31 Very Creepy Wikipedia Stories People Discovered In 2021

Let's keep scrolling into 2022.

2021 has been A YEAR. And I'm willing to bet you spent many nights awake, totally unable to get to sleep, and scrolling down some deep internet (i.e., Wikipedia) rabbit holes, yes?

@videoland / Via giphy.com

Well, if you have, THAT'S FINE. Because we've all done it. It's hard not getting stuck reading a bunch of Wikipedia pages...especially when they're CREEPY Wiki pages. And here are some of the creepiest ones people came across in 2021:

Note: This post contains stories of true crimes; some include topics like abuse and murder.

1. The Disappearance of Johnny Gosch:

KCCI / Via youtube.com

"In 1982, 12-year-old Johnny Gosch vanished on his paper delivery route. His mother claims that in 1997, a 27-year-old Johnny visited her accompanied by a strange man, talked with her for an hour, then left again, feeling it was not safe to return home. She hasn’t seen him since."

—u/somnum_osseus

2. The death of actor Carole Lombard and a group of Army soldiers:

John Kobal Foundation / Getty Images, Bettmann / Bettmann Archive / Getty Images

"On Jan. 16, 1942, 33-year-old actor Carole Lombard won a coin toss that determined she and her group would return home from a war bond tour by plane instead of by train. Their flight wound up crashing into a mountain outside Las Vegas, killing all 22 on board, including 15 US Army soldiers."

—u/Go_To_Bethel_And_Sin

3. The earthquake during a recording of Pink Floyd's "Shine on You Crazy Diamond":

Marka / Marka/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

"A man was recording a copy of 'Shine on You Crazy Diamond' when an earthquake hit. The recording starts to bump as the shockwave arrives, and then the audio switches to the rumble of the earthquake along with the voices of the scared people inside the house."

—u/slinkslowdown

(You can hear the actual recording here.)

4. The term "endling":

John Carnemolla / Corbis via Getty Images

"An endling is the last known individual of a species or subspecies. Once the endling dies, the species becomes extinct."

—u/ActualGiantPenguin

5. The tragic case of Aeroflot Flight 593:

Anton Balakchiev / Getty Images/Stocktrek Images

"On Mar. 23, 1994, a captain of a commercial airliner had his children in the cockpit of an Airbus A310 wide body jet aircraft during a revenue flight. One of them accidentally bumped the autopilot switch. There were no survivors."

—u/ViolenceForBreakfast

6. The murder of Cara Knott:

CBS 8 San Diego / Via youtube.com

"Cara Knott was an American student who disappeared on Dec. 27, 1986. On December 28, her body was recovered at the bottom of a ravine. Her killer, a police officer, was interviewed while covering the investigation of the murder, and scratches, that were inflicted by Knott, are seen on his face."

—u/trissle_hippie

7. The injury of gymnast Elena Mukhina that left her paralyzed:

Universal / Corbis/VCG via Getty Images

"…her first thought as she lay on the floor with her neck severely broken was, 'Thank God, I won’t be going to the Olympics.'”

—u/zetsv

8. The entry solely about crime in Antarctica:

Delphine Aures / Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images

"Crimes in Antarctica, including the 2018 Bellingshausen Station stabbing. The perpetrator, Sergey Savitsky, a 54-year-old electrical engineer, stabbed 52-year old welder Oleg Beloguzov because Beloguzov was giving away the endings of books that Savitsky checked out at the station's library."

—u/sekerzitski

9. The Turpin case:

Handout / Getty Images

"The parents had imprisoned, beaten, and strangled their 13 children, allowing them to eat just once per day and shower just once per year. The 29-year-old weighed just 82 pounds. Some appeared to lack basic knowledge of the world, being unfamiliar with what medicine and police were."

—u/slinkslowdown

10. The UK undercover policing relationships scandal:

Kirsty O'connor - Pa Images / PA Images via Getty Images

"A number of undercover police officers had, as part of their 'false persona,' entered into intimate relationships with members of targeted groups and in some cases proposed marriage or fathered children with protesters who were unaware their partner was a police officer."

—u/traveler_poppy

11. The term "missing white woman syndrome":

Leon Neal / Getty Images

"Missing white woman syndrome is a phrase used to describe the disproportionately higher coverage of white women and girls in the upper-middle-class who disappear."

—u/LongdayinCarcosa

12. The death of Eben Byers:

Based On / Via youtube.com

"After taking a radium energy drink, Byers lost his upper jaw and lower jaw, his bones were disintegrating, and holes were forming in his skull."

—u/dinosaurnuggets0

13. The term depersonalization-derealization disorder:

Tunatura / Getty Images/iStockphoto

"Depersonalization-derealization disorder is a mental disorder in which the person has persistent or recurrent feelings of being disconnected or detached from one's self. People experiencing this may report perceiving the world around them as foggy, dreamlike/surreal, or visually distorted."

—u/ZodiacReaderY

14. The practices of Carl Tanzler:

Crypticc / Via youtube.com

"Carl Tanzler, a radiologist who had fallen in love with woman named Maria Elena Milagro de Hoyos, who was dying from tuberculosis. Eventually, when she died, Tanzler had embalmed her body and had taken it home with him, where he would perform necrophilia on her body for seven years until being discovered."

—u/West-Emu-8696

15. The Disappearance of Brian Shaffer:

blameitonjorge / Via youtube.com

"In 2006, an Ohio State medical student named Brian Shaffer entered a bar with friends. After being recorded entering through the bar's only publicly accessible entrance by security cameras, Shaffer was never seen exiting the bar and has never been seen or heard from since."

