to feed and clothe them. His son Giacomo disowned him and left. Cristoforo and Rocco, heirs to their father’s temper, were killed in duels. Antonina, Beatrice’s older sister, successfully petitioned the pope and asked him for permission to either marry without Francesco’s consent or join a convent to escape him. The pope consented to her marriage and stuck her father with a hefty dowry.

Francesco was (as usual) enraged. His fines had already begun to outstrip his inheritance and now he had Antonina’s dowry to deal with. His creditors’ harassment (as well as his newly acquired case of scabies) put him in a foul mood. There was no way he could let Beatrice pull the same trick as Antonina, so he moved his wife, Beatrice, and his youngest son Bernardo to one of his remote country estates in the mountains.

Statue of Beatrice Cenci by Harriet Goodhue Hosmer, illustrated by William Roffe (1857) (via Wikimedia)

There he imprisoned Beatrice and her stepmother Lucrezia in a sealed-up suite. Far removed from their nosey neighbors in Rome, Francesco’s depravity intensified. He insisted Beatrice and Lucrezia both sleep in the same bed with him. He began forcing Beatrice to scrape the scabies on his body from head to toe. Beatrice wrote desperate letters to her bother Giacomo, but Francesco only whipped her when he found them. Beatrice began plotting his death.

The estate had two servants who served as her hitmen, one whom Beatrice bribed and the other whom she seduced. On the night of the murder she gave Francesco opiate-laced wine then instructed the two servants to smash his head in, throw him off the balcony and make it look like the railing gave way. Francesco died that night but the murder was hurried and the cover-up amateurish. Investigators were quick to notice that a man who dies on his balcony usually doesn’t bleed out in bed first.

Beatrice Cenci in prison, painted by Achille Leonardi (19th century) (via Wikimedia) 

The Cenci family — Giacomo, Lucrezia, Beatrice, and even young Bernardo — were immediately implicated and imprisoned. The servant Beatrice bribed tried to skip town but was hunted down and killed by a cousin of the Cencis. The servant she seduced was imprisoned with the family. Given his low rank, he was the first to be tortured to death though he never confessed that Beatrice was the mastermind behind the murder. 

When the Cencis all pled innocent despite evidence to the contrary, Pope Clement VIII authorized the torture of the entire family. Each confessed on the rack. They were all sentenced to die, with the exception of 13-year-old Bernardo, who was sentenced to watch their deaths then live as a galley slave.

Ponte Sant'Angelo & Castel Sant'Angelo (photograph by Dennis Jarvis)

The gallows were raised in front of the Castel Sant'Angelo, and a massive crowd gathered on September 11, 1599 to watch what most considered a terrible miscarriage of justice. How could the papal courts allow Francesco’s crimes to slide, only to punish Beatrice when she tried to protect herself from further abuse? Some thought it was because Pope Clement was eager to snap up the remains of the Cenci fortune, though Pope Clement maintained that he simply couldn’t set a precedent for pardoning patricide.

The morning of their executions, the Cencis were driven in carts down Via di Montserrato accompanied by members of the Brotherhood of St. John the Decapitated, a confraternity dedicated to caring for the condemned. Today you can still see a plaque dedicated to Beatrice at 42 Via di Montserrato.

The plaque at 42 Via di Montserrato (photograph by the author)

Lucrezia was the first to die. She fainted on the chopping block before the sword severed her neck. Beatrice was the second, praised for her dignity and composure on the block. Finally, Giacomo suffered the worst fate due to his sex. His head was smashed with a mace then his body was drawn and quartered, a punishment too immodest even for a condemned woman.

Diorama of drawing and quartering at the criminological museum (photograph by the author)

There are still relics of that day on display at the Museo Criminologico in Rome: the “sword of justice” that killed Lucrezia and Beatrice, the clothes and insignia of the confraternity that accompanied them (featuring the severed head of St. John the Baptist), and a little diorama depicting a stripped man being drawn and quartered like Giacomo.

The "sword of justice" (via museocriminologico.it)

According to tradition, Beatrice’s body was buried in the church of San Pietro in Montorio, though her grave marker was allegedly destroyed by French troops in 1789. She experienced something of a resurrection in the 19th century. Mary and Percy Bysshe Shelley heard her story while on holiday in Italy, and Percy was moved to write a play based on her life. Subsequently, Beatrice appeared in works by Alexandre Dumas, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Stendhal. She then trickled down to Antonin Artaud (who fittingly reserved the part of her father for himself), and even David Lynch (who inserted her portrait into Mulholland Drive).

The chapel at San Pietro in Montorio where Beatrice is allegedly buried (photograph by the author)

If you want to see the image of her that continues to haunt artistic imaginations, head to the Galleria Borghese. There you’ll find a portrait by Guido Reni. Painted about a year after her death, it’s portrays Beatrice the day before her execution dressed as a Sibyl, her eyes still damp from crying.

Guido Reni, "Portrait of Beatrice Cenci" (1662) (via Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica)

Read more strange tales of the dead at Elizabeth Harper's All the Saints You Should Know.

Sources:

Beatrice Cenci by Corrado Ricci

Death Comes to the Maiden: Sex and Execution 1431-1933 by Camille Naish

Memory Gardens, Imperial, California (all photographs courtesy zachofalltrades)

Out beneath the scorching sun of Imperial Valley, California, is a cemetery that became a wasteland. For decades, Memory Gardens has turned from a tended burial ground where plants were carefully grown in the arid environment, to a dry expanse of parched earth.

The cemetery of Imperial, California, sold its last plot in 1967, although burials continued for those who purchased space. The sign out front, visible from the passing road, still promises green hills and a leafy tree, but the only flora that grows are plastic flowers shoved into the cracks in the baked ground. 

Imperial Vally has long been an unfriendly place to live. As cited by the Los Angeles Times, Audubon lamented the area as "most melancholy" in 1846, and a Franciscan friar bemoaned it as a "deadly place" on an early Spanish expedition. However, irrigation at the beginning of the 20th century brought people to make it their home. In 1963, Memory Gardens was licensed, but it lost that license by 1967 due to poor management that left the place in a bad state of repair. The property was later foreclosed on. 

Aerial view of Memory Gardens (via Google Earth)

Street view of the cemetery (via Google Earth)

Entrance of the cemetery (via Google Earth)

Things went downhill from there, especially when the recession spurred the economic decline in the community and the recent drought sapped what life remained from the land. Bills and workers at the cemetery went unpaid, the utilities were turned off, and according to a 2009 Washington Post article, it appeared someone was even squatting into the abandoned cemetery office. There were promises along the way to upkeep the cemetery and some efforts to improve the grounds, but for the over 800 people buried here, the main care has continued to be from family members who refuse to forget. The Los Angeles Times described in 2005 one family member hoisting a 100-galloon water tank each week to tend to plants at her family plot. 

Find a Grave has photographs of many of the grave markers, their metal nameplates dusty with the dirt. According to a December 2012 Imperial Valley Press article, the United Veterans Council of Imperial County was attempting to help with 17 of the 80 acres. However, as these photographs from this year show, the cemetery remains in a state of desert decay, the plots of the deceased disappearing in the thirsty soil. 

All photographs by zachofalltrades unless indicated. 

Explore more cemeteries on Atlas Obscura >

In some science fiction cinema, the future looks pretty bleak, with dystopic visions of a world struggling with overcrowding, high crime, pestilence, and the aftermath of war. And it can also look uncomfortably familiar thanks to filmmaker’s use of real-world buildings in their sets — sometimes to anchor the story in real life, and sometimes just because it already looks “futuristic.” We’ve assembled a list of 14 real-world filming locations of sci-fi dystopias. 

Blade Runner (1982)
Los Angeles, California

This 1982 sci-fi classic was set in a futuristic Los Angeles, and features several landmarks from the genuine article. One of the most notable is the Bradbury Building, where police officer Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) fights with a mob of the film’s cyborg “replicants,” and has a final standoff with the replicant Roy Batty (Rutger Hauer). Much of the action takes place in the Bradbury Building’s courtyard, which is open to the public today. 

Stairways of the Bradbury Building (photograph by Luke Jones)

Skylight in the Bradbury Building (photograph by Andrew Shiah)

Across the street from the Bradbury Building is the Pan Am Building, which stood in for the “Yukon Hotel," where Deckard catches a replicant early in the film. The police station in which Deckard receives his orders to assassinate all these replicants in the first place was a film set built inside Los Angeles’ cavernous Union Station, a major railway hub. 

Ennis House (photograph by Jean-Pierre Louis)

Deckard’s apartment is in the Ennis House, a complex designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and meant to emulate Mayan temples. The building, which has been turning up in films since the 1930s, is a national landmark and guided tours are available. 

Ennis House (photograph by Sarah Le Clerc)

Total Recall (1990)
Mexico City, Mexico

Originally, Paul Verhoeven wanted to film 1990's Total Recall in Houston, but the accountants said no. So Verhoeven moved production south to Churubusco Studios in Mexico City. A handful of other sites in the city were also used, like the penthouse of the Hotel Nikko (now the Hyatt Regency). The crew even stayed at the hotel while filming, and the art directors were so impressed by its streamlined design that they borrowed elements for other scenes. 

Hotel Nikko Mexico (photograph by Felipe Alfonso Castillo Vázquez)

An especially gory scene of Total Recall sees construction worker/secret agent Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) fleeing from gunmen via an escalator, and using the body of an unfortunate innocent bystander as a human shield. That escalator is in the Metro Chabacano subway station in Mexico City; some visitors claim they can still see leftover blood splatters from filming. 

Metro Chabacano (photograph by César Rincón)

A different metro station — Metro Insurgentes — is also used earlier in the scene for the external shots. 

Outside entrance of Metro Insurgentes in Mexico City (photograph by Thelmadatter/Wikimedia)

Robocop (1987)
Dallas, Texas

Paul Verhoeven did get to film in Texas for an earlier film — set in Detroit. Most of 1987’s Robocop, in which Peter Weller plays Alex Murphy, a recently-deceased Detroit policeman-turned-cyborg-supercop, was actually filmed in Dallas. 

 
Atrium of Plaza of the Americas in downtown Dallas (photograph by Dfwcre8tive/Wikimedia)

The monolithic “Omni Consumer Products” is the sci-fi team responsible for Murphy’s transformation, and three separate locations in Dallas stand in for different spots in the sprawling OCP headquarters. Dallas’ City Hall serves as the building’s exterior — special effects extended the hall to a towering 95 stories. Some interior scenes were shot in the atrium of the Plaza of the Americas — a shopping center which also incorporates Dallas’ Marriott Hotel. A different hotel, the Rosewood Crescent, offered its parking garage as OCP’s garage in the film. 

Dallas City Hall (photograph by Daquella Manera)

Dallas High School on North Pearl Street stands in for the shabby Detroit Police Headquarters, while the interior Detriot PD scenes were filmed in the Sons of Herman Hall. The Sons of Herman Hall was a former German-American social club, which today serves as a music venue. 

Dallas High School (photograph by Jeffrey Beall)

Logan's Run (1976)
Fort Worth, Texas

Dallas and Fort Worth hosted the 1976 dystopian film Logan's Run. Several scenes were filmed in the Dallas Market Center, a shopping mall standing in for “The City,” an underground complex whose residents believe is the only safe place left on Earth. Another mall, the Hulen Mall in Fort Worth, was just completing construction during filming and was also used for some scenes. 

The Water Gardens (photograph by Allison Meier/Atlas Obscura)

The Fort Worth Water Gardens stand in for The City’s hydro-electric power generator. The Philip Johnson-designed Water Gardens are an unusual architectural attraction, featuring three different concrete pools with fountains and water features. In the “Active Pool,” featured most prominently in the film, visitors can walk down a series of 38 steps to the small reflecting pool at the bottom, while water cascades down the steps and terraces all around them. 

The Water Gardens (photograph by Allison Meier/Atlas Obscura)

The Hunger Games (2012/2013)
Henry River Mill Village, North Carolina

The Hunger Games trilogy implies that “District 12,” the impoverished coal-mining region which is home to heroine Katniss Everdeen (Jennifer Lawrence), corresponds with Appalachia. Much of the first film was shot in North Carolina, with the abandoned Henry River Mill Village standing in for District 12’s center.

