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Being the older brother of Napoleon Bonaparte wasn’t an easy job. Joseph wanted to be a writer, but instead had to rule Naples and then Spain. When Napoleon was defeated, Joseph set sail for the United States, where he eventually settled in …New Jersey!
Bonaparte may have been dethroned, but he was still royalty. He built up the estate to reflect his social standing.
He constructed a vast mansion for himself, with a large wine cellar, floor-to-ceiling mirrors, elaborate crystal chandeliers, marble fireplaces and grand staircases. His library held the largest collection of books in the country at the time (eight thousand volumes versus the sixty-five hundred volumes of the Library of Congress).
The land surrounding the mansion was elaborately landscaped and featured ten miles of carriage paths, rare trees and plants, gazebos, gardens, fountains and an artificial lake stocked with imported European swans.
But life in the Garden State was not all fun and games. Joseph Bonaparte dealt with some who sought revenge against his name, the wife who would not immigrate with him, and even the Jersey Devil! Read all about Bonaparte’s American life at mental_floss. Link
Last year, Chesley Sullenberger saved the day when he landed a crippled passenger jet on the frigid Hudson River. This year we have Frank Vogt, a traffic reporter’s pilot whose Cessna lost oil pressure 1200 feet off the ground. In the early dawn darkness, that ground looked like one big mass of black void… except the turnpike.
“I knew it was wide enough, I knew it was straight enough. There wasn’t any wires, and I didn’t see many overpasses,” Vogt tells Asylum. He reasoned that since the traffic was still light, there would be enough space between the cars that they could slow down and let him in.
His hastily concocted plan worked perfectly. He even managed to pull his Cessna to the side of the road, although the inevitable rubbernecking — completely justified in this case — still blocked traffic a mile-and-a-half in both directions.
Link with video from CBS (which is also responsible for the photo.)
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There’s a spot in a Lowes movie theater parking lot in New Brunswick, New Jersey, where you’ll never forget where you parked your car: the grave of Mary Ellis. Yes, a cemetery right smack in the middle of a parking lot!
Not only is the grave of Mary Ellis embedded in a parking lot, it’s also the focus of a terrific legend. Mary, who came to New Brunswick in the 1790s to live with her sister, fell in love with a sea captain who promised to marry her once he returned from his next voyage. The captain then left Mary his horse and sailed off down the Raritan River.
Every day, Mary rode her lover’s steed down to the river, hoping to meet him at the water’s edge. For years, she gazed at the river, waiting for his return. In 1813, she purchased a plot of land overlooking the river, where she maintained her vigil until her death in 1826. And there she was buried, forever waiting for her captain.
Meanwhile, commercialism swept through, establishing a series of retail businesses, including a popular flea market, all sharing space with Mary. Today, Mary’s grave is entrenched in the parking lot of a Lowes movie theater.
Wesley Treat’s Roadside Resort has more on Paved Paradise: Cemeteries in Parking Lots – via
Previously on Neatorama: 10 Most Fascinating Tombs in the World
