Sun Sep 15 12:00:00 UTC 2024: ## Famous Dead People: They Don’t Go It Alone

Despite popular belief, most people don’t die in complete isolation. While some might find themselves resting in a vast cemetery or scattered at sea, a few famous individuals have experienced more peculiar fates after their passing.

Take Galileo Galilei, for example. His middle finger, of all things, has been on display at the Galileo Museum in Florence since 1927. It turns out his fingers were removed by “admirers” in 1737, and the museum simply stumbled upon the most irreverent one before finding the rest in 2009.

Then there’s Albert Einstein, whose brain was removed by pathologist Thomas Harvey after his death in 1955. Harvey hoped to uncover the source of Einstein’s genius, but his efforts yielded little to no results. Years later, Einstein’s dissected brain ended up in two mason jars in Harvey’s office before being donated to various museums, where it’s displayed on slides.

Even John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Lincoln, wasn’t completely forgotten. The government, after storing his body for years, finally released it for burial. However, they kept the three vertebrae hit by the fatal bullet as souvenirs. The Booth family’s attempts to gain access to the bones for DNA testing were denied, despite their claim that a patsy was shot in Booth’s place.

Frédéric Chopin’s heart, however, had a more adventurous post-mortem journey. He requested his heart be returned to Poland, so his doctor placed it in a jar of cognac, and his sister embarked on a cross-border trip with it. It was later stolen by Nazis from Warsaw’s Church of the Holy Cross but eventually returned by an SS commander seeking to improve his image.

The story of Adolf Hitler’s remains is equally intriguing. Although conspiracy theories abound about his escape, the Red Army discovered his body in his bunker and took possession of it. In 2018, his teeth were conclusively matched to his dental records, confirming his demise.

In the end, even Hitler didn’t die alone, even if it was in a ditch and on fire. These stories remind us that even in death, these individuals, despite their fame and notoriety, continue to be connected to the world in unexpected and often bizarre ways.

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