Abandoned Henry River Mill Village House (via hungergamestrilogy.net)

Abandoned Henry River Mill Village (via hungergamestrilogy.net)

Built in 1904, the whole town was constructed to provide housing for the employees of a major textile mill on the Henry River. The mill ultimately closed in the 1980s, and the town was abandoned. 

Swan House (photograph by Jim Bowen)

In Catching Fire, the latest entry in the film series, Katniss is one of the guests of honor at a party thrown by the scheming President Snow (Donald Sutherland). President Snow’s estate is actually the Swan House, a mansion built for a 1920s cotton magnate in Buckhead, just north of Atlanta, Georgia. Elsewhere in Atlanta, scenes featuring the Cornucopia — a bunker of supplies which contestants must collect — were filmed at the Beach, a portion of Atlanta’s Clayton County International Park originally constructed for the 1996 Olympics. 

Marriott Marquis elevators (photograph by Brian Pennington)

Atlanta’s Marriott Marquis Hotel stands in for the victors’ quarters in the Capitol — Panem — and several scenes feature the hotel’s striking interior courtyard and elevator. The hotel was still receiving guests during filming, which lead to an embarrassing moment for actress Jenna Malone. A scene required her to walk out of the elevator topless, and during one take the elevator stopped at the wrong floor, giving some guests quite a surprise. 

Brazil (1985)
UK & France

Filming locations for Terry Gilliam’s 1985 “dystopian satire” Brazil jump between the United Kingdom and Paris. 

Millennium Mills (photograph by Ed Webster)

Scenes set at the “Department of Records,” where everyman Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) works, were filmed at the spooky Millennium Mills in East London, an abandoned flour mill from the early 20th Century. 

 
Leighton House (photograph by Europa Nostra)

In one scene, Lowry’s mother (Katherine Helmond) undergoes a bizarre facelift in a lavish office. Gilliam filmed in the Arab Hall at the Leighton House Museum, the former residence of Victorian-era painter Frederic, Lord Leighton. The Arab Hall is tiled with the ceramics and woodwork Leighton collected on trips to the Middle East. Mrs. Lowry later returns “home” to what once was the Billiard Room of the National Liberal Club, a former clubhouse for members of England’s Liberal Party. The clubhouse has since been taken over by London’s Royal Horseguards Hotel, and the Billiard Room is used for special events. 

Espaces d'Abraxas (photograph by Marcus/Flickr user)

Scenes in Lowry’s own home were actually filmed in Paris, chiefly in the Noisy-le-Grand commune. His apartment complex is the Espaces d'Abraxas designed by architect Ricardo Bofill and meant to evoke an ancient Greek amphitheater. Portions of the complex also stand in for “Chapel of Our Lady of the Checkout Counter,” which hosts a funeral scene. At film’s end, Lowry finally escapes his restrictive society — sort of — in the lush fields of Cumbria, in England’s Lake District. The exact scene lies somewhere near the village of Askham.  

Gattaca (1997)
Marin County, California

Several scenes from Gattaca set at the “Gattaca Corporation,” the DNA testing and eugenics center controlling every person’s destiny, were filmed at the Marin County Civic Center just north of San Francisco.

Marin County Civic Center (photograph by Daniel Hartwig)

The Civic Center was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, and also appears in another dystopic film — the 1971 THX-1138, George Lucas’ very first work. 

Los Angeles City Hall (photograph by Ryan Quick)

In another scene, the exterior of the Los Angeles City Hall stands in for a concert hall where Vincent (Ethan Hawke) and Irene (Uma Thurman) have their first date, watching a 12-fingered pianist. Afterward, Vincent takes Irene to watch the sunrise at a “solar farm,” filmed at an actual solar power plant in the Mojave desert. 

Great Western Forum (photograph by  Horge/Wikimedia)

Later in the film, Irene starts to suspect (correctly) that Vincent is lying about who he is, and secretly takes one of his hairs in for DNA testing. The exterior and box office windows of the Great Western Forum are used for the testing facility. 

Escape from New York (1981)
East St. Louis, Illinois; St. Louis, Missouri; NYC

Despite its name, much of the filming for this 1981 cult classic took place in East St. Louis, Illinois, as director John Carpenter feared it would be too expensive to make the real New York look sufficiently rundown. East St. Louis had plenty of townhouses which resembled New York, and had also recently suffered a major fire, on top of having an abandoned train station and a bridge, two locations the movie required. 

East St. Louis (photograph by Tyson Blanquart)

Liberty Island (photograph by Glen Scarborough)

One scene was filmed on location in New York. In the film, Manhattan Island has been turned into a maximum-security prison colony, with the guards stationed on Liberty Island, at the foot of the Statue of Liberty. Carpenter was able to persuade federal officials to let the film use the real Liberty Island for the scene — the first film crew ever given access to the site at night. In the scene, guards receive word that Air Force One has crashed into Manhattan, and the President (Donald Pleasance) is now the hostage of the “The Duke Of New York” (Isaac Hayes). 

Fox Theatre (photograph by Matthew Black)

The exterior of St. Louis’ Fox Theater turns up in an early scene where Snake (Kurt Russell), the anti-hero inmate charged with rescuing the President, first goes looking for him. 

Union Station's Grand Hall (photograph by Paul Sableman)

St. Louis’ Union Station stands in for Grand Central Station, where the President is being held captive. The place where Snake fights gladiator-style for his release is also in Union Station, in the Grand Hall. 

Old Chain of Rocks Bridge (photograph by Thomas Duesing)

The Chain of Rocks Bridge stands in for New York’s 69th Street Bridge, over which Snake leads the President to ultimate safety. Formerly a bridge on the iconic Route 66, the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge is now closed to vehicular traffic, but hosts biking and pedestrian paths. 

Soylent Green (1973)
Los Angeles, California

Most of the 1973 Soylent Green was filmed in Hollywood sound stages, but two scenes use locations elsewhere in Los Angeles. The exterior of the “euthanasia shop,” where Sol Roth (Edward G. Robinson) goes to subject himself to an assisted suicide, is actually the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena.

Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena (photograph by Pelladon/Wikimedia)

Meanwhile, Los Angeles’ Hyperion Sewage Treatment Plant was used for the factory in which Robert Thorn (Charlton Heston) discovers what the film’s “Soylent Green” nutritional wafers are really made of. (Spoiler alert: it's people.)

Hyperion Sewage Treatment Plant (photograph by Doc Searls)

12 Monkeys (1995)
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Baltimore, Maryland

This 1995 12 Monkeys by Terry Gilliam features John Cole (Bruce Willis) in a time-travel paradox, with several filming locations in Philadelphia and Baltimore. Set in the future after a global plague, the first scenes depict Cole collecting air samples outside Philadelphia’s City Hall.

Philadelphia's City Hall (photograph by Ted Drake)

Cole is later sent back in time to discover the plague’s origins, where his behavior lands him in an insane asylum, alongside a gloriously demented Jeffrey Goines (Brad Pitt). For the asylum, Gilliam chose Philadelphia’s Eastern State Penitentiary. 

Eastern State (photograph by Allison Meier/Atlas Obscura)

Eastern State (photograph by Sandi Hemmerlein)

The penitentiary is itself worth a visit. Built in the 1820s, this spoke wheel-shaped prison represents a major reform in the early American penal system. Closed in 1969, the prison is now open for historic tours, where guests can see the former cells of real-life inmates (such as Al Capone) as well as the 12 Monkeys film sites. 

Philadelphia Convention Center (photograph by Tracie Hall)

Elsewhere in Philadelphia, scenes from Cole’s recurring dream set at an airport were filmed at Philadelphia’s Convention Center. A scene towards the end of the film, where Kathryn Railly (Madeleine Stowe) buys disguises for herself and for Cole, were shot at Wanamaker’s Department Store.

Senator Theater (photograph by Sean Naber)

In Baltimore, the Garrett-Jacobs Mansion stood in for the home of Dr. Goines (Christopher Plummer), the virologist whose lab inadvertently developed the plague from Willis’ time. Late in the film, Cole and Railly seek some private time in Baltimore’s Senator Theater, an art deco gem. 

The Matrix Trilogy (1999-2003)
Sydney, Australia

The virtual-reality city inside "the Matrix" is supposed to be a generic any-place. But much of the trilogy was filmed in and around Sydney, Australia. 

Metacrotex (photograph by Kenneth Pinto)

The Metacortex building, where Neo (Keanu Reeves) works as a programmer and first suspects something’s not right with the world, is actually the Metcentre, a shopping mall in Sydney’s Central Business District. The bridge where Neo waits for Trinity (Carrie Ann Moss) to collect him in a car and bring him to meet Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) is the Adam Street Bridge near Sydney’s Chinatown. 

Adams Street Bridge (photograph by Brett Taylor)

Sydney shows up in some of Morpheus’ training programs as well. For example, where Neo is distracted by a woman in a red dress at a fountain and then sees her transformed into one of the film’s “agents" is in a plaza near the corners of Martin Place and Pitt Street.

Martin Place (photograph by SG_Harrison)

Nearby is the Westin Hotel on the site of the former General Post Office. This is where Neo sees a black cat and has a moment of “déjà vu,” tipping his companions off to an impending attack.  

General Post Office (photograph by Bob Mead)

The Colonial State Bank Center is also close by. This is the building where Morpheus is held captive and tortured by agents. The Colonial State may not admit visitors, but you can get into Forty One Restaurant at 2 Chifley Square, where one of Neo’s teammates betrays him to Agent Smith (Hugo Weaving) over a steak. 

 
White Bay Power Station (photograph by Jes/Flickr user)

Both sequels also feature Sydney; The Matrix Reloaded uses Sydney’s historic White Bay Power Station for the scenes where the rebels attempt to blow up a power station to kill the electricity to a building, and Matrix Revolutions concludes with a meeting between the Oracle and the Architect at the Royal Botanic Gardens on Sydney Harbor. 

Royal Botanic Gardens (via Wikimedia)

Minority Report (2002)
Los Angeles, California

Like Blade Runner, this is based on a Philip K. Dick story and was shot mainly in Los Angeles, despite the story’s Washington, DC setting. A few DC landmarks do make an appearance, however — the exterior of the Ronald Reagan Trade Center is used for the “Department of PreCrime” building where John Anderton (Tom Cruise) is the star detective. The Willard Washington DC Hotel is the site of a splashy party thrown by Anderton’s superiors just before the film’s “PreCrime” system goes national. 

Ronald Reagan Trade Center (photograph by David Gaines)

Back in Los Angeles, the Descanso Botanic Gardens stand in for the home of Dr. Iris Hineman (Lois Smith), whom Anderton visits when he suspects the PreCrime system has some flaws. Descanso is home to a wide collection of roses, camellias, lilacs, and native California flora on its 160 acres (but none of the sentient poisonous plants which attack Anderton). 

Descanso Botanic Gardens (photograph by dailymatador/Flickr user)

The film’s PreCrime system is driven by the visions of three clairvoyant men and women, known as “Precogs.” Anderton kidnaps one, Agatha (Samantha Morton), and brings her to an abandoned shopping mall. The mall is only half abandoned in real life. It’s actually the Hawthorne Plaza Mall, just south of Los Angeles. The entire shopping complex once consisted of an indoor mall with three big-box stores close by, but the mall portion was closed in 1999 after a spate of finance trouble. The three big-box stores are still open, while the mall is now used for a police training center.

Hawthorne Plaza Mall (photograph by Amin Eshaker)

Visitors can even also see one of the film sets on a studio backlot. The Warner Brothers VIP Studio Tour includes the street set where Anderton uses a jetpack to escape arrest after being falsely accused of a future murder. 

V for Vendetta (2005)
England & Berlin

Alan Moore set his fascist dystopia in London, so the 2005 adaptation of V for Vendetta features some obvious landmarks like the Old Bailey courthouse and Big Ben. Much of the film was actually shot on sound stages in Berlin, although a handful of scenes were captured at lesser-known English sites. The film’s prologue, which depicts the story of English antihero Guy Fawkes, sets Fawkes’ execution at Hatfield House, a country house in Hertfordshire.

