Skull Tomb Virtual Cache
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A small, unsssuming stone building on the WPI campus had earned the name, "Skull Tomb"? Don't you wonder why?
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Skull Tomb 42 16.356 71 48.390
http://www.wpi.edu/About/Tour/skull.html
Constructed in 1887 entirely without iron, Skull Tomb was a place where WPI faculty members and students conducted delicate experiments in electricity and magnetism until vibrations from early Worcester streetcars ended that work. The building was next used for experiments with high-voltage transformers. For a time, the student newspaper was published here. In 1917, rocket pioneer Robert Goddard '08 used the building for secret experiments. Legend has it that while using a lab in Salisbury, explosions caused some damage and he was then moved to the Magnetic Lab (now Skull Tomb). Even here, neighbors complained of hearing loud noises. Since 1921, this has been the home of Skull, a senior honorary society, which holds its secret ceremonies here.
Yeah. Right.
The following is overdramatized fiction, inspired the last year's Team Pantalaimon:
How could a small unassuming stone building obtain the hideous name of skull tomb? Could it have been the post-WW1 nerve gas experiments that left so many victims behind? With their head cut off to examine the extent of brain damage from the gas? Or could an over zealous professor, doing the “delicate” electricity and magnetism experiments, have brought an early end to many lab assistants, because they weren't so "delicate '? Or in the days of uncontrolled fraternity hazing, a nearby initiation gone awry? The bodies dumped in a nearby landfill, with the heads removed to avoid identification? Or Robert Goddard's "secret experiments", where he was forced by the military to investigate the effects of highly accelerated rocket flight on the human body, only to find that the weak point of the human body is the neck?
As long as their tuition check cleared, would WPI show any concern to investigate these disappearances such as these?
With the heads forgotten and left to rot in the basement, they would be discovered years later by an unassuming janitor, who, unable to recover from the fright, is now in a local mental institution. The rumors of his demise have given the small stone structure the name of… Skull Tomb.
The mission of this virtual cache is to find the date of dedication on the plaque on the side of the building, and the anniversary. This must be completed and e-mailed by midnight, otherwise you will become a victim, too. At daybreak the next day, the tomb turns in to a regular virtual cache, and safe for all visitors.
There is a parking lot a short walk from the tomb.
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