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Miss Baker was one of the first two animals to go to space and come back alive. In 1959, this squirrel monkey and another female rhesus macaque named Able were launched into the Earth's orbit aboard a Jupiter rocket where they spent 16 minutes before safely returning to ground—a major milestone at the time.
The clever author of ‘The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy’ wrote about “a planet entirely given over to ballpoint life forms. And it was to this planet that unattended ballpoints would make their way, slipping away quietly through wormholes in space to a world where they knew they could enjoy a uniquely ballpointoid lifestyle, responding to highly ballpoint-oriented stimuli, and generally leading the ballpoint equivalent of the good life.”
A pioneer in the women's suffrage movement in the US, Susan B. Anthony’s gravesite is adorned each Election Day with a tribute to her efforts: the “I voted” sticker.
Still, at his tomb on the island of San Michele in Venice, Italy, his grave is reportedly adorned with pointe shoes to honor his legacy.
Sergei Diaghilev was an art critic and patron who is considered one of the most influential figures in the world of dance, credited with reviving ballet in Europe and Russia during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and famed for establishing the Ballets Russes in Paris in 1909. Interestingly, he was never a dancer himself.
The King of Prussia from 1740 to 1786, Frederick II earned his moniker by being a skilled military leader, a patron of scholarship and the arts, and a major reformer of domestic and foreign affairs. But what people leave on his grave are potatoes.
Imaginative children’s author Roald Dahl was understandably a strange figure—that was clear enough from the ideas behind his stories. But apparently his favorite vegetable was the onion, so fans leave him plenty at his grave in Great Missenden in Buckinghamshire, England.
The icon of pop art was buried in St. John the Baptist Byzantine Catholic Cemetery in Bethel Park, Pennsylvania. A camera was left to live stream his grave 24 hours a day, seven days a week, as part of a collaboration between The Warhol and EarthCam to turn his grave into a piece of visual art.
Harry Houdini stunned crowds around the world with his clever illusions, mind-boggling escape acts, and daring stunts. When he died in 1926, he was buried in Queens, New York, at the Machpelah Cemetery, where fans leave a number of tributes.
Famed poet Edgar Allan Poe died in 1849 under mysterious circumstances and was buried in Baltimore, Maryland. A century after his death, a mysterious person now referred to as the “Poe Toaster” started showing up in 1949 and appeared to have a drink each year with the deceased author every January 19, Poe’s birthday.
The Poe Toaster would arrive masked, and leave three red roses and a half bottle of cognac on the grave. It’s said that by the late 1990s the mystery figure was replaced by his sons.
One of Frederick II’s most notable efforts was apparently introducing the potato to Prussia, which provided nutritional and economic (and gustatory) benefits to his subjects. Visitors to Frederick's grave in Potsdam, Germany, keep his memory alive with some spuds.
French musician Serge Gainsbourg died of a heart attack in 1991 and was buried at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris, where his grave is often found with heads of cabbage.
Oscar Wilde was an Irish poet and playwright most famous for penning ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray.’ He died at 46 in Paris and was buried there in Père Lachaise Cemetery, where a rather unusual gift completely covered his grave: kisses.
Gainsbourg, who became the face of French pop during his career, also became known as "The Man with the Cabbage Head" after he released his concept album of the same name in 1976.
"A kiss may ruin a human life," Wilde once wrote, and his grave perhaps fittingly then was covered in lipstick kisses. It actually became a problem for his grandson Merlin Holland, who reportedly complained about the cult tourist pastime that has a €9,000 (US$9,050) fine should you be caught in the act.
Companions in life and in death, famed philosophers, activists, and writers Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre were buried together at the Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris. Their graves are often littered with metro tickets.
Most theories posit that the metro tickets honor Sartre's support for activists who stole metro tickets and distributed them to members of the working class for free, or that they more generally pay tribute to the pair’s shared socialist beliefs.
Rubs and kisses are the gifts of choice at Noir’s grave at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. It has become a site that symbolizes fertility, and visitors give his sculpted figure a kiss and give his private parts a rub with the hopes of getting pregnant soon after. The heavily touched area is now a different color than the rest of his body.
