91 Fun Facts About Unsolved Mysteries

Which network launched 'Unsolved Mysteries' as a weekly series on October 5, 1988?

NBC launched Unsolved Mysteries as a weekly series on October 5, 1988, after seven specials had aired on the network since January 1987.

Which trench-coated host narrated Unsolved Mysteries for eleven seasons across NBC and CBS?

Robert Stack, an Oscar nominee and TV's Eliot Ness in The Untouchables, delivered the trench-coated narration for four specials plus eleven seasons across NBC and CBS.

What element does the Netflix revival of 'Unsolved Mysteries' notably drop from previous iterations?

Co-creator John Cosgrove promised a 'pure documentary style' with no presenter, though an image of the longtime host still appears in every title sequence.

Which actor hosted the very first 'Unsolved Mysteries' special in 1987 before Robert Stack took over?

Best known as Perry Mason and Ironside, Burr fronted only the pilot; Karl Malden took the next two specials before Stack settled in as the permanent host.

Who were the creators of the American mystery documentary television series 'Unsolved Mysteries'?

'Unsolved Mysteries' was created by John Cosgrove and Terry Dunn Meurer, who also served as executive producers for various iterations of the show.

Approximately how many cases featured on 'Unsolved Mysteries' have been solved following their broadcast?

Over 260: the producers credit viewer tips phoned in after broadcasts with solving more than 260 of the cases profiled, reuniting over 100 families and helping exonerate seven wrongly convicted people.

After CBS cancelled it in 1999, which cable channel picked up Unsolved Mysteries?

Lifetime picked up the series in 2001, mixing repackaged segments with new cases until the cable run ended in September 2002.

Which actor took over as host of 'Unsolved Mysteries' during its revival on Spike TV from 2008 to 2010?

Dennis Farina, the Crime Story and Law & Order actor and a former Chicago police officer, hosted the Spike TV run from 2008 to 2010, mostly repackaging segments from earlier seasons.

In what year did the Netflix reboot of 'Unsolved Mysteries' first premiere?

2020: the Netflix reboot premiered on July 1, 2020, co-produced with 21 Laps, the production company behind Stranger Things.

Besides cold cases, what kind of segments on Unsolved Mysteries led NBC News to demand a 'not a news broadcast' disclaimer?

Paranormal occurrences, specifically the UFO and ghost segments, led NBC News to demand a disclaimer before each episode stating it was 'not a news broadcast'.

How much ransom did hijacker D. B. Cooper demand in 1971 before parachuting from a Boeing 727?

$200,000: Cooper demanded $200,000 in cash plus four parachutes, then jumped from the Boeing 727 over southwest Washington; he had bought his ticket as Dan Cooper, and a press error produced 'D. B.'

How many of the Zodiac Killer's four cryptograms had been decrypted by the end of 2020?

Two: the 408-symbol cipher was solved by a schoolteacher couple in 1969 and the 340-symbol cipher by a team of amateur codebreakers in December 2020.

The vellum of the undeciphered Voynich manuscript has been carbon-dated to which period?

The early 15th century: radiocarbon dating at the University of Arizona in 2009 placed the vellum between 1404 and 1438, and its first confirmed owner was the 17th-century Prague alchemist Georg Baresch.

The Mary Celeste was found deserted but seaworthy off the Azores in 1872 by which Canadian ship?

Dei Gratia, a Nova Scotia brigantine under Captain David Morehouse, sighted the drifting Mary Celeste in December 1872; her lifeboat was gone but the alcohol cargo and the crew's belongings were untouched.

Who governed the 'Lost Colony' of Roanoke when it was settled in 1587?

Ralph Lane had led an earlier military outpost on the island in 1585-86; the second colony vanished while White was away seeking supplies.

How many Soviet ski hikers died in the 1959 Dyatlov Pass incident in the Ural Mountains?

Nine: all nine hikers died after cutting their way out of the tent in February 1959 and fleeing into the cold; six succumbed to hypothermia and three to severe injuries.

