AmeriWeird

On September 27, 1986, the United Way of Cleveland tried to put its city on the map with a Guinness world record: nearly 1.5 million helium balloons — 1,429,643 by the official count — released at once from Public Square, surrounding Terminal Tower in a cloud one reporter called a helium mountain. Then a cold front and rain knocked the still-inflated balloons back down over northeast Ohio: a runway at Burke Lakefront Airport closed for half an hour, a ten-car pile-up hit the Shoreway, balloons blanketed Lake Erie while the Coast Guard was searching for two missing fishermen, and balloons washed ashore in Canada. The record stood, the fundraiser lost money, two lawsuits settled quietly — and Cleveland eventually banned mass balloon releases itself. I'm Nate, and this is AmeriWeird: strange but true stories from across America.

In January 1942, a Pennsylvania dental surgeon named Lytle S. Adams wrote to the White House with a wild idea: strap tiny timed napalm bombs to hibernating Mexican free-tailed bats, drop them over Japan, and let the bats carry fire into the eaves and attics of wooden cities. President Roosevelt approved it. The weapon — a casing of more than a thousand bats — was tested at Carlsbad, New Mexico, where armed bats got loose and burned down much of their own airfield, and later at a mock Japanese village in Utah, where officials judged it an effective weapon. Cancelled in 1944 at a cost of about $2 million, it was never used in war. I'm Nate, and this is AmeriWeird: strange but true stories from across America.

On August 15, 1977, Ohio State University's Big Ear radio telescope recorded a strong, narrowband signal from the direction of Sagittarius — 72 seconds long, about 30 times stronger than background noise, right next to the 1420 MHz hydrogen line. Days later, astronomer Jerry Ehman found it on a paper printout, circled the intensity code "6EQUJ5" in red pen, and wrote "Wow!" in the margin. It appeared in only one of the telescope's two feed horns, leaving two possible positions in the sky — and despite searches with Big Ear, the Very Large Array, and a 2022 Breakthrough Listen campaign, it has never been heard again or explained. I'm Nate, and this is AmeriWeird: strange but true stories from across America.

On October 30, 1938, Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre turned H.G. Wells's The War of the Worlds into fake breaking news — dance music interrupted by bulletins of a Martian landing at Grover's Mill, New Jersey. Some listeners were genuinely frightened and called police and newspapers. The next morning, front pages coast to coast reported a nationwide panic. But ratings taken that night show only about 2 percent of homes were listening at all — and historians now say the great panic was largely invented by newspapers competing with radio. I'm Nate, and this is AmeriWeird: strange but true stories from across America.