Beyond Bizarre --  Las Pozas - Winchester House - Mini Elephant - video Dailymotion

artofkor

Documentary television hosted by Jay Robinson focused on exploring great mysteries around the world, from ghost sightings, alien encounters and everything else in between.

Transcript

00:00The secret demons of many people have often driven them to bizarre extremes of behavior.

00:09But rarely have they been so creative as in our next story, where they find expression in architecture.

00:18Strange abodes that have resulted from the peculiar motivations of those who dwell within them.

00:27The three remarkable constructions we'll examine, each has its own strange story.

00:39Isolated in a rain forest, a day's drive south of Texas,

00:44this 30-acre architectural phantasm is a whimsical concoction of concrete and steel.

00:53Still a work in progress, it was the brainchild of a wealthy English eccentric named Edward James.

01:05Inspired by creative friends such as Salvador Dali, Picasso, and Stravinsky,

01:11Edward sought to create a surrealistic Garden of Eden in which artists could thrive,

01:17and in which he found sanctuary from the likes of his cold, society mother.

01:23A kind of woman who would attend church with her children only if they matched her wardrobe.

01:30Though Edward longed to be an artist himself,

01:33his poetry was dismissed by critics as the ramblings of the idle rich.

01:39He thus embraced the surrealist art movement which mocked the very society he lived in.

01:46It mocked the very society that had rejected him for his delight in the avant-garde.

01:52In the late 1930s, Edward joined the free spirits of Los Angeles,

01:57and there he was struck by the vision of the famous Watts Towers,

02:03which Edward himself helped to save from demolition.

02:09Inspired by this extraordinary construction, he ventured on to Mexico's Sierra Madre Mountains,

02:15where his love of nature and art could be forged in concrete,

02:19amid the jungle-shrouded collection of pools and waterfalls called Las Posas.

02:28Here he would put 40 builders to work for the next 25 years,

02:33to construct an erratic assembly of 36 structures.

02:38Admittedly an act of megalomania,

02:41his self-made art colony became a playground for his subconscious passions

02:46and a shrine to his every obsession,

02:49from flowers to his ex-wife's feet.

02:54In this isolated fantasy land,

02:57Edward found artistic freedom at last until his death in 1984.

03:04But it remains a place of intrigue and fascination to avant-garde artists everywhere,

03:11and those who knew him are still touched by his creation,

03:16the goal of every true artist.

03:21Near San Jose, California, we enter the realm of one of the most unconventional homes ever built,

03:28an idiosyncratic assembly of domestic oddities that defy conventional design and even common sense.

03:37Stairways that lead to nowhere,

03:41skylights that rise from the ground,

03:45and doors that open onto walls or, more remarkably, into nothing but thin air.

03:53This opulent Victorian mansion took 22 carpenters 38 years to build.

04:02This house contains 10,000 windows, 2,000 doors, 52 skylights, 47 fireplaces, 40 bedrooms, 40 staircases,

04:1213 bathrooms, 6 kitchens, 3 elevators, 2 basements, and only one shower.

04:18And there's a total of 161 rooms.

04:22The designer behind this architectural curiosity was Sarah Winchester,

04:28the rich widow of munitions baron William Winchester,

04:31creator of the Winchester Repeating Rifle, the legendary gun that won the West.

04:38After the tragic death of her infant daughter and later her husband,

04:42Sarah consulted a Boston spiritualist who convinced her that her misfortune was the work of ghosts

04:50who were avenging their deaths from the results of her husband's deadly creation.

04:56The remedy, he suggested, was to build a home in such a way as to create a comforting environment for kind spirits

05:04and to confuse and repel the more sinister entities.

05:10It was a very popular thing, especially for the upper classes to be into spiritualism,

05:17and because she was so devastated by the deaths of her family,

05:20it left her a little more susceptible to believe that the spirits were going to kill her

05:26if she didn't build continually night and day.

05:30In 1884, the guilt-ridden heiress embarked on a lifelong obsession with bizarre home improvements.

05:37It kept work crews busy around the clock for four decades.

05:42Some of her curious designs actually made perfect sense.

05:47The 47 ornate fireplaces kept the house warm to ease Sarah's arthritic condition.

05:56A strangely shallow staircase, an electric elevator, and low ceilings also served the ailing and diminutive Sarah.

06:06And the confusing layout of the house required an innovation which Sarah called the enunciator,

06:13which informed her 20 domestics where she was located in the mansion's baffling labyrinth.

06:21But other eerie additions seemed completely surreal, perhaps even the work of a madwoman.

06:29The number 13 plays a prominent role.

06:33Rooms feature 13 ceiling panels.

06:37Windows have 13 panes.

06:40There are 13 bathrooms, and even a 13th light has been added to this important chandelier.

06:49Sarah's fascination with the supernatural is evidenced by places like this blue seance room.

06:56As the servants tell it, when the mansion's bell tower struck midnight,

07:01Sarah would steal away to this sanctuary to consort with spirits, from whom she took inspiration for her construction plans.

07:11There are even 13 coat hangers in the closet for her ghostly visitors.

07:17Yet, as one leaves the room, one doorway leads to a dead end,

07:23and the other, astonishingly, reveals a straight drop to the floor below.

07:30Then there are the 10,000 windows that adorn the mansion,

07:35many of them brilliant works of stained glass artistry.

07:39The works of Tiffany are represented here in what has been called one of the world's largest collections of art glass.

07:48In 1906, the great San Francisco earthquake collapsed three of the mansion's seven stories.