Which university's Big Ear radio telescope picked up the 1977 'Wow!' signal?

Ohio State: its Big Ear radio telescope recorded the signal on August 15, 1977, and astronomer Jerry Ehman circled the reading '6EQUJ5' on the printout, writing 'Wow!' beside it.

From which constellation did the Wow! signal appear to come?

Sagittarius: the signal came from a patch of sky near the Chi Sagittarii star group and lasted the full 72 seconds that Big Ear could observe any one point.

Jimmy Hoffa, who vanished in 1975, had led which US labour union from 1957 to 1971?

He was declared dead in 1982; the union grew to over 2.3 million members at its peak.

The 'Somerton Man' case takes its other name from the Persian phrase 'tamám shud', torn from which book?

The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám: the scrap reading 'tamám shud', meaning 'it is finished', was found in a hidden fob pocket in the trousers of the man discovered dead on Somerton Beach, Adelaide, in December 1948.

Derek Abbott's 2022 DNA claim identified the Somerton Man as Carl Webb, a man of what profession?

Electrical engineer: Abbott and genealogist Colleen Fitzpatrick used DNA from hairs embedded in the man's plaster bust to identify Carl Webb, a Melbourne-born electrical engineer and instrument maker.

How many keepers vanished from the Flannan Isles Lighthouse in December 1900?

Three: James Ducat, Thomas Marshall and Donald MacArthur were gone when the relief ship Hesperus arrived on December 26, 1900; one set of oilskins was left behind, suggesting a keeper had rushed out.

How did the thieves who stole 13 works from Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990 get inside?

Posing as police officers: two men in uniform talked their way in on March 18, 1990, handcuffed the two guards in the basement, and spent 81 minutes removing 13 works.

What reward did the Gardner Museum set in 2017 for the return of its stolen art?

$10 million: in 2017 the museum doubled its standing reward to $10 million for information leading to the recovery of all 13 works, which include Vermeer's The Concert and Rembrandt's only seascape.

Jim Sanborn's cipher sculpture Kryptos stands at which US agency's headquarters?

The CIA: Jim Sanborn's Kryptos, dedicated in 1990 in a courtyard at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, carries four encrypted passages on its copper plates, three of them cracked by 1999.

The Beale ciphers supposedly locate a treasure buried around 1820 in Bedford County, in which US state?

Virginia: the 1885 pamphlet places the treasure near Bufords in Bedford County, Virginia; only the second of the three ciphertexts, keyed to the Declaration of Independence, has ever been decoded.

Oak Island and its 'Money Pit' lie off which Canadian province?

Treasure hunters have dug there since the late 18th century, and accounts of the pit have been in print since 1857.

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished in March 2014 en route from Kuala Lumpur to where?

Beijing: the Boeing 777 left Kuala Lumpur for Beijing on March 8, 2014, with 239 people aboard; military radar tracked it turning west across the Malay Peninsula after it vanished from civilian screens.

In 1980 a small portion of D. B. Cooper's ransom money, $5,800, turned up along the banks of which river?

The Columbia: in February 1980 eight-year-old Brian Ingram dug up three decaying bundles of the $20 bills at Tena Bar, a Columbia River beach just north of Vancouver, Washington.

The name 'Jack the Ripper' originated in which missive sent to the press in 1888?

The 'Dear Boss' letter, received by the Central News Agency on September 27, 1888, was signed 'Jack the Ripper', the first known use of the name; the 'From Hell' letter went to George Lusk with half a kidney.

How many Whitechapel victims make up Jack the Ripper's so-called 'canonical' group?

Their murders fell between 31 August and 9 November 1888; police probed eleven killings in all from 1888 to 1891.

The 1986 NBC specials 'Missing...' that grew into Unsolved Mysteries focused on what?

Their success led creators Cosgrove and Meurer to broaden the concept to mysteries of every kind.

The unsolved 1912 Villisca axe murders, which killed eight people, took place in which US state?

