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3 moments that might convince you Edgar Allan Poe was a time traveler.

In the case of Poe, it was his fiction that was, well, stranger than fiction.

3 moments that might convince you Edgar Allan Poe was a time traveler.


I'm pretty positive that Edgar Allan Poe had (has?) the power to travel through time. Hear me out on this one.

It's not just the well-known circumstances of his life — orphaned at a young age, father of the mystery novel, master of cryptology, maestro of the macabre. Nor am I referring to the head-scratching details of the days leading up to his death: how he was found on the street near a voting poll wearing someone else's clothes, and during his subsequent hospitalization, he was alleged to babble incoherently about an unidentified person named “Reynolds."

And I won't even get into the confounding reports of a nameless figure who, for seven decades, would show up to Poe's gravesite in the early hours of his birthday with a glass of cognac and three roses.



Tragic and curious, yes, but hardly evidence that the acclaimed horror writer could transcend the limits of space and time. No, my time travel theory concerns the author's creative output, which you'll soon see is so flukishly prophetic as to make my outlandish claim seem plausible — nay, probable!

The proof is in the pudding, and the pudding is a loosely linked map of flesh-eating floaters, crunched skull survivors, and primordial particles. OK, here we go…

Photo by Albert Sterner/Wikimedia Commons.

Exhibit A: "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket"

Published in 1838, Poe's only completed novel details a mutiny on a whaling ship lost at sea. Out of supplies, the men revert to cannibalism, drawing straws to elect a sacrifice. A boy named Richard Parker draws the shortest straw and is subsequently eaten.

Now here's where it gets weird(er): In 1884, 46 years after the novel's publication, four men would be set adrift following the sinking of their yacht. Shipwrecked and without food, they too would go the survival cannibalism route, electing to kill and eat a 17-year-old cabin boy. The boy's name: Richard Parker.

The extraordinary parallel went unnoticed for nearly a century, until a widely-circulated letter from a descendant of the real Parker outlined the similarities between the novel's scene and the actual event. The letter was selected for publication in The Sunday Times after journalist Arthur Koestler put out a call for tales of “striking coincidence." Striking indeed.

Image from the collection of Jack and Beverly Wilgus/Wikimedia Commons/Wikimedia Commons.

Exhibit B: "The Businessman"

In 1848, a railroad worker named Phineas Gage suffered a traumatic brain injury after taking an iron spike through the skull. Somehow he survived, though his personality would change drastically. These behavioral changes were closely studied, allowing the medical community to develop the first understanding of the role played by the frontal lobe on social cognition.

Except for Poe, who'd inexplicably understood the profound personality changes caused by frontal lobe syndrome nearly a decade earlier. In 1840, he penned a characteristically gruesome story called “The Businessman" about an unnamed narrator who suffers a traumatic head injury as a young boy, leading to a life of obsessive regularity and violent, sociopathic outbursts.

Poe's grasp of frontal lobe syndrome is so precise that neurologist Eric Altshuler wrote, “There's a dozen symptoms and he knows every single one… There's everything in that story, we've hardly learned anything more." Altshuler, who, to reiterate, is a medically-licensed neurologist and not at all a crackpot, went on to say, “It's so exact that it's just weird, it's like he had a time machine."

Photo via NASA/Wikimedia Commons.

Exhibit C: "Eureka"

Still unconvinced? What if I told you that Poe predicted the origins of the universe 80 years before modern science would begin to formulate the Big Bang theory? Surely, an amateur stargazer with no formal training in cosmology could not accurately describe the machinery of the universe, rejecting widely-held inaccuracies while solving a theoretical paradox that had bewildered astronomers since Kepler. Except that's exactly what happened.

The prophetic vision came in the form of "Eureka," a 150-page prose poem critically panned for its complexity and regarded by many as the work of a madman. Written in the final year of Poe's life, "Eureka" describes an expanding universe that began in “one instantaneous flash" derived from a single “primordial particle."

Poe goes on to put forth the first legitimate solution to Olbers' paradox — the question of why, given the vast number of stars in the universe, the night sky is dark — by explaining that light from the expanding universe had not yet reached our solar system. When Edward Robert Harrison published "Darkness at Night" in 1987, he credited "Eureka" as having anticipated his findings.