Old Palace at Hatfield House (photograph by Jason Ballard)

Hatfield House was the childhood home of Queen Elizabeth I. Her successor King James I disliked it and gave it to the Earl of Salisbury, who remodeled it extensively into the house that exists today. 

Cloth Fair Street (photograph by Simon Wicks)

The street where the masked hero V (Hugo Weaving) rescues Evey (Natalie Portman) from a group of corrupt policemen is Cloth Fair, a thoroughfare where medieval textile merchants would set up stalls during summer market fairs. 

Chalk Farm Footbridge (photograph by Danny Robinson)

In a catalytic scene, a girl is shot for daring to deface a political poster, and the surrounding crowd revolts. That scene takes place on the Chalk Farm Footbridge on Regent’s Park Road, near the trendy Camden Town district. And at the film’s finale, a mob of rebels, all in Guy Fawkes masks like V, gather at London’s Trafalgar Square before marching on Parliament.

Trafalgar Square (photo by the author)

Discover more real-world film locations on Atlas Obscura >

Landfill operations in Jamaica Bay, New York (1973) (photograph by Arthur Tress)

Before the rise of modern waste management systems, the trash produced by the intense urbanization of the 17th century was dealt with through mainly informal channels — the rag-collectors and charnel-men, the night-soil men and toshers, mudlarks and flushermen, who all sifted through the detritus of society, earning a pittance in exchange for the recyclables they collected, some of which we would not recognize as being recyclable at all.

Urine was collected via “piss-pots,” placed strategically outside taverns, and was then sold on to tanneries. Vegetable scraps were collected to sell either to those poorer than the collectors, or to urban farmers as food for pigs and cattle. As populations continued to rise and migration to urban centers exploded, the cities themselves became health hazards, and it took the pioneering efforts of people like Eugène Belgrand who designed Paris’s sewerage system between 1852 and 1869, Joseph Bazalgette in London, and George E. Waring, Jr., who used his Civil War experience to militarize the Sanitation Department in New York City after the fall of corrupt Tammany Hall, and cleared the streets of often-shin-high waste. 

Scavenging in Jakarta (2004) (photograph by Jonathan McIntosh) 

Other than the men and women pushing shopping trolleys filled with rusting cans, and the nocturnal missions of dumpster diving, either for food, or, as in Cory Doctorow's novel Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town, for electrical components, the subsistence-level rubbish collector seems to belong in the past.

In Southeast Asia, India, South America, and Africa, however, the traditional task of the unofficial garbage collectors goes on, and is still dirty, unhygienic, and dangerous.

Payatas Dumpsite in the Philippines (2007) (photograph by Kounosu/Wikimedia)

Collecting trash in Calcutta, India (photograph by butforthesky/Flickr user)

The wages are pitiful, as unscrupulous residents often avoid even the merest donations. In India, where the garbage collectors are often a part of the dalit — or the "untouchables," the lowest class in the Indian caste system — the waste collectors live on the fringes of society, and are treated patronizingly by the national government.

When, for example, the garbage collectors recently asked for a wage, rather than being forced to rely on the current donation system, the government responded by issuing gloves as an inducement to better hygiene practices, rather than the money these people so desperately need. In Egypt, where waste management has been, since at least the 1940s, the preserve of the zabaleen, a group mostly composed of the country's minority Coptic Christians, the government has removed from them even this pittance of a livelihood, through introducing and legislating in favor of modern waste management systems, and by contracting this role to multinational companies operating outside of Egypt.

A Donkey at Moqattam Hill in Cairo (2007) (photograph by Matthias Feilhauer)

Mokattam, Egypt (photograph by Ayoung Shin)

In the favelas of Brazil, even the cartoneros live highly stratified lives. The young and the good looking find work in nicer, more affluent (and presumably less effluent) neighborhoods, where tips and donations are higher. They regularly face police crackdowns, as a result of accusations of theft, as well as the violence of the drug traders who operate in the slums. In Southeast Asia, women sift and trawl their way along the polluted waterways, searching primarily for paper. In the Philippines, children pick their way atop burning rubbish piles. 

Even in a developed nation like Japan, the Burakumin (literally “hamlet/village people”) continue to be shunned and ostracized, forced to live on the outskirts of cities and towns, and severely limited in terms of what jobs they can perform, despite decades of government-level attempts to legislate against this discrimination. In Bangladesh, men, women, and children salvage wrecked ships, abandoned on their beaches by profiteering multinational corporations, despite the toxic chemicals and heavy metals that contaminate the hulks, and in spite of the risk to life that this engenders. The challenge stands, to raise the quality of life for these people.

Ship breaking in Bangladesh (photograph by Stéphane M. Grueso)

Ship breaking in Bangladesh (photograph by Naquib Hossain)

Charities have sprung up in the Western world to provide some source of training or appropriate recompense for trash pickers, such as Practical Action, which works to help waste pickers in Nepal,  and the Saga Charitable Trust , which supports the poor in the Philippines. Two questions will remain, however, if trash picking is replaced in the developing world by modern sanitation systems.

Firstly, how will struggling economies cope with the demand for waste management systems of a Western standard? And secondly, what will become of the people who are engaged in this much maligned role? Will they go the way of Egypt's Coptic Christians, and fall further into poverty and desperation? We must find some way of retraining and reintegrating these people into societies where they are traditionally derided as outsiders, as less-than-human.

Throughout the Western world in the past, and in much of the rest of the world today, the life and work of the garbage collectors is, in the co-opted words of Thomas Hobbes, nasty, brutish, and short.

Our fellow explorers over at Hendrick's Gin have been up to some very interesting things, taking an expedition to Venezuela in search of a mysterious botanical with veteran explorer Charles Brewer Carias! Here is part two of the article series documenting the 'Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest':

Enjoy watching as Hendrick’s Gin, Global Ambassador, David Piper, immerses himself in the indigenous culture of the Kanaracuni village, Venezuela... 

 

Embarking on the ‘Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest’ was a fantastic opportunity to find some of the most unusual botanicals in the world, but it was also a rare chance to encounter another very different way of life. The expedition team spent the majority of their time in Venezuela as guests of the very much isolated, yet very friendly, Kanaracuni tribe.

This indigenous Indian tribe has been living in the jungle here for centuries, far away from civilization. Being welcomed into their tribe to live alongside them and have some insight into their way of life, their cultures and treasured traditions was an incredible experience for David and one that he will never forget.

Fully immersed in tribal life, David took part in ritual ceremonies, channeled gods, ate live insects, tried and failed at the art of blowpiping, to name but a few of his experiences. He and Lesley also contended with the realities of jungle life, from sand flies (they’re mighty difficult to dig out of your foot!) to bathing in leech-infested waters and a dangerous liaison with a less than friendly tribe (facing a drawn arrow was certainly character building!).

Still want to know more about the Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest? Visit http://www.hendricksgin.com/perilous-botanical-quest
 More to come in article four!

Anatomical theaters were where students viewed dissections, scholars witnessed human anatomy, and surgeons explored new techniques of treatment. For patients, however, the time below the knife in the early days of medicine was unpleasant, with the option of opium, whiskey, or a mallet to the head being the main painkiller. Yet these theaters from the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 19th have an enduring beauty, where they were designed for natural light to filter in prior to electricity, and to present the human body as a thing of wonder. 

Anatomical Theatre of the Archiginnasio
Bologna, Italy

photograph by Maria Firsova

Carved entirely from spruce in 1636, the anatomical theater at the University of Bologna in Italy was an early arena for dissection. Wooden statues on the walls represent physicians from history, while a canopy over the teacher's chair is held aloft by representations of anatomical models. The gorgeous space was almost lost during World War II, but the pieces were saved from the rubble and reconstructed so visitors can experience the theater in a similar state to the 17th century. 

photograph by Maria Firsova

Old Operating Theatre
London, England

photograph by Michael Reeve

The Old Operating Theatre in London's St. Thomas Church was forgotten for a century until it was rediscovered in the mid-20th century and revived as a museum in 1962. The theater was opened in 1822, and the stately chamber was padded with sawdust so blood from operations wouldn't leak on the churchgoers below. It's the oldest surviving surgical theater in the UK. 

photograph by John Pannell

Waag
Amsterdam, Netherlands

via Waag Society

Waag in Amsterdam is a 15th century building that was originally a city gate. In the 17th century part of it was turned into an anatomical theater for the surgeon's guild. Over the entrance from the courtyard, you can still find the inscription "Theatrum Anatomicum." In 1670, it was used as the setting of Adriaen Ruysch's famous painting of the "Anatomy Lesson by Prof. Frederik Rusych." Now the soaring space with its well-windowed dome is used by the Waag Society, which encourages experimentation and discussion in art, science, and technology.

photograph by Frank Boyd

Sala Gimbernat
Barcelona, Spain 

via casessingulars.com

The red-draped walls and marble operating table of Barcelona's Sala Gimbernat date to 1762. In the 18th century, the Royal College of Surgery employed it for anatomy instruction using the dissection of corpses. Now on Wednesday mornings, visitors can stand in awe of the grand anatomical theater. 

Palazzo del Bo
Padua, Italy

photograph by Kalibos/Wikimedia

Built in 1594, the anatomical theater in the Palazzo del Bo at the University of Padua in Italy is the oldest surviving such space in the world. Its six tiers carved from walnut wind around in a soaring circle. There is in place an inscription in Latin: "Hic locus ubi mors east gaudet succurrere vitae," or "This is a place where the dead are pleased to help the living."

Ether Dome
Boston, Massachusetts

via Curious Expeditions 

In 1846 in Boston, dentist Dr. William T.G. Morton performed a revolutionary operation where he removed a tumor from a man's neck using ether, the first time it was administered in surgery. Now the Ether Dome, used from 1821 to 1868, remembers Morton in its name. The striking operating theater is much as he left it, with light streaming down from its copper dome. 

via Curious Expeditions

Tieranatomisches Theater
Berlin, Germany

photograph by Matthias Heyde

King Frederik William II ordered the creation of the veterinary medicine school in Berlin with its anatomical theater in 1787. It's now the city's oldest academic building. Along the dome built with an illuminating truss structure are representations of animals and the countryside, witnesses to numerous animal dissections over the years. 

Indiana Medical History Museum
Indianapolis, Indiana

photograph by Huw Williams

Located in the old pathology building of the Central State Hospital for the Insane, the Indiana Medical History Museum preserves an autopsy amphitheater in much the same state as it was left in 1896. It's now the oldest surviving pathology facility in the United States. 

photograph by Meddlingwithnature/Wikimedia

Gustavianum Museum
Uppsala, Sweden

photograph by Dvortygirl/Flickr user

Located in what's now the Gustavianum Museum in Uppsala, Sweden, is the world's second oldest operating theater. It was constructed in the mid-17th century as part of Uppsala University. Its muted-hued viewing tiers descend down to an octagon operating area.   

photograph by Celeste Lindell

Pennsylvania Hospital
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

via Curious Expeditions

The oldest operating theater in the United States is at the Pennsylvania Hospital in Philadelphia. Known as the "dreaded circular room," it was used from 1804 to 1868, and only on sunny afternoons when enough light came through the windows.  Visitors are now welcome, and this May 17, Atlas Obscura will be exploring the old theater as part of our Philadelphia road trip. 

via Curious Expeditions

Discover more medical history on Atlas Obscura >

Abandoned Solar Two Tower (photograph by Marcin Wichary)

Like the vanished, money making dreams that spawned them, it can be hard to find abandoned solar and wind farms.

The most impressive are in the United States, where investors slammed up wind turbines and solar panels in the aftermath of the 1970s energy crisis. Everyone expected oil to get even more expensive, and government subsidies and tax breaks for renewable energy were easy to get. But oil prices didn’t climb as anticipated, and as the subsidies went away, so too did many developers of wind and solar farms, no longer interested when the money wasn’t right. Projects were sold, or left in the sun and wind.

Solar panels and wind turbines are not brick, concrete, or stone. They’re relatively easy to remove, and most are built with a plan to tear them down at some point. But there are a few places you can still go to wander among abandoned dreams of wind and light.