Iowa: on the night of June 9-10, 1912, Josiah and Sarah Moore, their four children and two visiting Stillinger sisters were bludgeoned with an axe in their Villisca home; no one was ever convicted.

The 1585 Roanoke colony was abandoned when Governor Ralph Lane sailed home with which English seafarer?

Sir Francis Drake, calling at Roanoke in June 1586 after raiding Spanish ports in the Caribbean, carried Lane and his colonists home to England; Grenville's delayed resupply fleet arrived about two weeks later.

The Mary Celeste was bound from New York for which Mediterranean port when found abandoned in 1872?

Genoa: she had sailed from New York on November 7, 1872, carrying 1,701 barrels of denatured alcohol for Genoa; her last log entry, dated November 25, came ten days before she was found.

The Zodiac Killer murdered at least five people between 1968 and 1969 in which US metropolitan region?

The San Francisco Bay Area was his hunting ground: three couples and a cab driver in Benicia, Vallejo, Napa County and San Francisco, with two of seven victims surviving.

The anonymous 'Circleville Letters' that began in 1976 terrorised a small town in which US state?

Ohio: from 1976 residents of Circleville, Ohio, received thousands of threatening anonymous letters; Paul Freshour was jailed in 1983 for a booby-trap attack tied to them, yet the letters kept coming while he was in prison.

The 1908 Tunguska explosion flattened some 2,150 square km of forest in which region?

Siberia's remote taiga kept scientists away until 1927, no crater was ever found, and an airburst of a small asteroid or comet is the leading explanation.

Flight 19, a group of US Navy Avenger bombers lost in 1945, disappeared over which area?

The Bermuda Triangle: the five Avengers vanished off Florida on December 5, 1945, and a PBM Mariner flying boat sent to search for them also disappeared that night with 13 crew, feeding the region's legend.

Toddler Madeleine McCann vanished from a holiday apartment in 2007 in which country?

Portugal: she disappeared on May 3, 2007, from a ground-floor holiday apartment in Praia da Luz in the Algarve while her parents dined at a tapas restaurant nearby.

Amelia Earhart vanished in 1937 while flying from Lae toward which tiny Pacific island?

Howland Island, a US possession less than two miles long, was the refuelling stop; the Coast Guard cutter Itasca waiting offshore heard her radio calls grow stronger on July 2, 1937, but she never appeared.

Which English king is the usual prime suspect in the fate of the Princes in the Tower?

Richard III, who had the boys declared illegitimate and took the throne in June 1483, is the usual suspect; bones found under a Tower staircase in 1674 were reburied in Westminster Abbey in 1678.

In which Colorado city was six-year-old JonBenét Ramsey killed at home in December 1996?

Boulder: her body was found in the basement of the family's Boulder home on December 26, 1996, hours after a two-and-a-half-page ransom note was discovered inside the house.

In 1987 an intruder in a Max Headroom mask hijacked two TV signals in which US city?

Chicago: on November 22, 1987, the intruder broke into WGN-TV's sportscast and then WTTW's Doctor Who broadcast for about 90 seconds; despite an FCC investigation the perpetrators were never identified.

The looted Amber Room was last documented in which East Prussian city before 1945?

Königsberg: the panels were displayed in Königsberg Castle from 1942 until the city was bombed and besieged in 1944-45, after which they vanished; a replica was completed in the Catherine Palace in 2003.

The Phaistos Disc, stamped with an undeciphered script, was found in 1908 on which island?

Crete: Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier unearthed the disc at the Minoan palace of Phaistos in 1908; its 241 signs were pressed into the clay with stamps, and some scholars have called it a forgery.

NOAA attributes the 'Bloop', a mysterious 1997 underwater sound, to what?

An icequake, not a monster: by 2012 NOAA called the sound consistent with ice calving or seabed gouging by ice, after years of speculation about an enormous unknown animal.

Which actress joined the longtime host as co-host for the show's 1999 season on CBS?