In an interview with Nautilus, Italian astronomer Alberto Cappi speaks of Poe's prescience, admitting, “It's surprising that Poe arrived at his dynamically evolving universe because there was no observational or theoretical evidence suggesting such a possibility. No astronomer in Poe's day could imagine a non-static universe."

Photo from Dodd, Mead and Company/Wikimedia Commons.

But what if Poe wasn't of a day at all, but of all the days?

What if his written prophecies — on the cannibalistic demise of Richard Parker, the symptoms of frontal lobe syndrome, and the Big Bang theory — were merely reportage from his journey through the extratemporal continuum?

Surely I sound like a tinfoil-capped loon, but maybe, maybe, there are many more prophecies scattered throughout the author's work, a possibility made all the more likely by the fact that, as The New York Times notes, “Poe was so undervalued for so long, there is not a lot of Poe-related material around."

I'll leave you with this quote, taken from a letter that Poe wrote to James Russell Lowell in 1844, in which he apologizes for his absence and slothfulness:

"I live continually in a reverie of the future. I have no faith in human perfectibility. I think that human exertion will have no appreciable effect upon humanity. Man is now only more active — not more happy — nor more wise, than he was 6000 years ago. The result will never vary — and to suppose that it will, is to suppose that the foregone man has lived in vain — that the foregone time is but the rudiment of the future — that the myriads who have perished have not been upon equal footing with ourselves — nor are we with our posterity. I cannot agree to lose sight of man the individual, in man the mass… You speak of “an estimate of my life" — and, from what I have already said, you will see that I have none to give. I have been too deeply conscious of the mutability and evanescence of temporal things, to give any continuous effort to anything — to be consistent in anything. My life has been whim — impulse — passion — a longing for solitude — a scorn of all things present, in an earnest desire for the future."


This story was originally published on HistoryBuff and first appeared on 8.16.16



Pop Culture

In 1969, the Monkees appeared on The Johnny Cash Show and played a stunning, original country song

"Nine Times Blue" is a jaw dropping intersection of craftsmanship and pure talent.

the monkees, nume times blue, monkees live, monkees country, johnny cash show

The Monkees perform on "The Johnny Cash Show."

The great debate about The Monkees is whether they were a real band or just a group of actors thrown together for a TV show. The answer is yes. They were actors cast to play an American version of The Beatles, and many of their early songs were written by big-time professional songwriters such as Tommy Boyce, Bobby Hart, Neil Diamond, Carole King, and Gerry Goffin.

However, The Monkees would pick up their own instruments, play on the 1967 Headquarters album, and perform as a live band on sold-out tours. After a resurgence in the '80s, the band enjoyed a lucrative career as a legacy act, with various members continuing to perform as The Monkees until Michael Nesmith died in 2021. Nesmith, originally a country singer from Dallas, Texas, wrote several of The Monkees' hits, including "Mary, Mary," "Papa Gene's Blues," "The Girl I Knew Somewhere," and "Listen to the Band," and was a driving force in the group being taken seriously as musicians.




By the summer of 1969, The Monkees' TV series was off the air, and the affable Peter Tork had exited the group, citing exhaustion. The remaining three soldiered on, performing on The Johnny Cash Show to promote their latest album, Instant Replay. The band chose to perform "Nine Times Blue," a country song written by Nesmith that he had demoed at the time but wouldn't be released until he recorded it as a solo artist in 1970.

The performance is a wonderful reminder that The Monkees were great comedic actors and accomplished musicians. Davy Jones and Micky Dolenz do a fantastic job singing harmonies on the chorus, while Nesmith plays some nice fills on his Gibson acoustic.

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Later in the show, The Monkees joined Cash for a performance of his 1966 novelty song, "Everybody Loves a Nut," which perfectly suited the band's comedic sensibilities. Two weeks after the release, Cash scored one of his biggest hits with "A Boy Named Sue," recorded live at San Quentin prison.

A few months later, Nesmith left The Monkees to pursue a country-rock career, first with the seminal group The First National Band, which scored a Top 40 hit with "Joanne" from the album Magnetic South.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

Although Nesmith's country-rock albums of the '70s were moderately successful, he was still overshadowed, as a musician, by The Monkees' towering success and subsequent downfall. In the '70s, it wasn't easy for Nesmith to get the respect he was due as a country artist. But in the years leading up to his death in 2021, Nesmith's work was reappraised, and he was seen as a brilliant songwriter who anticipated the rise of alt-country.