THERE FOR ALL TO SEE

Tehachapi and Altamont Wind Energy Areas
California

Tehachapi wind turbines (photograph by TomSaint11/Wikimedia)

Tehachapi and Altamont are the granddaddies of them all — sites of a 1970s-1980s wind energy rush gone wrong. Federal subsidies sparked developers into action, crowding what are now considered antique, poorly functioning turbines into particularly windy areas of California.

At Tehachapi in hapless Kern County, north of Los Angeles, officials had no provision in law requiring developers to cover the future tear-down costs of the wind turbines. At first, that may not have seemed like a big deal. But the federal tax breaks soon dried up and the developers vanished, leaving behind thousands of rusty, cranking turbines standing in rows like soldiers on the windy plain outside Tehachapi.

Tehachapi Pass Wind Farm (photograph by Ikluft/Wikimedia)

Estimates vary on how many of the turbines in the Tehachapi area are defunct. Some range as high as 4,000, but others are lower. No matter how many are abandoned, Tehachapi is definitely a wind turbine boneyard.

To get there:
For a loop drive with great view of the area’s turbines, drive south from Tehachapi on Tehachapi Willow Springs Road, hang a left on Oak Creed Road heading east to Mojave. Take Highway 58 north and west back toward Tehachapi to complete the loop.

 Altamont Pass Wind Farm (photograph by David J Laporte)

In Altamont, one hour’s drive east of San Francisco, California, there are approximately 5,000 wind turbines. All were installed in the early 1980s in the wake of generous federal and state subsidies for renewable energy. Subsequent decades have brought larger, more efficient wind turbines, but there are plenty of aged turbines in the Altamont area, with their telltale lattice-work towers.

The older, smaller turbines are unfortunately efficient bird slicers, and will soon get upgraded by operators in the area to larger, slower speed turbines under a deal to avoid more bird deaths.

 Altamont Pass Wind Farm (photograph by David J Laporte)

To get there:
For a good view of the Altamont area wind turbines, drive east from Livermore, California, on Interstate 580. Take the West Grant Line Road exit and either go north to make a left and head east on Altamont Pass Road, or better, go south to wander among the turbines that stretch between the interstate and Patterson Pass road that runs east-west to the south.

Solar One/Solar Two
Daggett, California

Solar Two tower (via eeremultimedia.energy.gov)

The Department of Energy’s Solar One plant was based on a simple if somewhat wild idea: line up nearly 2,000 mirrors to reflect sunlight on a focal point to heat water, make steam, and generate power.

The plant was completed in 1981, in cooperation with Southern California Edison, L.A. Dept. of Water and Power, and the California Energy Commission. It spread across 126 acres 10 miles east of Barstow, California, generated about 10 megawatts of power, and was in operation from 1982 to 1986. In 1995, additional mirrors were added to the site, which now heated a molten salt solution that could store energy while clouds passed overhead.

Solar Two heliostat (via Wikimedia)

Solar One proved the viability of the molten salt energy storage concept. The site was decommissioned in 1999 and converted by University of California-Davis into a kind of telescope that measures gamma rays hitting the atmosphere.

To get there:
Drive on Interstate 40 east of Barstow, take the Daggett exit, skip past historic Highway 66 and instead take Santa Fe Street east for about three miles. Solar One/Solar Two will be on your left, to the north.

THE DEARLY DEPARTED

Kamaoa Wind Farm
Hawaii’s Big Island, Southern tip

Kamaoa Wind Farm in 2006 (photograph by Rebecca Stanek)

A cluster of 37 wind turbines formerly marked the spot of the Kamaoa Wind Farm, at the far south end of Hawaii’s Big Island. The small wind farm opened in 1987 and was decommissioned 20 years later after a deal for the turbines’ power expired.

Yet the Mitsubishi turbines cranked on, became an ever-worse eyesore, and maddened those who wanted good views of the coast and Pacific Ocean. The farm’s owner, Apollo Energy Corp., finally removed the turbines in 2012 and sold them as scrap to China.

Kamaoa Wind Farm in 2007 (photograph by Christian Razukas)

ARCO Carrizo Plain Solar Farm
San Luis Obispo County, California

Abandoned Carrizo Plain's solar power plant (via Center for Land Use Interpretation) 

There’s nothing left of an ambitious plan to generate power from the sun at one of the sunniest places in California, about 70 miles west of Bakersfield. But for 11 years — from 1983 to 1994 — Carrizo Plain hosted a 5.2 megawatt solar farm built by Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO).

ARCO, traditionally an oil company, was a pioneer in solar power after the 1970s energy crisis. It built its own solar cells and deployed them on Carrizo Plain. ARCO sold the 177-acre solar farm to Carrizo Solar Corp. in 1990, which dismantled the farm in 1994.

PG&E Pilot Solar Plant
Kerman, California

Near the town of Kerman, California, sits the new Five Points Solar site, the direct descendent of Pacific Gas & Electric’s pilot solar plant in Kerman, demolished in 2011. The 10-acre site was built in 1992, retired in 1997, and its panels were removed 14 years later after neighbors complained.

Explore more awe-inspiring abandoned places on Atlas Obscura >

In the Middle Ages, books were incredibly scarce, and although many wanted to share knowledge with the masses, they didn't quite trust the public. So the chained library was born, and while most of these restrained reading collections have vanished, a rare few still exist, looking much as they did centuries ago. 

WIMBORNE MINISTER
Dorset, England

Wimborne Minister Chained Library (photograph by dorsetforyou/Flickr user)

Located in the parish church of Wimborne is one of the UK's first public libraries. The room of its massive tomes linked to the shelves is now run by volunteers, and still open to the public. 

ZUTPHEN CHAINED LIBRARY
Zutphen, Netherlands

The Librije (photograph by Jim Forest)

Not much has changed at Zutphen's Librije public library since the 16th century. Most of its books in the rows of reading pews in St. Walburga's Church are chained where they were when first made available to bibliophiles. As a curious contrast to the ecclesiastical air of the stately room are supposed "devil's footprints" under the desks.

HEREFORD CATHEDRAL LIBRARY
Hereford, England

Hereford Cathedral Chained Library (photograph by Ivan Pope)

Most of the chained books predate Gutenberg's 15th century printing press, such as at Hereford Cathedral where its old volumes largely date back to the 12th century. The hand-written books share the Hereford space with the Hereford Mappa Mundi, the world's largest medieval map.

Hereford Cathedral Chained Library in an archive photo (via pellethepoet/Flickr user)

BIBLIOTECA MALATESTIANA
Cesena, Italy

Biblioteca Malatestiana (photograph by Massimiliano Calamelli)

The 58 desks in the Malatestiana Library in Cesena, Italy, each have leather-bound books chained in their shelves. The building with its vaulted ceiling and windows that offered plenty of light in pre-electricity days dates to the 15th century, with little change, including an adherence to the natural light. 

Biblioteca Malatestiana (photograph by Massimiliano Calamelli)

THE FRANCIS TRIGGE LIBRARY
Grantham, England

Chained book at Francis Tigge Library (via discoverstwulframs.org.uk)

Founded in 1598, the Francis Tigge Library is England's oldest public library. It was started by clergymen who thought the public should have access to books, and around 80 of these original volumes remain in the collections. 

CHELSEA OLD CHURCH
London, England

Chelsea Old Church's chained library (photograph by Colin Smith)

There's just a small collection of chained books at Chelsea Old Church, but they were given by the illustrious physician Sir Hans Sloane. The 12th century church also just barely survived the bombings of WWII.

ROYAL GRAMMAR SCHOOL
Guildford, England

Royal Grammar School chained library (via rgs-guildford.co.uk)

Most of the chained books were left to the Royal Grammar School in Guildford, England, by the Bishop of Norwich in his will. While they were endangered by a fire in the 1960s, the books still survive in their locks, although kept in the Headmaster's Study. Now the books with their age and rarity are just as valuable, if not more so, as when they were first cuffed into place, and it's likely the confining chains had something to do with their preservation.

Leaf through more library wonders on Atlas Obscura >

Heilstätten Hohenlychen (all photographs courtesy the author/Abandoned Berlin)

Berlin and its surrounding areas play host to a multitude of discarded, unwanted, or unloved deserted buildings. Most are hidden, others are sealed, with their secrets locked up and kept forever more. Or so they think.

At Abandoned Berlin, we document the German capital’s derelict sites, their histories, and the tall tales behind each one. Here are five ruins the city’s authorities would rather you didn’t know about.

Shrine to Saddam: The GDR’s Iraqi Embassy

Iraq’s embassy to East Germany still plays host to parties, despite the demise of one of the countries. The German Democratic Republic hasn’t existed since 1990, when it reunited with its western sibling to form the country we know now. It was outlived by its embassy to Iraq — but only by a few months.

The embassy must have been cleared overnight after all the staff were ordered out in January of 1991. There were reports of explosives being stored there at the time. All the files, letters, and correspondence were left as they were, and the desks, chairs, and telephones, too. Someone was in a hurry. Pictures of Saddam Hussein adorned the place until they were snapped up by zealous memorial hunters.

It has become more blackened in the intervening years, a little better known, and more vandalized, but it perseveres stubbornly as an embassy of sorts to a country that no longer exists.

Hospital from Hell: Heilstätten Hohenlychen

There is a former sanatorium to the north of Berlin where unspeakable crimes once took place. Heilstätten Hohenlychen has fallen into ruin, neglected in all likelihood as its sins are just too troubling to be forgiven, too disturbing to be forgotten.

The surroundings are wonderful, beside a peaceful tree-lined lake, and the buildings are beautiful, magnificent despite their heartache. Nazi doctor Karl Gebhardt conducted horrific experiments on people here — on prisoners from a nearby women’s concentration camp. He was a pal of SS head honcho Heinrich Himmler, and evil knew no bounds among the Nazi top brass.

Now the building complex is boarded up and decaying. Tiles gather dust and paint flakes off walls. The glass in the pretty window frames has warped with time and the sun twinkles innocently through crystal panes, just passing time. Hohenlychen still needs time to come to terms with itself.

Death by Scalpel: Anatomy Institute

Corpses were stored stacked in rows in custom made fridges in the cellar, pulled out for dissection on a student’s whim. Clean, shiny steel operating tables allowed the blood wash away conveniently and quickly, before any feelings of guilt or queasiness could get in the way.

This Berlin university’s anatomy institute has been abandoned since 2005 but the signs of its cutthroat past remain. The dissecting tables and university morgue are still there, along wit sparking laboratories, delicate display cases, awesome auditoriums, and weird anatomical contraptions.

Scalpel-wielding students no longer roam the college’s eerie corridors, but the feeling of their activities remains. It's pervasive, intrusive, all consuming. It stalks their former haunt, putting off any would-be tenants from taking over. The abandoned anatomy college is likely to keep gleaming silently for a while yet.

Das Boot: Submarine Bunker

Hidden deep in the woods north of Berlin lies an underground bunker that has taken on the characteristics of one of its protégés — a submarine.

Lager Koralle was the headquarters of Germany’s Naval High Command between 1943-45, controlling the Germans’ feted U-boat fleet during this time. The Navy HQ was moved from Berlin to this heavily forested area in the middle of nowhere to escape the air raids that were making life in the German capital difficult during WWII.

It turned out to be no escape from the skies, however, and it too was struck by an air raid in April 1945, shortly before the Russians took over. They blew up the over-ground bunkers, but used the rest of the site as a munitions depot. The submarine — sorry, subterranean — bunker survived, and is still accessible through a hatch in the ground.

In the pitch dark underground, water drips incessantly from the low claustrophobic ceilings — drip, drip, drip— conjuring a terrifying reminder of the sailors’ fate as they battled in cramped conditions for their lives under the waves. Tension rises with each drop until it becomes unbearable and very soon you too are dealing with waves of panic. It’s impossible to stay for long.

Bowled Over: Abandoned Bowling Alley

Formerly one of Berlin’s most popular bowling alleys, Süd-Bowling now lies empty, vandalized and gutted by fire. No one has bowled here for over for 20 years or more. It’s going spare.

