71. The Jumping Frenchmen in Maine

Imagine you're deep in the woods of northern Maine. It's the 1870s. The air smells like pine and cold mud, and you're living in a bunkhouse with thirty other lumberjacks, miles from the nearest town. You've been swinging an ax since before sunrise, and the only entertainment you've got is each other.

Now imagine one of the men in your bunk, a quiet French-Canadian guy, a little jumpy, a little shy, suddenly gets a sharp shout in his ear. And he loses it. He leaps off the ground, screams, throws whatever's in his hands, and then here's the wild part if someone shouts a command at him mid-jump, he just... obeys it. Without thinking. Even if that command is to hit someone, punch himself, jump into a rozen lake, or spill his food. He does it. Then all of a sudden everyone in the camp seemed to get this ... affliction.

This wasn't a prank. This wasn't a bit. This was documented medicine. And it's one of the strangest medical mysteries in American history.

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