The Monkees hold a complicated place in rock 'n' roll history. While some see them as a prefabricated band assembled to cash in on The Beatles' success, others recognize them as talented musicians brought together under bizarre circumstances who forged their own path and created something fresh and innovative, only earning proper respect years later.

1950s year book, old photos, college annual, students, 1950s america

The Wittenberger College 1956 yearbook.

Ever look through your parents’ high school yearbook and all the teenagers look like they are 35 years old? When you think about how teenagers look today, the difference is striking. But why? Did people grow up much faster back in the day, or is there something else at play?

If you look back to the 1980s, there’s a clear difference between actors Paul Rudd and Wilford Brimley at 50.


Sure, that's a cherry-picked, extreme version of the difference in how people age, but it does support the idea that just a few decades ago, people aged much faster.

In a recent video, the folks at Recollection Road did a deep dive into why your average high school junior in 1958 looked like a 55-year-old bank manager, and they found seven reasons. They were a mix of environmental and cultural factors that boiled down to one central point: people are much healthier these days.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

1. Smoking

“Cigarettes were everywhere: in diners, in offices, even on airplanes. In the 1950s, it wasn't unusual to see a mother with a baby in one arm and a cigarette in the other. High school kids would light up behind the gym, and by adulthood, many were chain smokers.”

A Gallup poll found that in 1954, 45% of U.S. adults smoked cigarettes at least once a week. Compare this with 2024, when only 11% of Americans smoked a cigarette in the previous week.

2. Sun exposure

“Back in the 1960s and 1970s, a summer tan wasn't just fashionable, it was almost required. People slathered on baby oil, laid out under the blazing sun, and cooked. There was no SPF 50. In fact, lotion was designed to help you burn faster for a deeper tan. Families on vacation didn't think twice about spending hours on the beach with no shade. By the time they were in their 30s or 40s, the sun had also carved wrinkles and dark spots into their skin.”


3. Fashion

“Think about old photos of your parents or grandparents. A 25-year-old man in 1948 was often dressed in a suit and tie, maybe even a fedora. A young woman might be wearing a conservative dress and practical shoes. By modern standards, those styles look more grown-up, more like something we'd expect from someone middle-aged.”

4. Life was harder

“Someone who grew up during the Great Depression often started working as a teenager to help put food on the table. A lot of young men were drafted into World War II or Vietnam before they were even old enough to legally drink. That kind of responsibility leaves its mark. … Even women carried heavy burdens. In the 1950s, a young mother might have had three or four kids by the time she was 25, while also running a household without modern conveniences like microwaves or dishwashers.”


5. Drinking

“Having a three martini lunch was common in the business world of the 1960s. Beer was practically considered a food group in some households. Combine that with less knowledge about exercise and health, and you can see why bodies wore down faster, giving people an older appearance earlier in life.”

There has been a sharp decline in the number of Americans who consume alcohol. In 1971, 71% of Americans had the occasional drink, but that number dropped to 54% in 2025. The decline in drinking is attributed to concerns over alcohol’s effect on health and a decrease in consumption amongst younger people.


6. Cultural expectations

"By their mid-20s, most people in the 1950s and ‘60s were married, raising children, and working full-time jobs. Life was about responsibility, not self-expression. They dressed older, behaved older, and carried themselves as adults.”

7. Testosterone

“Studies show that the average testosterone has been steadily declining for decades. Men in the 1950s and ‘60s often had higher natural testosterone than men today, which gave them more muscle mass, broader builds, and in some cases, more facial hair. While that might sound like it would make them look younger, it often had the opposite effect. The heavy brows, thick body hair, and rugged features made young men look tougher, older, and more weathered than their actual age.”

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Image via Canva/PeopleImages

Boomer grandparents are excessively gifting their grandkids, and Millennial parents have had enough.

Millennial parents and Boomer grandparents don't always see eye to eye on parenting and grandparenting. Now, Millennial parents are uniting on a nightmare Boomer grandparenting trend that sees them "excessively gifting" their grandkids with tons of both new and old *unwanted* stuff during visits.

