Ancient Astronauts Made Me Love Trivia

originally posted here. Written by me.


Some of you may recently have seen the startling evidence which reveals that Yoda actually visited Earth in the Middle Ages, and got to know some manuscripting monks well enough to sit for an illuminating portrait:

This Medieval Polaroid comes from Smithfield Decretals, a 14th-century manuscript that is part of the collection of the British Library. NPR has interviewed the Curator Julian Harrison, who they quote as saying: “It’s actually an illustration to the biblical story of Samson — the artist clearly had a vivid imagination!”

We here at the Akron Triviators know the truth.

Earth has been visited by aliens repeatedly and continually throughout our history.

(Sarcasm.  Honestly!)
Older geeks may remember the Time-Life Mysteries of the Unknown, an essential guide to the world of the odd, the weird, the occult and the unexplainable. The books were a formative experience for me as a budding collector of trivia, teaching me about the truth of things that were neglected in school – crystal skulls, Area 51, the Face on Mars, Lysenkoism,the Bermuda Triangle, the Hollow Earth, the Flat Earth, parapsychology, tripsychology, and quadrophenia.

The one that blew me away as a kid was Erich von Däniken, author of the nutball volume Chariots of the Gods.  In it, von Däniken claimed that practically *every* wonder of the ancient world was created by (you guessed it!) – ALIENS.  Pyramids, Easter Island statues, Ohio’s Serpent Mound, and everything else that wasn’t created by Europeans must have come from SPAAAACE!
Needless to say, he made it all up, and even possibly stole ideas from H.P. Lovecraft.
He is the spiritual forefather of this guy:

Even as a budding young geeklet, I was always skeptical of these claims, but I devoured everything I could find on subjects like this. I took out the entire Mysteries of the Unknown from the library, and read about every other fringe movement and conspiracy theory.  When The DaVinci Code came out, I could be counted on to be one of the folks who immediately accused Dan Brown of ripping off Holy Blood, Holy Grail. I read every oddball LaRouche pamphlet that claimed the US government was secretly under the control of the  Illuminati.  It never made me a believer, but it made me fascinated about real history, and the odd facts and cool stories that have been happening to humans for all of our time here. It taught me to love trivia.
However, on some level, I have a bit of Fox Mulder in me: