In June 2001, on a small farm in Staffordshire, England, a 10-year-old
girl named Laura Buxton was celebrating her grandparent’s 50th wedding
anniversary. At one point, urged by her grandfather, Buxton wrote a note
-- “Please return to Laura Buxton,” along with her address -- on a
small card, attached it to a gold mylar balloon, and released it into
cloudless sky...
Two days later, 140 miles away in a Milton Lilbourne, a farmer was
checking on his cattle in a field and came across the deflated balloon
in his neighbors’ hedge. He was about to discard it as trash, when he
noticed the note; his neighbors had a daughter named Laura, so he passed
it along to them...
The girl the farmer gave the balloon to was also named Laura Buxton, and was also just shy of ten years old... A three hour drive apart, the two Laura Buxtons not only shared the same
name, but were nearly the exact same age, were the same height (which
was unusual, considering they were both well above average for their age
at 4 feet, 7 inches), had brown pigtails and blue eyes, and were in
Year 5 in primary school. In a Radiolab interview,
the girls recalled the astonishing similarities that arose as they
spoke for the first time: they both had three-year-old female black
labrador dogs, grey rabbits, and guinea pigs with identical markings
(orange spots on hind legs). Upon meeting, they unintentionally chose to
wear identical outfits -- a pink sweater, and jeans...
You can read the rest of the story at Priceonomics (or listed to that Radiolab story).
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