Ohio mom Rose Grady (@nps.in.a.pod) shared her "Boomer grandparent" experience in a funny and relatable video. "Just a millennial mom watching her boomer parents bring three full loads of 'treasures' into her home," she wrote in the overlay.


Grady can be seen looking out the window of her home at her Boomer mom and dad carrying bags and boxes up her driveway after several visits. The distressed and contemplative look on Grady's is speaking to plenty of Millennial moms.

@nps.in.a.pod

Today's "treasure" highlight was the mobile that hung in my nursery... #boomerparents #boomers #boomersbelike #millennialsoftiktok #millenialmom #motherdaughter

Grady captioned the video, "Today's 'treasure' highlight was the mobile that hung in my nursery..."

The humorous video resonated with with fellow Millennial parents. "Straight to the trash when they leave," one viewer commented. Another added, "I always say 'if you don’t want it in yours, we don’t want it in ours' 😂."

Even more Millennial parents have shared and discussed their situations with Boomer grandparents buying their kids too much stuff on Reddit. "Both my mother and my MIL love buying and sending toys, books, clothes, etc. I don't want to be ungrateful but we just don't need it and don't have the space. I have brought this up politely in 'we are all out of drawers for that' but it hasn't slowed things down," one explained. "I think part of the issue is that the grandparents live in different cities and vacation a lot. They don't get to see our daughter much so they buy stuff instead."

Another Millennial parent shared, "While the intention is very kind behind these, all the grandparents are very aware that we do not need, nor wish to receive these gifts in such an excessive volume - as it creates a daily struggle to store and accommodate in our home. I struggle to keep on top of tidying as it is, and this is a massive added challenge."

millennial parents, millennial parent, millennial mom, kids room, organize Millennial mom struggles to organize her son's room.Image via Canva/fotostorm

How to talk to Boomer grandparents about gifts

So, why are Boomer grandparents excessively gifting? "Boomer grandparents may be the first grandparent generation to have accumulated the substantial discretionary funds that enables them to spend money on their grandchildren," Sari Goodman, a Certified Parent Educator and founder of Parental Edge, tells Upworthy. "These grandparents probably grew up with grandparents who didn’t have that kind of money and so they may be excited to give their grandchildren the things they didn’t get."

Goodman suggests that Millennial parents first discuss with them the "why" behind the gifting. "What comes before setting a boundary to limit over-the-top gift-giving is delving into the reasons grandparents are buying so much," she explains. "Coming from a place of compassion and understanding makes it possible to come up with mutually beneficial solutions."

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She recommends that Millennial parents sit down with their Boomer parents to learn more. "Did they grow up without many toys and clothes and are fulfilling a dream? Ask them about the values they learned as children (hard work, perseverance, the power of delayed gratification) and how they can pass on these lessons to the grandchildren," she suggests.

She adds that another reason may be that Boomer grandparents live far away and want their grandchildren to feel a connection with them. "Set up a regular FaceTime or Zoom meeting. Rehearse with the kids so they have something to say and suggest a topic for the grandparents," says Goodman. "Or send snail mail. Kids love getting mail. The grandparents can send postcards from where they live and explain some of the special sites."

boomer grandparents, boomer grandparenting, video chat, video call, grandkids Boomer grandparents have a video call with grandkids.Image via Canva/Tima Miroshnichenko

Finally, Goodman adds that for some grandparents, this may be is the only way they know how to show their love. Millennial parents could ask if they would be open to other ideas. "Parents can set up an activity for grandparents and kids to do when they come over—a jigsaw puzzle, art activity, board game, magic tricks," she says. "Arrange for the grandchildren to teach the grandparents something their phones can do or introduce them to an app they might like."

This article originally appeared last September

employee; employment law; work friends; work bestie; coworker boundaries; work boundaries; work life balance

Employment lawyer reveals 4 texts to never send a coworker

It's not uncommon for people to have a "work bestie" or "work spouse." Often, people spend a lot of their waking hours at work, so they're bound to feel like they've made true friendships with their coworkers. Before too long, numbers get exchanged, and they find themselves venting after hours about work, but this may not be a good thing.