—u/LivingRaccoon

16. The "screaming" Mummies of Guanajuato:

Chicago Tribune / Tribune News Service via Getty Images

"Due to the cholera pandemic, many bodies were buried immediately to control the spread of the disease. It is thought that in some cases, the dying may have been buried alive by accident, resulting in horrific facial expressions."

—u/unknownerror1916

17. The serial killer Baba Anujka:

Public Domain / Via en.wikipedia.org

"Baba Anujka was a 90-year-old serial killer from a small village in Serbia. She sold 'love potions' to women with marriage problems, which contained arsenic and killed the husbands after eight days. In 1929, she was sentenced to 15 years in prison. It is believed she killed between 50 and 150 people."

—u/LivingRaccoon

18. The term "smile mask syndrome":

Luis Alvarez / Getty Images

"Smile mask syndrome is a psychological disorder in which subjects develop depression and physical illness as a result of prolonged, unnatural smiling. It can lead to severe physical strain of the mouth and can result in an inability to stop smiling, even when upset or agitated."

—u/ratandparrot

19. The Persian Princess, a mummy sold on the black market:

Aamir Qureshi / AFP via Getty Images

"A sarcophagus sold on the black market that contained a mummy claimed to be that of an ancient princess, later discovered to possibly be the body of an unidentified woman murdered in the 1990s."

—u/silversunshinestares

20. The disappearance of Jamie Fraley:

Investigation Discovery / Via youtube.com

In 2008, Jamie Fraley went missing on the way to the hospital due to a stomach flu. Her fiancé's father, Ricky Simonds Sr., had driven her to the hospital earlier the same day, and because he had a criminal record that included manslaughter, he became a suspect. However, two months later...

"Ricky Simonds Sr. was found dead of heat stroke in the trunk of his ex-girlfriend's car. Investigators on the case believe Simonds was waiting in the trunk to ambush and murder his ex-girlfriend, when he became locked in the vehicle."

—u/Shaun_Ryder

21. The killing of Henryk Siwiak:

Inside Edition / Via youtube.com

"The last person killed in New York on 9/11 was Henryk Siwiak, a victim of an unsolved murder, killed shortly before midnight. His homicide is the only one recorded in New York City on Sept. 11, 2001, since the city does not include the deaths from the attacks in its official crime statistics."

—u/noonoonomore

22. The case of Sogen Kato, thought to be Tokyo's oldest man:

Associated Press / Via youtube.com

"Sogen Kato was thought to have been Tokyo's oldest man until July 2010, when his mummified corpse was found. He died in November 1978, aged 79, and his family never announced his death in an attempt to preserve his longevity record."

—u/slinkslowdown

23. The Kids for Cash scandal:

John Greim / LightRocket via Getty Images

"TIL about the Kids for Cash scandal: Two judges were convicted of taking bribes to ensure that for-profit juvenile detention centers were profitable."

—u/black_flag_4ever

24. The story of Blanche Monnier, who was secretly held captive by her mother:

Apic / Getty Images

"Blanche Monnier was a French socialite held captive by her mother for 25 years. When she was found by the authorities, she was lying in a bed covered with feces and leftover food. She only weighed 55 pounds. Twelve year after her rescue, she died in an insane asylum, having never regained her sanity."

—u/oldnips

25. The Capitol Hill's mystery soda machine:

Another Believer / CC / Via en.wikipedia.org

—u/decadentrebel

In operation from the early '90s until 2018, when it disappeared, this soda machine featured buttons with "?" on them. It's apparently unknown who stocked it.

26. The posthumous beheading of Mata Hari:

Bettmann / Bettmann Archive / Getty Images, Heritage Images / Getty Images

"Her head was cut off, embalmed, and kept in the Museum of Anatomy in Paris."

—u/spiceprincesszen

27. The term "la petite mort" — aka "the little death":

Cavan Images / Getty Images/Cavan Images RF

"The sensation of post orgasm as likened to death."

—u/spiceprincesszen

28. The Balloonfest '86 disaster in Cleveland, Ohio:

Bettmann / Bettmann Archive / Getty Images

"Cleveland Balloonfest '86, with 1.4 million balloons and 2 deaths."

—u/noonoonomore

29. The Guatemala syphilis experiments:

CNN / Via youtube.com

"The syphilis experiments in Guatemala were United States–led human experiments conducted in Guatemala from 1946–48. Doctors infected soldiers, prostitutes, prisoners, and mental patients with various STDs without the subjects' consent. The experiment resulted in 83 deaths."

—u/Starfire-Galaxy

30. The murder of Helle Crafts, which inspired the movie Fargo:

Medical Detectives / Via youtube.com

"Richard Crafts murdered his wife and put her through a wood chipper. Before she died, she told her friends, 'If anything happens to me, don’t think it was an accident.'"

—u/chloecampellone

31. And finally, the televised propaganda interview of P.O.W. Jeremiah Denton:

Horacio Nigro / Via youtube.com

"While answering questions, Denton blinked his eyes in Morse code, spelling the word 'T-O-R-T-U-R-E.'"

—u/Clanlogo

(You can see the actual interview here.)

Note: Some entries have been edited for length and/or clarity.

H/T: r/CreepyWikipedia

The year is almost over, and we're looking back on 2021. Check out more from the year here!