The old Kegelbahn, as Germans call bowling alleys, used to have 16 lanes, but no trace of them remains. The ceiling is collapsing in a jumble of cables and metal bars, soggy rubble covers the ground wherever you step, and old hoardings meekly advertise wares and services from a bygone era.

One pin remains, in the carpark under the alley itself, but all its colleagues have split. All that’s left is the reluctant kingpin, bowled over.

Ciarán Fahey explores the stunning ruins of Germany's capital at Abandoned Berlin, where you can discover more of these derelict wonders.

The dark beauty of Green-Wood Cemetery's catacombs at night
(all photographs by Steven Acres, visit http://stevenacr.es to view more of his work)

Last week, the New York Obscura Society and Riverhead Books invited 40 guests to join us on a mystery excursion to an undisclosed location. A small crowd braved the night's heavy downpour to gather at Madison Square Park in the early evening hours, where a charter bus was ready to whisk them away to a top secret destination, with a very special guest awaiting their arrival.

The rain and fog obscured our route to the extent that when we arrived at Green-Wood Cemetery's towering gates our location was still a complete puzzle for many of our passengers. The bus slowly made its way through the windy cemetery roads to our final destination: the Green-Wood catacombs.  

A flooded burial vault

Aglow with candles and lanterns, and with streams of rain finding their way through the burial chamber's 19th century skylights, showering into great pools of dark water on the floor of the various vaults, the hillside catacombs were at their very best: moody, atmospheric, and eerily beautiful.

Guests filed down the illuminated passageway, already a bit in awe, but following our guidance to make their way to the very back of the catacombs, at last the reason for our secret excursion was revealed. At a small table the infamous highwire-walker Philippe Petit awaited. He greeted his audience warmly before delving into a whimsical, intimate performance of close magic, conversing with us about his personal creative process and sharing excerpts from his new book, Creativity: The Perfect Crime.

Our guest of honor awaits

Philippe Petit enchants the crowd

With the aim of conveying a sense of Philippe's outlook on creativity as an often illicit, even criminal endeavor, our original itinerary for the evening involved a beautiful, abandoned structure just outside of the city limits. Unfortunately, a completely unrelated occurrence involving some pretty heinous animal sacrifice in a nearby vacant lot drew an onslaught of law enforcement to the area just days before our big event, forcing us to make a hasty change of plans.

Philippe's lucky audience

A lesson in sleight of hand

Although the transgressive element of the night had to be scrapped, the catacombs made for a pretty incredible substitution. Following Philippe's presentation, experimental harpist Ellena Phillips performed and several of the burial chambers were opened to reveal hidden cocktail bars. One of our guests even started his own pop up tarot reading station on a dry section of the catacombs' floor.

The beautiful Ellena Phillips on the harp

Impromptu divinations

As our night came to a close, Philippe bid us adieu. Our guests loaded back onto the bus to return to their various boroughs, signed books in hand, leaving the catacombs behind like awaking from a strange and beautiful dream.

A quiet still life in a vacant burial chamber

A final glance goodbye

The Obscura Society is the real-world exploration arm of Atlas Obscura We seek out secret histories, unusual access, and opportunities for our community to explore strange and overlooked places hidden all around us. Join us on our next adventure!

All Upcoming Obscura Society Events

all photographs by the author

A VISUAL LOOK AT MASKS, SKULLS AND TAXIDERMY CREATURES

[Sarawak Museum 1.JPG – The proboscis taxidermy display.]

Entering the galleries in the Sarawak Museum, you probably can’t help but feel like all eyes are on you - watching you, watching them.

[Sarawak Museum 2.JPG – A loris taxidermy giving you an eyeful.]

It may be the use of minimal bright lighting, or the gloom of a cloudy weather that day; whichever the reason, this added a subtle eerie air to the roomful of taxidermy specimens that has been there for decades.

[Sarawak Museum 3.JPG – Sarawak Museum (Old Building), the oldest museum in Borneo.]

Prompted by the famous British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, Charles Brooke the second White Rajah of Sarawak, built the Sarawak Museum in 1891. This historic building sits on a slope in the center of Kuching, Sarawak. It houses the natural history collection on its ground floor, and the ethnographical artifacts of indigenous peoples on the first.

[Sarawak Museum 4.JPG – Taxidermied Orang Utan, one of the many taxidermy exhibits from the Brooke Era displayed in the museum.]

The natural history collection contains many taxidermy exhibits that dates back to the Brooke Era; like this particular Orang Utan display. Based on the story, this Orang Utan was one of the two shot by James Brooke, the first Rajah of Sarawak. Both Orang Utans were then packed in ice and shipped to Britain, where they were taxidermied and mounted into a display case of wood and glass, and then shipped back to this museum. Imagine the amount of time it took for all this done with no harm to the entire display in the 1900s.

[Sarawak Museum 5.JPG – Another long-time exhibit, a fang-baring primate taxidermy encased in a wood and glass display.]

[Sarawak Museum 6.JPG – Flying squirrels in permanent suspended animation.]

[Sarawak Museum 7.JPG – Bushy-tailed ground squirrel taxidermy from the jungles of Borneo.]

[Sarawak Museum 8.JPG – Various taxidermied birds of Sarawak.]

[Sarawak Museum 9.JPG – Unusual but well-preserved jungle fowl.]

[Sarawak Museum 10.JPG – Forever watchful big-eyed tarsier and loris.]

[Sarawak Museum 11.JPG – A taxidermy of wild cats.]

[Sarawak Museum 12.JPG – A local fish specimen conserved in a jar is also part of the natural history collection, along with other specimens of reptiles, amphibians and marine life.]

Moving on to the first floor, you’ll find a collection of traditional indigenous artifacts.

[Sarawak Museum 13.JPG – Traditional ceremonial masks from various ethnic groups.]

It includes these wood-carved masks used by spirit doctors for rituals from celebrating a good harvest to spiritual ceremonies like luring illness-causing evil spirits out from a victim’s body.

[Sarawak Museum 14.JPG – Masks of the Orang Ulu (left) and the Iban (right), which has a ‘beard’ made from human hair.]

Most of these masks come from the Iban, a tribal subgroup of the Dayak people of Sarawak. Some ceremonial masks have actual human hair implanted into them as facial hair.

[Sarawak Museum 15.JPG – More masks from the Iban tribe.]

[Sarawak Museum 16.JPG – Creepier looking Iban ceremonial masks.]

In the old days, headhunting was practised by the Dayak people. Usually, this practice relates to funeral rites where a head of the enemy is required to end the mourning period, especially for the Iban and Orang Ulu groups.

[Sarawak Museum 17.JPG – A circle of human skulls hung on the ceiling, as part of the exhibit in a longhouse model built within the museum.]

Heads preserved and installed in longhouses are usually placed at the communal gallery. These heads are believed to bring a good harvest, fertility to the community, and serves as a visual warning to enemies. However, keeping these heads takes diligence: they need regular food offerings, and a constant fire lit beneath them. Failure to do so would anger the spirits of the heads, and this only spells bad omens to the inhabitants.

[Sarawak Museum 18.JPG – Face-to-face with a skull.]

Impressing the in-laws may be difficult today, but in those days, it takes on a whole different meaning. A suitor had to present a head to the parents of a potential bride in order to be truly impressive and win her hand in marriage.

Of course, the practice of headhunting has long been eradicated. No need to lose your head with worry over it today.

The Swing at the End of the World in Ecuador (photograph by Rinaldo Wurglitsch)

Home is where the imagination lives. My 12-year-old self only required a small bedroom to create an expansive world of wonder where epic dramas played out and fantasy kingdoms were captured and rescued on a daily basis. Twelve-year-old you might have had a blanket fort under a grand piano, a survival tent in a modest patch of backyard, a treehouse that consisted of a couple sturdy limbs and some boards nailed to a trunk.

No matter where you grew up, your home was the world in which you discovered and designed other realities for yourself — places you would call yours if you could. The home of your dreams might've been inspired by a beloved book or an exciting film, or maybe it manifested purely from the rapid fire of your developing brain. Whatever the source, even as adults, our inner child lights up when we recognize a nook or cranny in this world we we would have drooled over as a kid. My inner kid is the long-burning lamp of curiosity that inspired me to compile this list.

So here we go: Places my 12-year-old self would have loved to call home...

HOBBITON
Matamata, New Zealand

Hobbiton (photograph by Rob Chandler)

At home on The Shire... (photograph by Rob Chandler)

What I loved most about Tolkien’s literary universe as a kid was the incredible landscapes and magical environments he created. Many 12-year-olds have imagined the sights and smells of a cozy Hobbit dwelling in the Shire, perhaps curled up with that very book in front of a tiny hearth in a hole underground. 

A local farm in this rural community of New Zealand caught the eye of Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson for its lush, rolling hills and whimsical pastoral. He knew immediately it was the Shire. Now Hobbit-abandoned, this tiny, charmed village is open for tourism.

CHEMOSPHERE
Los Angeles, California 

John Lautner's Chemosphere (photograph by evdropkick/Flickr user)

Home sweet UFO, hovering over L.A. (photograph by mikelbarto/Flickr user)

The Chemosphere in Los Angeles, California, looks like E.T.’s ship lighting down in lush greenery atop a hill. What kid wouldn’t dream of being the captain? The Modernist house was designed by John Lautner in 1960. Lit at night, it looks ready to take off into the cosmos.

THE HEMLOFT
Whistler, Canada

A secret treehouse egg just hanging out (photo by Geoffrey Steventon)

In Whistler, Canada, I can see myself now, uncupping a long telescope from my snug little lookout, like a long shot from Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom. Let your inner child behold: the HemLoft. 

Says carpenter, dreamer, and lover of ingenuity, Joel Allen, on his site: “The HemLoft is a self-funded secret creation that I built on crown land in Whistler, Canada. It hangs on a precipitous slope, in a towering stand of hemlocks, about a five minute walk from the nearest road…” With good friends, Allen lovingly designed and built this beautiful suspended treehouse in 2008 and documented the experience. You can watch some of it in this video. In 2013, Hemloft was give to the Canadian Wilderness Adventures, which took it apart and has plans to reconstruct it at some point in the future. 

HOUSE ON THE ROCK
Spring Green, Wisconsin

Carousel in the House on the Rock (photograph by Rob Pongsajapan)

Inside House on the Rock (photograph by Garret Voight)

The trippy labyrinthine lair of a perpetual child (photograph by Garret Voight)

Alex Jordan was an architect with a chip on his shoulder about Frank Lloyd Wright, and an unstoppable imagination. Inside the House on the Rock, what looks to be an unassuming Wright knock-off planted into a large rock in Wisconsin is a sometimes charming and sometimes chilling odyssey into the manic mind of a Pan-esque visionary, who kept building deeper and deeper until the day he died.

Wander room after room of glass cases full of toy collections, visit tiny recreations of villages, and gaze in wonder at a carousel of strangely painted mythical creatures. All my 12-year-old self wanted when I visited this rural spot was to somehow jam myself into an arcade machine or a grandfather clock and hide until the museum closed, so I could explore after dark.  

THE SWALLOWED ANCHOR HOUSE
Esquimalt, British Columbia, Canada

The pirate’s life for you... (photograph by Yvonne Fried)

It may just be a small Victorian ornamented in eccentric Nautical ephemera, but my 12-year-old self would have called this infamous little abode in a West Bay Marina village in British Columbia a pirate’s quarters.

Legend has it that the owner and bedazzler of this home was an older gentleman who would dress as a mermaid and row a small boat out from this house on the regular to live the sea life. Much of the loot decking this home he salvaged locally, so it holds a lot of history. Unfortunately, the house might soon be demolished. 

BIOSPHERE II
Oracle, Arizona

Become a scientist and you can actually live here! (photograph by Ronald Hall)

When I was a preteen, my exposure to environmentalism didn’t necessarily come from science classes or local activism. But I did get some insight on the relationship between humans and this planet through the misadventures of Pauly Shore and Stephen Baldwin in Bio-Dome.

