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Did You Know? 12 Strange Coincidences That Will Shock You
Throughout history, the world has witnessed countless events that defy logical explanation and stretch the boundaries of probability. While scientists often attribute these occurrences to mere chance, the human mind cannot help but marvel at the extraordinary nature of certain coincidences. From presidential assassinations to literary predictions and twin synchronicities, these twelve remarkable coincidences challenge our understanding of randomness and leave us questioning whether fate plays a larger role in our lives than we might think.
1. The Lincoln-Kennedy Coincidences
Perhaps one of the most famous sets of coincidences involves Presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy. Both were elected to Congress in ’46 (1846 and 1946), became president in ’60 (1860 and 1960), and were assassinated on a Friday in the presence of their wives. Their successors were both named Johnson—Andrew Johnson born in 1808 and Lyndon B. Johnson born in 1908. Even more astonishing, both assassins, John Wilkes Booth and Lee Harvey Oswald, were known by three names comprising fifteen letters and were themselves assassinated before standing trial.
2. The Titanic Novel Prediction
In 1898, fourteen years before the Titanic disaster, author Morgan Robertson published a novel titled “Futility, or the Wreck of the Titan.” The book described a massive British ocean liner called the Titan that was deemed unsinkable but struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic and sank with massive loss of life due to insufficient lifeboats. The similarities between the fictional Titan and the real Titanic are eerily precise, including their size, speed, capacity, and the month of the disaster—April.
3. The Jim Twins Phenomenon
Identical twins Jim Lewis and Jim Springer were separated at birth and adopted by different families in Ohio. When they reunited at age 39, they discovered mind-boggling similarities. Both had married women named Linda, divorced, and remarried women named Betty. They had sons named James Alan and James Allan respectively, drove the same model car, smoked the same brand of cigarettes, drank the same beer, and even vacationed at the same Florida beach. Both worked as part-time sheriffs and had dogs named Toy.
4. The Hoover Dam Bookend Deaths
Construction of the Hoover Dam began with the first death on December 20, 1922, when J.G. Tierney drowned while surveying the Colorado River. Thirteen years later to the day—December 20, 1935—the last person to die during construction was Patrick Tierney, who fell from an intake tower. Patrick was J.G. Tierney’s son, making this tragedy a haunting bookend spanning exactly thirteen years.
5. The Falling Baby and Joseph Figlock
In Detroit during the 1930s, a man named Joseph Figlock was walking down the street when a baby fell from a fourth-story window and landed on him. Both survived with minor injuries. Incredibly, one year later, Figlock was walking down the same street when the same baby fell from the same window and landed on him again. Once more, both escaped serious injury. The odds of this happening once are astronomical; twice seems virtually impossible.
6. Edgar Allan Poe’s Only Novel Prediction
Edgar Allan Poe wrote only one complete novel, “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket,” published in 1838. In it, four shipwreck survivors in a lifeboat resort to cannibalism and kill a cabin boy named Richard Parker. Forty-six years later, in 1884, the yacht Mignonette sank, and four survivors in a lifeboat killed and ate the cabin boy to survive. His name was Richard Parker.
7. The Bermuda Triangle License Plate
In 1975, a man riding a moped in Bermuda was struck and killed by a taxi. One year later, the man’s brother was killed riding the same moped on the same street. He was hit by the same taxi driver carrying the same passenger, making this one of the most improbable traffic accident coincidences ever recorded.
8. Anthony Hopkins and the Rare Book
When actor Anthony Hopkins was cast in a film based on George Feifer’s novel “The Girl from Petrovka,” he tried to find a copy to study his role. Unable to locate one anywhere, he discovered a book left on a bench at a train station—it was a copy of “The Girl from Petrovka.” Two years later, Hopkins met Feifer, who mentioned he no longer had a copy of his own book because he had lent his annotated copy to a friend, who lost it in London. Hopkins showed him the book he found—it was Feifer’s lost copy, complete with his personal annotations.
9. The Bullet That Waited
In 1883, Henry Ziegland broke up with his girlfriend, who subsequently took her own life. Her brother sought revenge and shot Ziegland, but the bullet only grazed his face and lodged in a tree. Years later, Ziegland decided to remove the tree using dynamite. The explosion propelled the lodged bullet out of the tree and into Ziegland’s head, killing him instantly.
10. Mark Twain and Halley’s Comet
Mark Twain was born on November 30, 1835, just two weeks after Halley’s Comet reached its perihelion. In 1909, he predicted he would “go out with it” when it returned, saying it would be a great disappointment if he didn’t. True to his prediction, Twain died on April 21, 1910, one day after the comet reached its perihelion again, making his entrance and exit from the world perfectly synchronized with this celestial event that appears only once every 75-76 years.
11. The Golden Gate Bridge Suicide Net
During construction of a safety net beneath the Golden Gate Bridge in the 1930s, nineteen men fell into the net and were saved, forming an exclusive “Halfway to Hell Club.” Tragically, one worker fell and bounced out of the net into the water. By an extraordinary coincidence, his father had been one of the original workers who died building the Brooklyn Bridge decades earlier, making both father and son casualties of iconic American bridge construction.
12. The Triple Lightning Strike Coincidence
Major Summerford, a British officer, was struck by lightning in 1918 in Flanders, which knocked him off his horse and paralyzed him from the waist down. Six years later in Vancouver, while fishing, he was struck by lightning again, paralyzing his right side. In 1930, two years after recovering, he was struck yet again in a park, permanently paralyzing him. He died two years later. Four years after his death, his gravestone was struck by lightning, shattering it completely.
Conclusion
These twelve astonishing coincidences remind us that reality can sometimes be stranger than fiction. While probability theory might attempt to explain these occurrences as statistical inevitabilities in a world with billions of people and countless daily events, the specific nature and timing of these coincidences continue to fascinate and perplex us. Whether viewed through the lens of science, fate, or pure chance, these remarkable stories demonstrate the extraordinary patterns that occasionally emerge from the chaos of everyday life, leaving us to wonder about the mysterious forces that shape our world.
