Whoa! Did I Read That Right? Double-Take Posts of 2009

Finicky bears, addled boaters, a cannon that was, a cannonball that wasn’t. In 2009, these and other outside-the-box stories reminded us that you just never know what you’re going to run into – or what might run into you -- in America’s national parks.

National Park Mystery Photo 9 Revealed: Reviewing Stand? Hardly!

He was known, quite appropriately, as the "hanging judge." During his 21 years at Fort Smith, Judge Isaac C. Parker sent 160 men to the gallows, a replica of which this week's Mystery Photo depicts.

What Not to Do with an Old Cannonball

On the morning of April 21, 2009, a local homeowner arrived at the visitor center at Fort Smith National Historic Site in Arkansas with the best of intentions but the worst of plans—he was carrying an old cannonball he'd dug up in his garden.