100 Human Brains Went Missing From the University of Texas

Here’s a story you don’t hear every day: Approximately 100 human brains, complete with their formaldehyde storage casing, have gone missing from the University of Texas in Austin.

Psychology professor Tim Schallert told the Austin American-Statesman Tuesday that while they “think somebody may have taken the brains… we don’t know at all for sure.”

So culprits could include anything from students with strange taste in Christmas tree ornaments (postulates Business Insider) to Halloween pranksters (guesses other UT professors) to, and we’re just putting this out there, the Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz. (Beats zombies, am I right?)

The brains came into the university’s collection 30 years ago, and many were stored in the basement of the school’s Animal Resources Center. One of the brains that is suspected missing belonged to Charles Whitman, a sniper who killed 16 people after firing from the Austin clock tower in 1966. He had requested his brain be studied for mental illness.