Virginia Madsen was added for the 1999 CBS season to attract female viewers; the experiment failed, and her segments were later re-dubbed with the original host's narration for cable reruns.

Which future Oscar winner played a murder victim in a 1992 segment filmed in Texas?

Matthew McConaughey, who later won the 2014 Best Actor Oscar for Dallas Buyers Club, played Texas murder victim Larry Dickens in a 1992 re-enactment, one of his earliest screen roles.

Who narrates the official Unsolved Mysteries podcast launched in 2020?

Steve French narrates the weekly Unsolved Mysteries podcast, launched in 2020 with Cadence13, which revisits classic cases and asks listeners to send in tips.

Which Stranger Things executive producer is also an executive producer of Netflix's Unsolved Mysteries reboot?

Shawn Levy and his company 21 Laps Entertainment 'refreshed' the show with Cosgrove-Meurer Productions, dropping the old four-cases-an-hour format for a single mystery per episode.

A viewer recognised missing child Kayla Unbehaun after which 2022 Netflix episode?

Abducted by a Parent, in the third volume, profiled her 2017 abduction by her mother; in May 2023 a shopper in Asheville, North Carolina, recognised Kayla, her mother was arrested and she was reunited with her father.

Rey Rivera's body was found in 2006 under a hole in the roof of which Baltimore building?

The Belvedere: his body lay in a disused room of the former Belvedere Hotel, beneath a hole in its roof; his glasses and phone sat undamaged on the roof above, which a retired detective called evidence of staging.

Alonzo Brooks, subject of the episode 'No Ride Home', died in 2004 in which state?

Kansas: Brooks vanished after a party in rural La Cygne, Kansas, in April 2004; his body was found beside a nearby creek a month later, and the FBI reopened the case in 2019.

Josh Guimond, profiled by Netflix in 2022, vanished in 2002 from which school's campus?

Saint John's University in Collegeville, Minnesota: Guimond, a 20-year-old junior, was last seen leaving a party in the Metten Court apartments on the night of November 9, 2002, and no trace of him was found.

Jack Wheeler, found in a Delaware landfill in 2010, had helped create which landmark?

The Vietnam Veterans Memorial: Wheeler, a West Point graduate, chaired the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund that built the Washington wall in 1982; his body tumbled out of a garbage truck in Wilmington, Delaware, on December 31, 2010.

Xavier Dupont de Ligonnès's family were found buried in their garden in which French city?

Nantes: the bodies of his wife Agnès, their four children and two dogs were unearthed under the terrace of the family home in Nantes on April 21, 2011, with Xavier last seen a week earlier in the Var.

The woman known as 'Jennifer Fairgate' died in 1995 in a hotel room in which capital?

Oslo: she was found shot in room 2805 of the Oslo Plaza Hotel in June 1995; she had checked in without identification, given a false Belgian address, and nearly every label had been cut from her clothes.

The unsolved 1922 Hinterkaifeck farm murders took place in which German region?

Bavaria: six people were killed with a mattock at the Hinterkaifeck farmstead near Ingolstadt in March 1922; the killer apparently stayed on for days afterward, feeding the animals and eating the family's food.

The 1966 'Lead Masks Case' bodies were found on a hill in which Brazilian city?

Niterói: electronics technicians Manoel Pereira da Cruz and Miguel José Viana were found dead on Vintém Hill in August 1966, wearing suits and lead eye masks, beside a note reading 'ingest capsules, after the effect protect metals await signal mask'.

Kaspar Hauser, who claimed he grew up in a dark cell, turned up in 1828 in which city?

Nuremberg: the teenager appeared in the city's Unschlitt Square on May 26, 1828, carrying a letter and barely able to speak; a 2024 mitochondrial DNA study ruled out the theory that he was a hidden prince of Baden.

The schooner Carroll A. Deering was found aground without crew in 1921 off which headland?

Cape Hatteras: the five-masted schooner was found hard aground on Diamond Shoals off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, on January 31, 1921, with food laid out as if for the next meal but lifeboats, logbook and navigation gear gone.