I was thrilled to discover that the futuristic complex this stoner comedy’s protagonists mistake for a shopping mall actually parodied a real-life Bio-Dome in the Arizona desert, where scientists were sealing themselves in to carry out environmental research missions. Launched in 1987, the Biosphere 2 is currently owned by the University of Arizona and is now more of a learning and research center than a closed ecosystem.

DARK ISLAND
St. Lawrence Seaway, Hammond, New York

Singer Castle (photograph by John Hayes)

Your own private island of sulk... (photograph by John Hayes)

The dream of youth: Disappearing from the pop culture-drenched, angst ridden existence to a private island somewhere remote, where you can sulk in a solitary tower or, better yet, create your own reality. This might be what Michael Jackson, our contemporary culture’s perpetual adolescent, had in mind when he attempted to purchase Singer Castle on Dark Island for his own beloved Neverland.

In the Thousand Islands region between the United States and Canada rests this mysterious private island upon which looms the eerie castle of one of the royal families of Golden Age New York City. The family who owned the Singer corporation (that’s right, sewing machines) had the castle built in 1903. Once known as the Towers, the residence is full of secret passageways from its days as a bootlegger’s station during Prohibition. Until open to tourism in the last decade, Dark Island was a private home.

THE POSEIDON UNDERSEA RESORT
Fiji

A life aquatic... (via PoseidonResorts.com)

An underwater existence would sound like something out of a sci-fi novel to 12-year-old me, but I’d jump at the chance to sleep, dine, and read books with the fishes. In the last couple of years, great big fantastical designs of underwater living spaces have started to become a reality, the most promising of which is the Poseidon Undersea Resort off the coast of Fiji, now taking registration for future reservations.

In case the responsible adult in you feels a bit wary: Under the resort’s FAQ, prospective guests are reassured that, unlike underwater research habitats, the pressure inside the hotel is as above-sea-like as possible and does not change.

DR. MARIO MOTTA'S PRIVATE OBSERVATORY
Cape Ann, Massachusetts   

The private observatory (photograph by Mario Motta MD)

A star room of one’s own ... (photograph by Mario Motta MD)

For any rural or city kid who used to try to get to the highest height, whether that be the roof of your home, your middle school, or the local make-out point with your camping telescope, this is what happens when you grow up to become a cardiologist.

Dr. Mario Motta’s breathtaking view of the cosmos was an addition his inner child made to the blueprints for his lovely Gloucester home in 2004. From his gorgeous DIY observatory, this amateur but prolific astronomer takes stellar photographs, some of which he shares with his local astronomy club here. 

BURG ELTZ
Münstermaifeld, Germany

Knights eternally at your service... (photograph by Jack Countway)

Not only is West Germany's Burg Eltz aesthetically the storybook castle of my childhood dreams, but it has the delicious reputation of being haunted by medieval knights. What more could my inner kid ghostbuster ask for?

I’ll admit it, I’m still on Geocities-bleeding-text-and-animated-bat-gifs-style ghost websites some late nights, seeking out reportedly haunted real estate all over the world. But you don’t have to dig through the supernatural internets for info on how you can experience Eltz castle for yourself, just go here, it's open to explore for both intrepid children and young-at-heart adults.

Find more treehouses, castles, and underwater wonders that your 12-year-old self would adore on Atlas Obscura >

At a fundamental level, art is intended to elicit an emotional state. Statues in public spaces in particular are lightning rods for controversy, possibly due to the implication that the piece will remain for a significant period of time or that some community value is manifested physically by the statue itself.

However, there are just some statues that everyone seems to hate (or at least love to hate). Beauty may indeed be in the eye of the beholder, but for some of the statues below, only the sculptor’s mother may have applauded at the unveiling.

Nathan Bedford Forrest Statue
Nashville, Tennessee, United States 

Nathan Bedford Forrest Statue (photograph by Brent Moore)

A common nominee for biggest eyesore in Nashville, Tennessee, this gold and silver disaster along the highway depicts none other than one of the key founders of the Ku Klux Klan (General Forrest's defenders usually counter that the Klan didn't become such an overtly white supremacist group until later, but this is splitting racial hate hairs). The statue is surrounded by thirteen poles, each of which used to fly confederate flags. 

And yes, he is dual wielding a sword and a pistol, and awfully delighted about it.

photograph by Brent Moore

Burnside Fountain
Massachusetts, United States 

Burnside Fountain (Photograph via Wikimedia)

The Burnside Fountain in Worcester, Massachusetts, allegedly depicts a young boy riding a turtle. For those of us with our minds deeply drenched in the gutter (hello, everyone), this statue depicts a clear act of man-turtle loving.

The background of this fountain dregs up some morbid bits and bobs. Architect Henry Bacon, who later was the architect for the Lincoln Memorial, put together the plan for this fountain, and the piece was assigned to sculptor Charles Y. Harvey. Around a week after beginning the sculpture, Harvey began hearing voices ordering him to kill himself. He eventually was found in a park along the river with the two razors that he used to slit his own throat. Another sculptor, Sherry Fry, completed the statue and the finished artwork was installed in Central Square with no dedication ceremony or unveiling.

photograph by Rafaelgarcia/Wikimedia

Christopher Columbus
Washington, United States 

Christopher Columbus (photograph by Hubert K)

It's unclear why a favorite "discoverer" of countries has a statue in Seattle of all places, facing a body of water he would perhaps never have dreamed of existing. The statue was soundly rejected by the local Arts Commission of Seattle, but the Seattle City Council overruled the people who could have averted this disaster. Christopher Columbus' alien-robot doppelganger was the first statue by local Douglas Bennett, who said he wanted to depict Columbus as gaunt and worried. Bennett allegedly never received a commission to sculpt again.

via City of Seattle

Baphomet (Satan)
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States [TBD]

Satan with two children (via Satanic Temple)

For a statue that does not yet exist, it has certainly drawn a lot of controversy. In protest of the existing monument of the Ten Commandments, the Satanic temple has asked the grounds committee for the Oklahoma State Capitol to permit the placement of a privately funded statue of Satan in a Baphomet form, complete with pentagram and two children. 

Any decision on the statue's installation will have to wait until the current ACLU lawsuit to remove the Ten Commandments statue is resolved. According to the Temple, the statue will have a lap for visitors to sit in for Kodak moments.

Triumph of Civic Virtue
Brooklyn, New York, United States

Triumph of Civic Virtue (Photograph by Jim Henderson)

Long derided as sexist, this statue by Frederick MacMonnies depicts a nude male depiction of "Civic Virtue" standing astride Vice and Corruption, represented by two female sirens prone on the ground. First unveiled in 1922 outside New York City's City Hall, then-Mayor Fiorella LaGuardia banished it to Queens, allegedly due to his exasperation of being “mooned” by the rather shapely buttocks of the nude Civic Virtue. 

After nearly a century of bickering and wrangling between defenders and detractors of the piece, "Triumph of Civic Virtue" was finally banished in 2012 to Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.

Civic Virtue in the cemetery (photograph by Allison Meier/Atlas Obscura)

Sleepwalker
Wellesley, Massachusetts, United States

Sleepwalker (photograph by Lorianne DiSabato)

When first installed, some students at the all-women Wellesley College reported feeling disturbed or even threatened by the realistic statue of a balding man shambling across the snowy lawn in his tighty-whities. More than a hundred students signed a petition requesting that the university administration remove it immediately, citing concerns about triggering sexual assault fears and undue stress.

Despite the controversy, on February 20, 2014, the president of Wellesley College announced that the college will keep "Sleepwalker" where it stands until the end of its temporary exhibition this spring.

Sleepwalker & a snowman (photograph by Lee Toma)

Proudy
Prague, Czech Republic 

Proudy (via Wikimedia)

The Czech artist David Černý has built his career on challenging sculptures that leave few social mores sacrosanct. With "Proudy" (“Streams”), two animatronic sculptures in front of the Kafka Museum piss continuously into a puddle shaped like the Czech Republic. Microchips in these two satisfied-looking statutes allow the precisely aimed streams of water (moving hips and penises and all) to be used in writing out famous quotations from Czech literature.

Jesus the Homeless
Davidson, North Carolina, United States

Jesus the Homeless (via Shellpoint Baptist Church)

This statue of a man sleeping on a park bench with a blanket against the cold fits right into any city’s skid row panorama. Unfortunately for the upscale denizens of Davidson, North Carolina, the statue is here to stay, and a closer look at its metal feet reveals crucifixion wounds that identify the subject as none other than Jesus, son of God.

When first installed, the statue prompted calls to the police requesting that they remove the vagrant, outcries that the piece demeans the neighborhood, and grumblings that this particular portrayal of Jesus is rather insulting.

"Jesus the Homeless" is intended as a visual depiction of a biblical passage in which Christ instructs his followers, “As you did it to one of the least of my brothers, you did it to me.” Other communities have been more enthusiastic about the statue, with requests for additional casts in Chicago and Washington, D.C. Apparently even Pope Francis might approve of one installed on the Via della Conciliazione, the road leading into St. Peter’s Basilica.

Unconditional Surrender
San Diego, California, United States

Unconditional Surrender (via US Navy)

When this 25-foot statue by J. Seward Johnson II was approved, two of the 12 members of San Diego’s Public Art Committee resigned in protest, and a third threatened to join them. Even the remaining board members admitted that the sculpture did not quite represent fine art at its best, but cited the fervent stream of visitors who loved to take pictures in front of it.

The kissing couple depicts a famous Life magazine photo of a sailor embracing a woman in Times Square on the day that Japan announced its surrender at the close of World War II. Fittingly, even the photo itself comes with a whiff of controversy because the woman in the picture, Greta Friedman, explained that she was “grabbed by a sailor. . . . I felt that he was very strong. He was just holding me tight.” In other words, a drunk sailor delirious with celebrating the war’s end, grabbed a random woman and made out with her, leading some to question whether a statue should be erected to celebrate a non-consensual act of intimacy.

Find more loved and loathed statues on Atlas Obscura >

Underground in the Virginia-Pocahontas Coal Company Mine (1974) (photograph by Jack Corn, via US National Archives)

You may recognize the name Iron Mountain — it’s a major records management and data storage company, and their shredder trucks can be seen collecting documents at offices in many big American cities. These days, much of their business takes place in “the cloud,” but Iron Mountain got its start in 1951 by storing bank records inside the “Iron Mountain mine” in Livingston, New York.

There, the cavities and tunnels left behind by an old limestone mine were turned into an ultra-secure storage facility 220 feet underground.  The company originally did business under the name “Iron Mountain Atomic Storage,” highlighting their ability to keep your valuables safe in the event of nuclear attack.  Today in Pennsylvania, the company is using part of another limestone mine to test the potential of geothermal cooling systems for computer server farms.  

 The original vault at Iron Mountain Atomic Storage (via Iron Mountain)

Around the world, people have taken over abandoned or disused mines and given them new life.  Sometimes mines are used for practical purposes, as with the Iron Mountain facilities, but others are more whimsical. In Colombia there is an entire underground cathedral crafted from salt, while Romania has an amusement park and art gallery underground. Others have been turned into medical clinics, shopping malls, government offices, and even a massive mushroom farm outside of Pittsburgh. 

The Salt Cathedral of Zipaquirá is an elaborate religious venue and tourist attraction, built 200 meters (656 feet) underground in Cundinamarca, Colombia. Although not officially a Catholic church, up to 3,000 visitors attend services in the Cathedral each week. It is not just a sanctuary; there are several chambers open to visitors depicting religious statuary carved from salt, as well as educational displays on the history of the mine and the salt mining process.

Pews in Zipaquira Cathedral (photograph by McKay Savage) 

Cross-shaped entryway in Zipaquira Cathedral (photograph by Remi Jouan)

The Khewra Salt Mines in Pakistan are said to be the second-largest in the world. Mining was first recorded here in the 1200s. Today, the mines still produce 325,000 tons of salt every year, and they don’t expect to run out any time soon. 

The empty space left behind by all this mining has been transformed into a popular tourist attraction. There is a mosque, as well as a post office, constructed entirely from salt. Among the more unique uses of the space is a 12-bed clinic for asthma patients to take in the salt mine air. Although it sounds downright Victorian, they are not the only place offering such therapy in the belief that the salt mine environment is beneficial for respiratory diseases.

