Here's a precursor to Pee Wee Herman's trick furniture.  The headline is from Popular Mechanics, 1931.

You've heard of a long summer, but here's one that lasted seven months.  (That said, the summer in Malta lasts eight months.)  From Colin Clout's Calendar: The Record of a Summer. April-October, by Grant Allen, 1883.

""Man-made star guides flyers.  Civilization is constantly reaching back into the centuries for old ideas to meet modern needs."  From Popular Mechanics, 1930.

"Noiseless city is predicted within ten years."  From 1931.  The naiveté would be quaint were Popular Mechanics not so excruciatingly, sickeningly smug about the religion it makes of Big Science.

"Twin thermometers reveal why one is uncomfortable."  From Popular Mechanics, 1921.

Just shoot me -- "'Mercy' bullet brings sleep instead of death."  From Popular Mechanics, 1930.

This sort of embarrassing hubris spans the centuries.  There are no "new" types of prehistoric Indians in Texas, only types new to the so-called discoverer who is merely extraordinarly behind the times.  From Popular Mechanics, 1931.

Here's one of the few headlines in Popular Mechanics that we've actually believed.  "Artists in butterfly wings do their work backward."  From 1929.

"Hoop-skirt parachute for airmen."  From Popular Mechanics, 1911.

"Electric knife is used to restore lost sanity."  From Popular Mechanics, 1927.

Here's an ad that actually promotes Stendhal Syndrome, a psychosomatic disorder in which you hallucinate that you are within a work of art.  The text reads, "Are you inside or outside this picture?  Something to think about!"  From Popular Mechanics, 1930.

Here's a surprising bit of occultism in the world of Big Science.  We daren't ask why, but scientists pointed a tadpole's head at a plant to see if it would encourage growth.  And it did.  The so-called scientific explanation was that invisible radiations from the tadpole's head made it happen.  (We aren't making this up.)  What's hilarious is that Big Science's explanation is along the lines of what Big Magic thinks is going on.  And so this item goes in our very, very slim file of articles in Popular Mechanics that we actually believe.  From 1931.

From Peter David's Sir Apropos of Nothing, 2001.

Here's a precursor to near-literates sharing their every thought on the internet.  "Dummy reproduces writing at a distance."  From Popular Mechanics, 1929.

"Prayers for revenge said by nails driven in wooden statue."  From Popular Mechanics, 1924.

"Voice from the sky carried by horns on plane."  From Popular Mechanics, 1930.  (However, the illustration is our own.)

We can affirm that a headache weighs almost nothing compared to the smug bullshit in every issue of vintage Popular Mechanics.  (We haven't dared to look in more recent issues.)  "Science to weigh headaches."  From 1928.

"Get an elephant."  From Popular Mechanics, 1911.

The magazine that glamorized big game hunting and the clubbing of seals for their fur (not to mention poaching eggs from critically endangered species—for merely one example, see "Youth Fights Condor to Win Thousand-Dollar Egg" from the Nov. '29 issue, in which the condor's near-extinction is noted), promoted smoking, considered rainforests to have "no practical purpose," and predicted that blimps would end of war and disease by the year 2000 ... this same magazine was smugly skeptical of physiognomy.  Hence, we're less skeptical of physiognomy than ever before.  From Popular Mechanics, 1928.

You've heard of "zombie Jesus," but some deceased bishops are also at large.  By Richard Henry Clarke, 1872.