It’s Sports Get Wild Week On Cool Weird Awesome

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This week we’re replaying our favorite episodes about when the world of sports went off course.

The dedication page of a book reads

In The 1920s There Was A Footrace From Los Angeles To New York

In 1928, the Trans-America Foot Race, aka the “Bunion Derby,” in which about 200 runners in Los Angeles set out to run all the way to New York City.


The dedication page of a book reads

The Netherlands Turned Pole-Sitting Into A Competitive Sport

The U.S. had flagpole sitting a century ago, but the Netherlands has Paalzitten, a sport in which people try to outlast each other sitting on poles.


A golf ball is just shy of the hole. (Photo by Catalin Munteanu via Flickr/Creative Commons https://flic.kr/p/6xcL8p)

The Time A Golfer Won The US Open While Suffering From Dysentery

The 1934 US Open was a prestigious but kind of strange golf tournament, and the guy who won it was sick as a dog the whole time.


A disc golfer begins a hole at the Stewart Pond course in Oregon. (Photo by Bureau of Land Management Oregon and Washington via Flickr/Creative Commons https://flic.kr/p/Zjen6D)

It’s The Birthday of “Steady” Ed Headrick, the “Father of Disc Golf”

Ed Headrick took two sports and fused them into one.


A man on a white horse puts his lance through one of the rings on the jousting course. (Photo by Pam Corey via Flickr/Creative Commons https://flic.kr/p/6Gh3sA)

Maryland’s Official State Sport Is Jousting”

In 1962 Maryland chose its official state sport and turned a lot of heads in the process.

Photo by Rich Anderson via Flickr/Creative Commons

The latest

Creator of the “Crappie Shack”

Funky little shack! Fun-ky little shack!

A Painting Chimpanzee Posed As A Modern Artist Named Pierre Brassau

The talk of the art world was an exciting avant garde painter named Pierre Brassau, except that Pierre Brassau was a big old hoax.

Drummer Hal Blaine Literally Left His Stamp On Popular Music

One drummer played on over 350 of the biggest hit records of the 1960s and 70s.

Shock Rocker Alice Cooper Was Good Friends With Comedy Legend Groucho Marx

They were two celebs from two different generations, but actually had a lot in common.

Fred The Cat Went Undercover To Catch A Fake Veterinarian In Brooklyn

He made headlines all over the world for the first ever cat-based sting operation.

Rosa Slade Gragg Outsmarted Detroit’s Racial Housing Rules, With A Workaround On A Corner Lot

A Black leader in Detroit found a way around housing rules that tried to keep her from using her own property.
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Brady Carlson
Brady Carlson
Brady Carlson is a writer and radio host from Madison, Wisconsin. more