Visitor praying in the Salt Mosque at Khewra Mines (photograph by Smsarmad)

Inside the Khewra Mines (photograph by Manal Khan) 

Outside of Boyers, Pennsylvania, an old limestone mine has been put to more prosaic use as the U.S. Office of Personnel Management Retirement Operations Center. The center employs 600 people working underground to process millions of paper documents by hand. Some of those documents end up in one of the 28,000 file cabinets lining the mine’s tunnels.  

The office is not located underground for security purposes or anything like that. The government just needed a lot of space to store files, and this turned out to be a very economical option.  

The Salina Turda Salt Mine in Romania went in a different direction, becoming an otherworldly underground amusement park. After mining stopped in the 1930s, the space was briefly used as an air-raid shelter and then as a cheese warehouse. In 1992, it was opened to the public as a park. In addition to a Ferris wheel and lake for boating, the mine contains a spa, museum and art gallery. 

Turda Salt Mine, Romania (photograph by Codrin Bucur)

Boating in the mine (photograph by Cristian Bortes)

A retired limestone mine in Worthington, Pennsylvania, is an important part of the world’s largest mushroom farm. In addition to a 2,000 acre aboveground property, Creekside Mushrooms Ltd. grows mushrooms underground in a 150-mile network of limestone tunnels. The facility can produce 60 million pound of mushrooms every year, and is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records. 

An example of mushrooms growing in a limestone mine in France (photograph by Édouard Bergé)  

Poland’s Wieliczka Mine produced salt from the 13th Century through 2007, leaving behind a thousand-foot deep, 178-mile long hole in the ground. Today mining has stopped, but millions of visitors still come to see the statuary, friezes, chapels, chandeliers and even an entire cathedral carved from the salt at this UNESCO World Heritage Site. If you can’t wait until your next trip to Poland, you can tour the mine from your computer on Google Street View.  

Wieliczka Salt Mine (photograph by jhadow)

Wieliczka Salt Mine (photograph by Pablo Nicolás Taibi Cicare)

Descend into more magnificent mines on Atlas Obscura >

Christopher Columbus, painted by Sebastiano del Piombo, 1519 (via Wikimedia Commons)

One of America’s top underwater archeologists says he’s found the remains of the flagship that sailed on Christopher Columbus’ first voyage to the Americas. The Santa Maria ran aground off Haiti in December 1492, and Columbus returned to Spain with two other vessels. The precise location of the wreck has been lost for centuries, but now, underwater explorer Barry Clifford believes he has found the ship on a reef off Haiti’s northern coast.

Clifford’s team first found and photographed the wreck in 2003, but at the time didn’t realize what they’d discovered. A re-examination of underwater photographs and new reconnaissance dives prompted a return visit to the site a few weeks ago, and Clifford says he’s confident he’s found what he calls “the ship that changed the course of human history.” The evidence rests in part on the fact that the wreck’s location lines up with information from Columbus’ diary, and stones found on the site have been linked to the region of Spain where the Santa Maria was constructed. 

Anchor from the Santa Maria on display at the Musee Pantheon National in Haiti (Photo by Sean Clowes via Wikimedia Commons)

A cannon found among the wreckage in 2003 also helped Clifford put the pieces together. According to Clifford, the cannon’s provenance was “misdiagnosed” in 2003, but after conducting further research on cannons of Columbus’ day, Clifford realized the cannon might indeed have been part of the Santa Maria. Unfortunately, on the most recent visit Clifford discovered that the cannon had been looted by treasure hunters, along with other artifacts that would have helped conclusively identify the wreck. 

Such underwater looting is increasingly common, and frustrating for archeologists. According to UNESCO, by 1974 all known wrecks off the Turkish coast had already been stripped of their valuables. In the 1990s, Israeli archaeologists estimated that 60% of cultural objects once found in their waters had been taken. Today French scientists estimate that only five percent of the antique wrecks off the coast of France are still untouched. In response, UNESCO created the Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage to strengthen the legal prohibitions against excavating and appropriating objects from shipwrecks that are at least a hundred years old. 46 countries have signed the treaty, although the United States is not among them.

The archeologist who claims to have found the Santa Maria, Barry Clifford, was previously known for finding the wreck of the Whydah Gally, a slave ship and pirate vessel that sank off the coast of Cape Cod in 1717. Canons, firearms, and pirate treasure from that ship are on display at the Whydah Pirate Museum in Provincetown, Massachusetts, while other items are part of the National Geographic Society’s touring exhibit “Real Pirates.” Clifford hopes that once detailed excavations confirm the identity of the Santa Maria (negotiations with the Haitian government are ongoing), remnants from that wreck could also go on display at a museum in Haiti.

Meanwhile, if you want to see a real shipwreck, you can visit the Jablanac shipwreck in Jablanac, Croatia, theÖzlem shipwreck in Batumi, Georgia, or the Dominator shipwreck off Palos Verdes peninsula in California, among other options. Sweden’s Vasa Museum features the remains of the Vasa warship, which sank on its maiden voyage in Stockholm in 1628, while at England's Mary Rose Museum, visitors can glimpse the remains of Henry VIII's flagship, which sank in a battle with the French in 1545.

 
Mary Rose conservation in progress (via Wikimedia Commons)

Diaphonized mouse by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

You've likely seen diaphonized creatures on display in natural history museums, where transparent specimens of dead fish, frogs, and snakes float in crystalline vials. Unlike the stuffed birds and mounted deer heads of taxidermy, these specimens are transparent, offering a literal window into their skeletal structure—enhanced by the rich reds, purples, and blues that highlight their bones and cartilage. Scientists have been using diaphonization techniques for decades, but more recently, artists have also taken up the practice. Atlas Obscura decided to look a little deeper at this unique form of preparation.

First developed in 1977 by the scientists G. Dingerkus and L.D. Uhler, the process of diaphonization has also been known as "clearing and staining." The animals are rendered transparent (the "clearing") by bathing in a soup of trypsin, a digestive enzyme that slowly breaks down their flesh. They also soak in several batches of bone, muscle, or cartilage dyes (the "staining"), with alizarin red and alcian blue the most commonly used.

Diaphonized snake by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

The results are at once visually striking and chemically intensive. As biologist Sadie Stednitz explained, “The appeal of diaphonized specimens is that they are beautiful physical objects that also give us an appreciation for biology.”

Stednitz is the owner of California-based Studio Pollex, which sells diaphonized pieces along with more familiar taxidermy. Stednitz told Atlas Obscura, “I work primarily with animals [that are] available as dissection specimens: rats, mice, frogs, fish, and snakes.” But not all creatures are suitable for the procedure, which has traditionally been used to study an animal’s skeletal structure. Large birds and mammals have feathers and fur that are difficult to remove. Moreover, both types of creatures are commonly dissected, and can easily be dry preserved. 

Other factors are also important: “A large rat could take upwards of six months to complete, so time is a big consideration," Stednitz said. "The denser and larger the tissues, the longer it will take for any stains to reach them. Anything that affects the chemistry of the dyes can [also] cause issues. For example, some dyes will only work in an acidic solution, and some animal tissues do not fare well in that kind of environment.”

Indeed, the technique is most often used with specimens that measure less than a foot in length. Thin-skinned amphibians, fish, and reptiles are especially well-suited to diaphonization, because their tissues are often too delicate for dissection and require preservation in fluids. Young mammals and birds are also suitable for this reason. By avoiding invasive measures, diaphonization helps scientists identify bones and cartilage structures as they exist in the body without any displacement. The technique is also especially useful for studying fetal organisms in the laboratory.

With a crystal-clear view of the subject’s internal features, scientists can also observe the direct impact of environmental pollutants. Diaphonist Brandon Ballengée has been a pioneer in this field, using cleared and stained frogs to highlight deformities such as extra limbs. Furthermore, fetuses offer crucial insight into how these chemicals affect normal growth and development. 

As Stednitz notes, “Comparative anatomy is another application; if you want to visually demonstrate the evolutionary relationships between different species, the skeleton is a good place to start because it is easy to see how one body plan can be modified to suit many different tasks."

 
Diaphonized specimens created by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

Despite its merits, diaphonization is not widely used in the field, due to its finicky and time-consuming nature. Advancements in imaging technology have also rendered the practice uncommon. However, diaphonization is increasingly becoming an art form. Animals that are predominantly cartilaginous, such as rays and sharks, will appear blue due to the cartilage stain, while bony fish, mammals, and reptiles will appear mostly red from the bone stain. Shades of purple can even be seen with muscle stains. With such a variety of vivid stains and animals to choose from, the creative possibilities are endless.

Among the public, diaphonization is not well known aside from a handful of collectors who seek out curios. Thankfully, that trend is slowly changing with the presence of Studio Pollex, and the exposure of other diaphonists such as Iori Tomita and Dr. Adam Summers. Tomita’s work has been displayed around Japan, including at the Tokyo Mineral Show, while Dr. Summers was featured in an exhibit called “Cleared: The Art of Science” at the Seattle Aquarium, which opened on December 1, 2013 and will be on display until early June (it will then go on tour).

Diaphonized frog by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

Fortunately, these magnificent works of anatomy can also be found in several natural museums. Often, the cleared and stained specimens are housed within ichthyology (fish) or herpetology (reptiles and amphibians) collections. Some notable locales include the Field Museum of Natural History, Royal British Columbia Museum, Texas Natural Science Center, Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and University of Alberta’s Museum of Zoology. Many of these locations serve as repositories for research. For example, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History boasts one of the largest herpetology collections in the United States. The Burke Museum has an ichthyology collection that has 324 lots of cleared and stained fish. The Field Museum of Natural History has an online searchable database of diaphonized fish, which lists the international location of specimens.

But no matter the location, the sight of a diaphonized animal is instantly appealing. Stednitz sums it up best by saying, “Visibility, color, and presentation are important factors for both academic and artistic specimens.” Indeed, the process of diaphonization blends art and science together so skillfully, it revives the dead with new life and color.

 
Diaphonized specimen by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

Diaphonized specimen by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

Diaphonized specimen by Sadie Stednitz, image copyright Chad Lowe

Our fellow explorers over at Hendrick's Gin have been up to some very interesting things, taking an expedition to Venezuela in search of a mysterious botanical with veteran explorer Charles Brewer Carias! Here is part four of the article series documenting the 'Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest':

Watch to see how gin is distilled in the jungle and the debut of the Venezuelan Guyana’s first ever cocktail bar with a rather extraordinary Martini serve.

As the ‘Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest’ expedition team trekked through the savannahs and deep Venezuelan rainforest, the indigenous Indians pointed out botanicals that they use for food, drink and herbal medicines. Any intriguing botanicals from a day’s trek were taken back to the village for testing. Using a tiny ten-litre alembic still - a very miniature version of the beloved Bennet still used in the distillery today to make Hendrick’s Gin – Lesley Gracie extracted, distilled and assessed the selection of unusual botanicals, logging everything in her expedition diary.

Countless distillations were made, but it was one botanical in particular that captured Lesley’s senses, that of the most unusual, ‘Scorpion Tail’. Believed by natives of the jungle to be a plant with magical powers for warding away evil spirits and traditionally used in tea infusions to treat stomach complaints, Scorpion Tail has an intriguing complex deep green note that works extraordinarily well with the peculiar character of Hendrick’s Gin.

In the heart of the jungle, Lesley distilled 8.4 litres of Scorpion Tail concentrate, which she successfully transported back to Scotland in her suitcase. Since the trip, Lesley has been tinkering away with the rather exotic Scorpion Tail distillate to create a rather extraordinary tiny batch (only 560 bottles exist and it will not be available for retail) of limited edition Hendrick’s Gin, called Hendrick’s Kanaracuni – named after the village where the expedition team were based during the expedition.


In celebration of this wondrously rare liquid, Hendrick’s Gin will be inviting fans across the world from 12th May to pledge a most unusual offering to the Hendrick’s Society of the Unusual Wall of Oddities for their chance to win a trip of a lifetime to the home of Hendrick’s Gin. Unusual offerings to the wall can include anything and everything under the sun, from an impassioned ode to a cucumber to a divinely inspired painting of a haggis, and all things creative or other worldly in between – the most unusual, bizarre and delightfully bonkers the offering, the better. Upload an unusual photo, intriguing video or an exquisitely crafted piece of text – the choice is yours – just be sure to let your imagination run wild.