The Doors singer Jim Morrison was buried in 1971 at the age of 27 at the Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Fans quickly flocked to the site and left not only his grave but others as well covered in graffiti, so much so that a fence had to be put up around it, which led to some other interesting things left behind.
Victor Noir was a French journalist whose death at the hands of Prince Pierre Napoleon Bonaparte (cousin of Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte III) in 1870 became a symbol of opposition to the imperial regime. What is left at his grave, however, is a rather strange tribute.
Wristbands of all kinds, photos, flowers, notes, and candles line the fence, and at Morrison’s grave you’ll also find a tree with tons of left-behind chewing gum on it. Many theories behind this suspect that the gum is not only a way for people to say they were there, but also as way to symbolically shun authority—as Morrison himself did.
The floral tribute garden set up in Green Park (across from Buckingham Palace) for the late Queen Elizabeth II has seen many marmalade sandwiches left behind—so many, in fact, that the Royal Parks organization officially warned people to stop because of the negative impact on the park's wildlife.
The sandwich tribute comes from a brief comedy sketch the Queen performed with Paddington Bear in celebration of her Platinum Jubilee, in which Paddington asks the Queen, "Perhaps you would like a marmalade sandwich?" He pulls it out of his hat and says, "I always keep one for emergencies." The Queen replies, "So do I," and pulls a sandwich of her own from her purse. "I keep mine in here. For later."
Fans erected a grave for beloved house elf Dobby from ‘Harry Potter’ at Freshwater West Beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales, where his death scene was shot. The site has drawn more fans who come and leave a meaningful gift at the site: a sock.
In the story, Dobby is freed from indentured servitude after his malicious owner, Lucius Malfoy, is tricked into gifting him a sock. But the sheer number of tribute socks have become an environmental concern for Freshwater West Beach, and officials from the conservation charity National Trust Wales issued warnings asking fans not to leave any more.
On the live stream you’ll be sure to find people leaving behind tributes to the subjects of some of his most famous works: Campbell soup cans and bottles of Coca-Cola.
It's not so surprising then to know that in honor of the late author and his work, blue ballpoint pens are left in a container in front of his grave in Highgate Cemetery in London.
As the author of famous books like ‘Matilda,’ ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,’ and ‘James and the Giant Peach,’ his grave is often also covered in toys, trinkets, and even peaches—which might smell foul with the onions after a while.
Able died soon after their return, but Miss Baker lived until 1984. When she died, she was buried outside the US Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, where visitors leave bananas to honor her.
Sources: (NBC) (Ranker) (Food & Wine)
See more: Beautiful and strange locations made famous by movies
The stickering practice at her grave at Mount Hope Cemetery in Rochester, New York, was ended in 2020 when local officials covered her tombstone with a plastic shield to protect it from the glue and materials used to clean it, but now people just place stickers on the shield instead.
Individual cards and decks of cards are regularly left at his grave, as well as witch's brooms. The number of gifts always ramps up around Halloween, which is the anniversary of his death.
In some cultures, gravesites are cherished places where the living can continue to honor the dead. Most commonly, flowers, candles, and stuffed animals are left behind as symbols of love, respect, and admiration. These gifts are a way for people to feel connected with the deceased and to help their spirit live on.
Some gravestones, however, have seen rather unusual items, only made more unusual if you have no context behind them (though sometimes even the context can't fully explain it...). These strange grave gifts often have fascinating tales tied to the deceased figure's history, and provide some insight into their lasting impact on people.
Intrigued? Click through to see the most unusual things people leave at the graves of famous figures, and why.
Strange things people leave at the graves of famous figures
Tributes range from peculiar perishables to questionable trinkets
CELEBRITY Curiosities
In some cultures, gravesites are cherished places where the living can continue to honor the dead. Most commonly, flowers, candles, and stuffed animals are left behind as symbols of love, respect, and admiration. These gifts are a way for people to feel connected with the deceased and to help their spirit live on.
Some gravestones, however, have seen rather unusual items, only made more unusual if you have no context behind them (though sometimes even the context can't fully explain it...). These strange grave gifts often have fascinating tales tied to the deceased figure's history, and provide some insight into their lasting impact on people.
Intrigued? Click through to see the most unusual things people leave at the graves of famous figures, and why.