Ed Hones is an employment attorney in Seattle, Washington, and he is not only discouraging coworkers from thinking of each other as friends, but also sharing what texts people should never send their colleagues. As an employment lawyer, Hones sees the legal fallout of the lines between friends and coworkers being blurred. Though he isn't saying people can't text their coworkers, he lists four specific types of texts to never send in case of a lawsuit.


"I see great cases destroyed every single day from one thing: old text messages," Hones reveals. "You might think that your text thread with your coworker is a safe space to vent, joke, or even scheme, but let me be clear about this one thing: it is not. In the eyes of the law, those text messages are evidence, and if you ever have to sue your employer for something, defense attorneys will find a way to get those text messages and destroy your credibility and tank your case."

employee; employment law; work friends; work bestie; coworker boundaries; work boundaries; work life balance Smiling at work, checking messages during a break.Photo credit: Canva

Of course, no one plans to sue their employer or to have their employer sue them, but sometimes things happen that result in lawsuits. Once a lawsuit is filed, discovery often follows, which means phone records and other device communications can be requested. If you've been trash-talking your boss or making egregious claims, you may be stuck having to explain it in court. But avoid sending these four texts, and you won't have to worry about your employer finding something to use against you in a lawsuit.

1. Asking a coworker to bend the rules

Hones explains that this often happens in the form of asking someone to clock you in or initial a form they forgot to complete. It may be something you think everyone does every once in a while at their place of employment, but sending a text message is documenting the request. Explicitly asking a coworker to break this employment policy can result in termination being justified. The employment attorney implores people to avoid doing it completely.

employee; employment law; work friends; work bestie; coworker boundaries; work boundaries; work life balance Man focused on his phone screen, deep in thought.Photo credit: Canva

2. Awkwardly acknowledging something inappropriate

"Here is the scenario," Hones says. "A coworker or supervisor texts you something inappropriate. Maybe it's a dirty joke or a comment about your private life, or medical condition. It makes you uncomfortable, but you have to see this person at the office tomorrow, and you don't want to make it awkward, so you reply with an LOL, laughing emoji, or a thumbs up. But if you send that text, you're walking into a legal trap called "The Unwelcome Standard.'" This means that if this behavior turns into harassment or creates a hostile environment, legally, it can be seen as being acceptable due to responses to inappropriate texts in the past.

3. Texting about job hunting

It's not uncommon for frustration to boil over and result in someone declaring they're going to start looking for a new job. Not every text or annoyed utterance about needing to find different employment is serious. Sometimes it is about blowing off steam, but other times it's truthful. Hones says not to let your employer be the one to decipher the difference in a court of law, because it may not work out in your favor. It could reduce an employee's lost wages claims, eliminate the ability to claim work conditions that resulted in an abrupt resignation, and even result in the company pushing an employee out if the text is revealed before they resign.

4. Talking trash about your boss or company

"We all need to vent, but doing it via text message hands the employer the perfect cover story," says Hones. This comes into play when an employee sues for discrimination or wrongful termination. According to the employment lawyer, if an employee sues for one of those reasons, the burden shifts to the employer to prove they didn't fire the employee for an illegal reason. If the employer discovers the negative texts about them, then it could give legitimacy to their claims if they have lied about the reasons someone was terminated. Hones says it's common for employers to lie in these cases by saying the employee was disrespectful or a bad employee, and texts trash-talking the boss would strengthen their argument.

employee; employment law; work friends; work bestie; coworker boundaries; work boundaries; work life balance Focused multitasking at the office.Photo credit: Canva

Hones explains in another video that it's not wise to assume your coworker-turned-friend will have your back in an employment investigation. Often, people need their jobs and are unwilling to risk them to help someone else keep theirs. Becoming overly familiar with a coworker may feel genuine and comfortable, but maintaining certain boundaries will help protect you legally should you ever have to sue your employer.

"Work relationships do not necessarily have to be friendly to be healthy," Dr. Maya Reynolds, MD, MPH, Psychiatrist and Behavioral Health Spokesperson at Choice Point Health, explains to Upworthy. "Keeping personal relationships and work relationships separated keeps a person free from additional emotional entanglement, rivalry, and disappointment. Because when work relationships step into personal life, promotions or disagreements can feel personal rather than professional, which brings a great emotional toll on oneself. Also, maintaining boundaries at work promotes your psychological safety."