With an eye for the curious things in life, Lesley Gracie will judge the entries and pick the fervent individual who will journey to Scotland later this year to have their unusual offering inducted into the distillery for all eternity.

For more information on the new Hendrick’s Kanaracuni limited edition gin and to enter the Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest competition, visit http://www.hendricksgin.com/perilous-botanical-quest
 

Just like human beings, machines eventually wear out and cease being useful. But where do machines—and other types of inanimate objects—go when they die? Around the world, there are many areas set aside (formally or informally) for the rusting carcasses of airplanes, tanks, ships, neon signs, and other objects. Below, a look at some of the most fascinating such sites around the world: 

309TH AEROSPACE MAINTENANCE AND REGENERATION GROUP
Tuscon, Arizona 

A partial view of the Davis Monthan Air Force Base (image via GoogleEarth)

A whopping 2,600 acres of the Davis-Montham Air Force Base in Tuscon are reserved for an aircraft cemetery, officially known as the 309th Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Group but popularly called "The Boneyard." The US Air Force began parking planes here shortly after World War II, and today the grounds are filled with almost 4,000 aircraft and 7,000 engines that were once used by the Air Force, Army, Navy, Coast Guard, and other branches of the US government. (The combined purchase price of the machines in The Boneyard is estimated at $35 billion.) Tuscon's low humidity, rare rainfall, and alkaline soil are useful for keeping rust and corrosion at bay, and the planes are routinely stripped for parts used to repair active aircraft. The dystopic setting has also made it a popular location for movies and films, including 2013's Man of Steel. (Until recently, there was another airplane graveyard in St. Augustine, Florida; others exist around the world.)

BAY OF NOUADHIBOU SHIP GRAVEYARD
Nouadhibou, Mauritania 

Shipwreck of the United Malika in the Bay of Nouadhibou (photo by jbdodane on Flickr)

Over 300 naval cruisers, cargo vessels, fishing trawlers and other ships are slowly rusting throughout Nouadhibou Bay in Mauritania, near one of the North African nation's largest and poorest cities. Poverty and corruption have reportedly led local officials to turn a blind eye to ship owners who abandon their vessels in the harbor rather than pay for proper disposal. The ship graveyard has been a boon to the local economy, since companies pay workers to salvage from the vessels, while many of the ships have also formed artificial reefs that support fish and other creatures. Nouadhibou Bay is home to just one of several ship graveyards around the world: you can see an abandoned wooden-hulled World War I fleet in Maryland, a rusting World War II fleet in California, a Tugboat Graveyard in Staten Island, and massive ship-breaking yards in Pakistan, Bangladesh, and elsewhere.  

SOVIET TANK GRAVEYARD
Kabul, Afghanistan

 
Tank graveyard on the outskirts of Kabul (photo by Andy Kelly-Price)

Leftovers from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan of the 1970s and 1980s still linger in an industrial area on the outskirts of Kabul. Most of the rusting hulks at this site have been stripped, but their skeletons remain as testament to the prolonged war, which some call "the Soviet Union’s Vietnam." Tank graveyards themselves are not uncommon: there are examples in Croatia, India, Pakistan, Kuwait, Ukraine, Eritrea, and other locations where armies have left in a hurry.

CINECITTÀ STUDIOS
Rome, Italy

 
Props on the Cinecittà lot (photo by Luca Di Ciaccio)

Cinecittà Studios, which sits just outside Rome, was founded by Benito Mussolini in 1937 to promote Fascist ideals through film. Fortunately, that experiment didn't last long, and the studios were repurposed to churn out a stream of Italian and international classics in the 1950s and 1960s. Today the studios are used far less frequently, and the site has become known as a graveyard for large-scale props and film sets. The grounds are littered with pieces from movies both old (Ben Hur, Fellini classics including La Dolce Vita and Satyricon) and new (Gangs of New York, HBO's Rome), making for some eerie juxtapositions and powerful reminders of how nature can take over even the most carefully produced fantasy. Elsewhere in the world, other film sets still stand in the places where they were set up, and have been slowly left to rot.

NEON BONEYARD
Las Vegas, Nevada

Old neon signs in various states of decay at the Neon Boneyard (photograph by Michelle Enemark)

Not all object graveyards are for extremely massive items. The two-acre lot of the Neon Boneyard is filled with more than 150 signs from Las Vegas' past in various states of decay, providing a fascinating overview of changes in design and technology. (Atlas Obscura visited the Boneyard in July 2013; read the round-up article here.) There are also object cemeteries devoted to phone booths, monster trucks, and other items—even the humble ice box.

National Central Library in Florence (photo by Kaylyn Wernitznig)

In 1999, workers repairing bookshelves on the second floor of Florence's National Central Library came across a small envelope hidden among some rare 17th-century manuscripts. Notarized documents found alongside the envelope identified its contents as dust from the tomb of Dante Alighieri, the great Italian poet of the Middle Ages. Needless to say, the repairmen—and the librarians—were stunned: How did Dante's dust end up here, so far from his tomb in Ravenna? 

Dante’s remains led a peripatetic afterlife, which seems only fitting for someone who travelled so much in life. Exiled from his birthplace of Florence in 1302 after a political coup, Dante wandered for years, dying (probably of malaria) in 1321 in Ravenna, where he was buried in a Franciscan church. In the centuries that followed, Florence repeatedly asked for the return of Dante's body, but Ravenna's citizens refused to return him to the city that had exiled him. Florence made their most significant attempt in 1519, when they managed to get the backing of both the pope and Michelangelo, who offered to design Dante’s tomb. But still Ravenna refused to let Dante go.

Dante's tomb in Ravenna (photo by Husky)

Things took a turn for the strange in 1865, when workers were repairing buildings around the tomb in honor of the sixth centennial of Dante’s birth. While removing part of a wall a few yards away from the tomb, the workers found a dilapidated wooden chest hidden inside the wall. When they lifted it up, one of its rotten planks clattered to the floor, revealing a human skeleton inside. An inscription atop the chest, and another inside, said the remains were “Dantis Ossa”—Dante’s bones. 

Feeling justifiably confused, the officials opened Dante’s tomb. It was empty. After examining the bones, and matching the skull inside with Dante’s death mask, they felt sure their poet had gone wandering again after death. Workers also discovered a hole in the back of the tomb, accessible only from inside the monastery, which had been plastered to hide its existence. Today many scholars believe that the Franscian friars in charge of the tomb were so determined not to let Dante’s bones go that they hid them, perhaps sometime shortly after Michelangelo got involved in 1519.

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Diagram of the location where the chest with Dante's bones was found, from Studies in Dante

It was dust from the 19th century discovery that ended up in Florence’s library. After the dilapidated chest was discovered in 1865, it was laid out on a carpet for examination. Afterwards, a devoted Dante fan named Enrico Pazzi, a sculptor, came along and collected the dust that remained on the rug. Pazzi divided the dust into six envelopes, four of which have since disappeared. A fifth was found in 1987, inside a medallion in the ceiling of the Italian Senate. 

As for the sixth envelope, the one at Florence’s central library, it was apparently presented to the director of library in 1889 in honor of his efforts to establish a Dante room at the library. Officials said it had last been seen in 1929, when it was shown to a conference of librarians. Library representatives speculated that the envelope had been mislaid during the move to a new building in 1935, although how it got among the 17th century manuscripts, where it was rediscovered in 1999, is anyone’s guess. Today, it's not entirely clear where in the library—or elsewhere—the rediscovered envelope has ended up, but hopefully, wherever it is, someone has catalogued it correctly. 

Earlier this week, we bought you an article on new and inventive uses for old mines. Part two in the series looks at what happens when mines are left abandoned.

From salt and coal to diamonds and gold, people have been digging things out of the earth for thousands of years. Most of us can picture a mining operation – headlamps, pickaxes, maybe a narrow-gauge train – but what happens to those old mines when they cease to be productive, and the workers move on?   

An abandoned mine in Sweden (photo by Magnus)

Across the U.S., there are as many as 500,000 disused mine shafts and tunnels – sometimes called “zombie mines.” The highest concentrations are in the Southwest, but old and abandoned mines can be found in every state in the country. 

A fortunate few of these zombie mines may go on to new lives as asthma clinics, amusement parks or mushroom farms, but the vast majority are unsuited for such redevelopment projects. 

These permanently abandoned mining sites pose a number of dangers to the public. While precise figures on injures and deaths at abandoned mines are hard to come by, in 2005 the U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration issued a report saying almost 150 people had died in recreational accidents at mining sites between 1999 and 2005. 

Entrance to an abandoned gold mine in New Mexico (photo by Dustin Askins)

Risks range from the obvious – falls, rockslides, and cave-ins – to less visible threats, like trapped pockets of toxic or explosive gases. Then there's the risk of plain-old getting lost in the dark, forever. In March of this year, an intoxicated Irish man fell to his death at an old mine shaft being operated as a historical museum in Queensland, Australia.  

Environmentalists are concerned about old mines as well. Mine shafts and entries provide an exit path for groundwater laden with naturally occurring heavy metals and other toxic chemicals. Toxins can also leach into groundwater supplies from mine tailings, the remnants of ore left behind after the target resource has been extracted. Other chemicals and petroleum products may have been introduced intentionally as part of mining processes, and then left behind. 

Runoff from abandoned coal mining operations (photo by The Energy Library)

So who is responsible for managing these risks? 

At the national level, the Mine Safety and Health Administration is responsible for establishing and enforcing safety and health standards around mines. But, for obvious reasons, their efforts are mainly focused on active sites. 

Mines located on private property are the responsibility of the landowner. But many zombie mines, especially out West, are on public lands controlled by the National Park Service or the Bureau of Land Management. 

Entrance to an abandoned gold mine in Big Bear, CA (photo by Bobby Magee) 

 Many old mines eventually become inaccessible, either through natural processes or intentional efforts to seal them off.    

Without maintenance, older mines are susceptible to natural destruction through collapse and flooding. As shoring timbers or other supports decay, cave-ins can permanently block access to all or part of the mine. Most mines of any significant depth are beneath the water table as well, and require constant pumping to stay dry. Once work stops and the pumps are turned off, these mines will begin to flood from the bottom up, blocking access. 

A flooded coal mine (photo by Gerry Thomasen)

Where nature hasn’t done the job already, private and public landowners often take steps to block access to old mines. Some put up chain-link fencing or locked gates over known entrances. Others go as far as intentionally caving in the entire mine or mine entrances with controlled explosions. Another option is “capping” or “plugging” the mine—permanently covering the entrances with concrete or other durable materials. 

But, where many people see a threat to public safety, others see an opportunity to explore an unfamiliar environment and have a good time.

In addition to the adventurous children and stray hikers who sometimes end up injured on old mining sites, there are groups of enthusiasts like the California Association of Cave and Mine Explorers, who intentionally seek out old mines for recreation. Despite efforts to render these old mines safer, many remain unguarded and accessible (if not always legally) to the public. 

They call their sport “mine exploring,” and climb, hike, map, and photograph their finds to share with friends. It has much in common with spelunking (also known as caving) in terms of technique and equipment, but with the added danger of man-made hazards.

A company called Iron Miners has turned mine exploration into a business. The company’s experienced miners and geologists investigate abandoned sites with the goal of finding unexcavated gold and reopening them as working mines.  

But not everyone is excited about the prospect of zombie mines coming back to life. In some cases these old mines can restart operations without an updated environmental review — potentially skirting regulations passed after the mine’s initial approval.  

There is no consistent nationwide plan or policy for dealing with our half-a-million zombie mines. Efforts to address the issue will probably continue on a piecemeal basis, with moves to block access often in reaction to a well-publicized accident.

In the meantime, if you want to have a look at one, here is a list of guided tours of old mines all across the United States. 

 
Exploration of an abandoned mine (photo by Denis O'Donovan)