07:56Sarah interpreted this as a sign from the spirits that she put too much emphasis on reworking the front of the house.

08:05So she boarded up 30 rooms and hallways, including the front door.

08:11They were never used again.

08:15In 1922, Sarah Winchester died, and with her passing, construction stopped.

08:23Did Sarah ultimately find peace with herself and with the legacy of the Winchester family?

08:30There was one day, kind of towards the morning, I felt like someone was standing right next to me as close as they could get.

08:38And no matter what I did, that feeling never went away until I actually left that room.

08:44I like to believe she's here.

08:47Whatever her fate, the ghosts that haunted Sarah did succeed in inspiring an exotic edifice.

08:55It is truly beyond bizarre.

09:03Elephants have played a central role in the culture and economy of Thailand for many centuries.

09:11They have been everything from beasts of burden to objects of worship.

09:16Their versatility is remarkable, and they are a common sight in many countries of the Far East.

09:23But there are stories of a certain breed of elephant that is rare and strange.

09:33Merely finding one is a newsworthy event.

09:39For thousands of years, the noble elephant has been venerated by Thailand's religion and culture.

09:48These gentle, intelligent creatures grace the country's Buddhist temples in an astonishing array of forms.

10:00They have been as crucial to Thai civilization as the horse has been to our own.

10:08They have been recruited to the call of battle in Asian warfare,

10:12and they continue to do the heavy lifting and logging and in other important industries.

10:18In playing the role of everything from family transportation to pets,

10:24the elephants of Thailand lord over the landscape.

10:29Primarily, of course, because of their immense size.

10:34They are, after all, the largest land animals that exist.

10:39But legends have it that deep in the remote swamps of Thailand and Burma,

10:45there lives another species of elephant that is respected and feared by man and animal alike,

10:52because they carry a deadly venom.

10:56The rivers of Southeast Asia's rainforests, there is rumored to be a species of elephant no larger than a matchbox.

11:07Rarely seen by the outside world, the famed miniature elephants are the secret masters of the jungle.

11:17According to eyewitness reports, these pocket-sized pachyderms roam the watery realms of the forest as freely as their massive cousins.

11:28They are allegedly aquatic animals, spending most of their lives as skillful swimmers in tropical rivers and lakes.

11:37Using their trunks to breathe air, they are much more at home in the water than the larger species,

11:44which we often see basking in the cool of a stream.

11:50Mini elephants are vegetarians, foraging off the lush plant life of the Thai and Burmese jungles.

11:58They also are communal animals, gathering in herds, much like their big brothers.

12:06While a stampede of these Lilliputian creatures hardly raises the same thunder as the larger species,

12:14they still command fear and respect from both man and beast, because these elephants are said to be poisonous.

12:26Decades ago, it was not uncommon to find a brisk trade in mini elephants in Asia.

12:32They were supposedly sold at auction in the open markets on the border between Thailand and Burma.

12:40Hundreds of witnesses attest to their existence, and the care and feeding of them is considered a sacred responsibility.

12:50But today, the trade is only in the dried remains of these diminutive dumbos, which are frequently brought to market by traders and explorers.

13:02They are fascinating to behold.

13:05Their features are strikingly like those of the full-sized elephants, yet strangely shrunken in size.

13:14Weighing little more than a mouse, their dainty dimensions are a remarkable evolutionary development.

13:22Rarely do they measure more than an inch or two in height, which makes finding them in the wild a particularly difficult task.

13:32Furthermore, their tusks are alleged to be poisonous.

13:37A single jab from their tiny ivories brings death to their victims in minutes.

13:45Believers claim that some 40 species of mini elephants exist in the Asian jungles,

13:52and animal physiologists have examined their pint-sized remains to test the veracity of those who claim that they are real.

14:02State-of-the-art technology has been employed in an attempt to unravel this minuscule mystery.

14:11Numerous x-rays have been taken, revealing details of the animal's interior structure.

14:19These pictures clearly show the ribs, backbones, tusks, and other anatomical parts within the dehydrated cadavers.

14:30Though experts and skeptics continue to test and debate their authenticity,

14:37clearly keen eyes are required for this exacting task.

14:44Even MRI scans have been performed to authenticate their delicate anatomy to a high scientific standard.

14:53Each intricate part of their anatomy has been scrutinized with precision instruments and computer analysis.

15:03Bogus claims have been uncovered this way.

15:07But there are many more examinations for which there seems no other explanation than the actual existence of these minuscule mammals.

15:17And debate continues to rage within Thailand's scientific community.

15:24The large elephants that graze the wilds of Africa and India are somehow comforting creatures.

15:32We enjoy watching and interacting with them in the zoos of the world.

15:38But there is something disturbing about the mini-elephant.

15:45Do herds of these creatures actually roam the forest floor?

15:52Do they rule the watery realms of the rivers they are said to inhabit?

15:56Is the fact that they are so deadly perhaps one reason why so few of them have been captured alive?

16:04Or is this sensational story just a hoax?

16:09Tales of these mysterious creatures will doubtlessly continue to be told along the remote waterways of Thailand.

16:17Perhaps one day an explorer will emerge with a harrowing report of a live confrontation

16:24with a new species of elephant previously unknown to science.

16:29It is a provocative possibility.

16:32And an encounter with these microscopic mastodons is one you would never forget.

16:38A safari into a corner of the animal kingdom that is beyond bizarre.

Beyond Bizarre -- Las Pozas - Winchester House - Mini Elephant

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