Living in the United States it is easy to do some site seeing. Of course living in Florida there are many things to do. However, we really love going to see Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Museums here in the United States.
Robert Ripley
My to have been in the shoes of this man! Mr. Ripley spent over 40 years collecting things that simply intrigued him. Some were gifts, some he purchased, but all are displayed in his various museums. People, even today donate objects of the unbelievable to the Ripley Museums, and some things are very believable.
Mr. Ripley traveled the world and visited places few people had ever heard of. Along his way he would document the odd and unusual as well as the customs and beliefs of ancient and modern civilizations.
His journey began in 1893, when Robert Leroy Ripley was born in Santa Rosa California. He was a self taught artist and sold his first drawing to Life magazine when he was just 14. he also was a natural athlete and longed to play baseball, but dreams of pitching were shattered when he broke his arm in his first professional game. He was a cartoonist covering sports for the San Francisco Chronicle after breaking his arm, but left and headed to New York City.
He felt most at home in China because he found the country to be most fascinating and he went as far as to adopt certain Chinese customs. He even signed his cartoon as “Rip Li” and was called the “Modern Marco Polo.” On trip alone he crossed 2 continents and traveled over 24, 000 miles from New York to Cairo and back again. This journey included 15, 000 miles via air travel, 8, 000 miles via boat/ship and over 1, 000 miles by camel, donkey and horse. So as you can see he was a determined man in his travel quest.
His cartoons were the most popular feature in any paper and had a greater readership than event the front-page news! Now that is a Believe It or Not! There was one man, who spent over 26 years trying to prove Ripley wrong, but was never ever to do so. This man was from Bedford, Iowa and he wrote over 22, 000 letters but never received a single reply that could contradict Ripley’s statements. You can see some of these letters and attempts to prove Ripley wrong in the various museums. We got to see some of them and they were certainly an effort on Mr. Harbour’s part.
Ripley died at age 55 in 1969 and buried in the church where his family worshiped and still do, in Santa Rosa, Ca., and the church is made out of a single giant redwood tree.
There is a book that you can buy, we paid $1.50 for our copy, that will tell you all about the history of Mr. Ripley.
Some Strange Things
Each item that is placed in one of the museums will always come with a brief history of that item. Some are out in the open and some are incased in glass cases or wooden cases because of their value.
You walk through the museum and can take your time at each display. You can take pictures if you like. You will also find various “Fortune” games where you can get your fortune told. Yes, we tried it. We also got our palms read, which was really interesting, because the darned computerized thing was right!
You will find puzzles that will allow you to try and figure out if you can get 8 pieces of cake from 3 cuts of the knife. Or you can ask a friend (or family member, or just your own thinking) to think of a number. Double it, then add 12, then divide by 2, then to subtract the original number. What will the answer always be? You tell me in the comment section and I will tell you if you are right! However I will tell you all after several days, that way no one will know until the comments have stopped or slowed down. And if no one comments, then you will not know the answer, unless you go to a museum that is.
While at any of the museums you will see weird animals, people, and pictures of weird people. The tallest person, the skinniest person, the shortest person, the biggest person in the world! You will also “shrunken heads” which are some of his most rare collections, which the practice of “shrunken heads” were once common with the Jivaro Indians of Ecuador. (The procedure is gross, so I won’t put it in this review.) You can even see a “shrunken torso” at one of the museums so we are told! We missed that commodity, thank goodness!
At the location in St. Augustine, on the outside, you will find a carved out home for one, from one of the oldest and biggest Oak Trees. When this tree was cut down, there were 6 pieces I believe, may have been 4, but, each piece was big enough to carve a one man/woman, 4 room, home out of it. They have this here so your curiosity will be up and you will want to go inside.
Other Strange Things
We got to see some very strange people at the museum we were at. People like “The double-eyed” man of China, who had set pupils in each eye, or “The Lighthouse Man” who was said to roam the streets of China with a candle set into the top of his head! The candle was supposedly set into a hole that was in the skull of the man. Of course these were wax replicas for our viewing pleasure. It was really interesting to see these things, however, I don’t know that I believed it!
There are items made from toothpicks, coke cans, match sticks, paper clips, bubble gum or chewing gum wrappers, jelly beans, chains whittled from one piece of wood and you can look inside these microscopic lenses to see things like: The Lord’s Prayer written on a grain of rice or a penny, or a pinhead. There is artwork from lint from clothes, chrome bumper art work, The Last Supper made from paper bags, art from toasted bread, dressed fleas, pecan people, and clothes made from human hair. Believe It or Not!
Locations
New Jersey,
Missouri
California, Hollywood, San Francisco and Buena Park
Tennessee
Texas, Grand Prairie and San Antonio
Wyoming
South Carolina
Oregon
Maryland
Florida, St. Augustine, Key West and Orlando
Wisconsin
There are also International locations.
Go to https://ripleys.com too find the exact addresses and phone numbers of each location and to find other locations as well.
The cost per adult ticket is 10.55 (US Dollars) per person. This place is great for the whole family, couples or just yourself.
How I Feel
I just can’t say enough about this place. We really enjoyed it! And seeing all of the interesting things and playing with the different machines, well we were just entertained for half a day!
The mirrors were really funny and that is all I will say about those!
My favorite in the St. Augustine museum was the marbled castle with lights, which at one time could not be found. Simply beautiful! The smallest Ferris Wheel of paperclips wasn’t bad either!
If you are going to visit the United States consider visiting a Ripley’s Museum while you are here. If you already live here, why have you not gone already?
I hope that this has helped in some kind of way.
God Bless!
©LKD 2002