The Lost Dutchman's Gold Mine is said to lie in which Arizona range?

The Superstitions: legend places the mine of German immigrant Jacob Waltz, who died in 1891, in the Superstition Mountains east of Phoenix, where a number of treasure hunters have died searching.

The first Cicada 3301 puzzle appeared in January 2012 on which website?

4chan: the first puzzle was posted to 4chan's /b/ board on January 4, 2012, leading solvers through steganography, a phone message and QR-coded posters in several cities; the 2014 puzzle's Liber Primus resisted decoding for years.

Under what pseudonym did the Georgia Guidestones' anonymous commissioner operate?

R. C. Christian: the commissioner approached Elberton Granite in June 1979 under that pseudonym, accepting the deliberately inflated price quoted to scare him off; the monument was bombed and demolished in July 2022.

The cryptic Toynbee tiles embedded in city streets reference which film director?

Stanley Kubrick: the tiles read 'Toynbee idea in Kubrick's 2001 resurrect dead on planet Jupiter'; hundreds have appeared in US and South American streets since the 1980s and their maker was never confirmed.

The 1518 'dancing plague', in which people danced for weeks, broke out in which city?

Strasbourg: it began in July 1518 when Frau Troffea started dancing in the street; within a month dozens had joined her, and the city authorities at first prescribed more dancing, even hiring musicians.

The Mothman sightings of 1966-67 centred on Point Pleasant in which US state?

West Virginia: sightings around Point Pleasant began in November 1966, and a biologist suggested a wandering sandhill crane; the town's annual Mothman Festival began in 2002.

The unidentified 'Isdal Woman' was found burned in 1970 near which Norwegian city?

Bergen: her body was found in the Isdalen valley near Bergen on November 29, 1970; her suitcases at Bergen railway station held wigs, cash in several currencies and clothing with every label removed.

A 1989 Polaroid thought to show missing cyclist Tara Calico turned up in which state?

Florida: the Polaroid of a bound young woman and a boy was found in June 1989 in a convenience-store parking lot in Port St. Joe, Florida; Scotland Yard said it showed Calico, Los Alamos disagreed and the FBI was inconclusive.

Where in the Stay on Main hotel in downtown Los Angeles was Elisa Lam's body found in 2013?

A cistern on the roof: guests had complained of low pressure and odd-tasting water, and footage of her behaving erratically in an elevator had gone viral days earlier.

Which New York governor appointed Judge Joseph Crater months before he vanished in 1930?

Franklin D. Roosevelt, then governor, named Crater to the New York Supreme Court in April 1930; Crater vanished on August 6 after dinner in Manhattan, and his case was so famous that 'pulling a Crater' entered slang.

Lord Lucan vanished in 1974 after being suspected of killing whom?

His children's nanny, Sandra Rivett, was bludgeoned in the family's Belgravia home on November 7, 1974; Lucan's car was found abandoned in Newhaven, a 1975 inquest jury named him the killer, and he was declared dead in 1999.

Pilot Frederick Valentich vanished in 1978 over which body of water?

Bass Strait: Valentich's Cessna vanished on October 21, 1978, en route from Melbourne to King Island; his last words to air traffic control were 'It's not an aircraft', and officials suggested he had flown upside down into the sea.

Australian PM Harold Holt disappeared in 1967 while swimming at which spot near Portsea?

Cheviot Beach: Holt went swimming in heavy surf there on December 17, 1967, and was never seen again; the wildest theory had him collected by a Chinese submarine, and a Melbourne swimming centre was named in his memory.

Explorer Percy Fawcett's final 1925 expedition set out from which Brazilian city?

Cuiabá: Fawcett, his son Jack and Jack's friend Raleigh Rimell left Cuiabá in April 1925 in search of a lost city he called 'Z'; their last message came from Dead Horse Camp in late May, and none returned.

Tylenol capsules that killed seven people in 1982 were laced with which poison?

The murders ended powder-filled capsules for over-the-counter drugs and produced tamper-evident packaging.

Five of the Sodder children vanished in a 1945 house fire on which holiday?

Christmas Day: the fire broke out around 1 a.m. on December 25, 1945, at the family home in Fayetteville, West Virginia; no remains were found, and the Sodders kept a billboard seeking the five children beside Route 16 for decades.

Which writer coined the nickname 'Servant Girl Annihilator' for an 1880s Austin killer?

O. Henry, then a young Austin resident named William Sydney Porter, used the phrase in an 1885 letter; the axe murders of 1884-85 came three years before Jack the Ripper, and some newspapers linked the two killers.

Glasgow's 'Bible John' met all three of his victims at which venue?

The Barrowland: all three women killed between February 1968 and October 1969 had spent the evening at the Barrowland Ballroom, and the well-spoken, Bible-quoting man seen with them became known as Bible John.

How many passengers and crew vanished from the MV Joyita, found adrift in 1955?

25: the 16 crew and nine passengers were all missing when the Joyita was found drifting north of Fiji on November 10, 1955; her cork-lined hull made her nearly unsinkable, so why anyone abandoned her baffled investigators.

The Arctic ghost ship Baychimo, seen crewless for decades, belonged to which fur trader?

The Hudson's Bay Company: the steamer carried furs and supplies along Alaska's Arctic coast until her crew abandoned her in pack ice in October 1931; she was sighted drifting, crewless, as late as 1969.

The undeciphered rongorongo glyphs were collected in the 19th century from where?

Easter Island: the roughly two dozen surviving rongorongo tablets were collected from Rapa Nui in the 1860s-70s; they are written in reverse boustrophedon, with alternate lines upside down, and none stayed on the island.

The Copper Scroll, listing 64 hidden treasure sites, is displayed in which country?

Jordan: found at Qumran in 1952, the scroll was taken to Amman, where it is held in the Jordan Museum; unlike the other Dead Sea Scrolls it is an inventory of 64 hiding places rather than literature.

The airliner Star Dust's final 1947 Morse message ended with which unexplained word?

STENDEC: the Avro Lancastrian's radio operator tapped the word three times before the aircraft hit Mount Tupungato on August 2, 1947; its wreck emerged from the glacier fifty years later, the crew having begun descending while still behind the Andes.

The low-frequency 'Taos Hum' is reported in which US state?

New Mexico: the hum is reported around Taos, and a 1993 University of New Mexico study found about two percent of locals heard it, each at a different frequency between 32 and 80 Hz.

The giant Nazca geoglyphs, best seen from the air, are in which country?

Peru's Nazca Desert holds the lines, which are only 10 to 15 cm deep; drones have revealed several hundred new figures this century.

How many victims are attributed to the 'Monster of Florence', active from 1968 to 1985?

Sixteen: eight couples were shot, mostly in parked cars in the Florentine countryside, between 1968 and 1985, with the same .22 Beretta used throughout; Pietro Pacciani and two associates were later convicted, but doubts persisted.

Bandleader Glenn Miller's plane vanished in December 1944 over which stretch of water?

The English Channel: Miller took off from Twinwood Farm, Bedfordshire, on December 15, 1944, in a single-engined Norseman bound for Paris, the day before the Battle of the Bulge began; no wreckage was ever found.

Writer Ambrose Bierce vanished in 1913 after joining whose revolutionary army as an observer at Ciudad Juárez?

Pancho Villa's army took him on as an observer, and Bierce, then 71, witnessed the Battle of Tierra Blanca; his last letter closed 'I leave here tomorrow for an unknown destination'.

The 'Boy in the Box', finally identified by DNA in 2022, was found in 1957 in which city?

Philadelphia: the boy's body was found in a cardboard box in the Fox Chase section of Philadelphia in February 1957, freshly bathed and with a crude haircut; in December 2022 police named him Joseph Augustus Zarelli.