![The tools of torture are apparently a big attraction at...]()
Mayo/AP
The tools of torture are apparently a big attraction at some museums around the world. Above, a reproduction of a torture chamber used during Franco's reign in Spain on exhibit at the Museum of Europe in Brussels.
![The supposed crash of an extraterrestrial spacecraft near the sleepy...]()
Mata/AFP/Getty
The supposed crash of an extraterrestrial spacecraft near the sleepy town of Roswell, N.M., in 1947 has been an an enduring source of mystery for UFO believers and conspiracy theorists. Among the displays at the International UFO Museum and Research Center in Roswell is the alien autopsy said to have been conducted - and covered up - by the government.
![Want to get a sense of what a 1930s jailhouse...]()
MCRAE/AP
Want to get a sense of what a 1930s jailhouse was like? Head to the Museum of Colorado Prisons, in Canon City, Colo., which opened in 1935 as a women's prison and is located near the still-in-use Colorado Territorial Prison.
![A young woman listens intently to information about the currywurst...]()
Gottschalk/AFP/Getty
A young woman listens intently to information about the currywurst sausage (on a handset shaped like a ketchup bottle) at the German Currywurst Museum, a Berlin museum dedicated to the history of ... currywurst sausages!
![The eyes have it: These wax models depicting diseases and...]()
Kennedy/AP
The eyes have it: These wax models depicting diseases and injuries to eyes are from the 1800s and are among the many offbeat and out-there displays at Philadelphia's Mutter Museum.
![No, it's not Chuckie's new girlfriend. It's a doll patterned...]()
Steven Senne/AP
No, it's not Chuckie's new girlfriend. It's a doll patterned after Lizzie Borden, the infamous Massachusetts spinster accused of taking an axe and giving her father and stepmother 40 whacks in 1892 (she was acquitted). The display is in the Lizzie Borden Bed and Breakfast/Museum in Fall River, Mass., the house where the murders took place.
![The Science Museum in London has an extensive collection of...]()
Court/Associated Press
The Science Museum in London has an extensive collection of centuries-old objects and artifacts detailing the history of medicine, such as this display of prosthetic arms - and a hook.
![Instruments of torture, along with drawings, engravings and illustrations are...]()
STEFFEN SCHMIDT/AP
Instruments of torture, along with drawings, engravings and illustrations are displayed at the Anna Goeldi Museum in Switzerland.
![A collection of old circus wagons are lined up at...]()
Gash/AP
A collection of old circus wagons are lined up at the Circus World Museum in Baraboo, Wis. Opened in 1959, the museum is on a 63-acre site that was the winter home of the Ringling Brothers' circus from 1884 to 1918.
![To really get a sense of U.S. history and culture...]()
Cain/Getty Images
To really get a sense of U.S. history and culture in the latter half of the 20th century, look no further than ... a PEZ dispenser. The Easton Museum of PEZ Dispensers, located in Pennsylvania, is set up to show how the designs of the popular candy dispensers reflect the time period in which they were manufactured. The collection consists of 1,500 dispensers from 1950 to the present.
![Interim director Margaret Lyman is shown with a collection of...]()
Widman/AP
Interim director Margaret Lyman is shown with a collection of skulls and skeletons at the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia, yet another museum dedicated to medical history and oddities.
![At the Inquisition Museum in Lima, Peru, visitors can see...]()
Mejia/AP
At the Inquisition Museum in Lima, Peru, visitors can see how Spanish sadists and the Catholic Church got all medieval on suspected witches and other godless heathen during the 340-year-long Spanish Inquisition.
![Among the artifacts at the National Museum of Health and...]()
Wolf/AP
Among the artifacts at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C., are the remains of the Lyon quintuplets, the first male quadruplets born in the U.S.
![Famous folks - or at least parts of them -...]()
Wolf/AP
Famous folks - or at least parts of them - are well-represented at the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C. A museum curator points to a section of John Wilkes Booth's spine, with a piece of his spinal cord (bottom center); a jar containing President Dwight Eisenhower's gallstones (center top), and a section of President James Garfield's vertebrae.
![Body parts, torture and space aliens? These weird and wacky...]()
WOLF/AP
Body parts, torture and space aliens? These weird and wacky museums are hardly what we remember visiting in grade school. When it comes to skeletons and other ghoulish artifacts, Halloween's got nuthin' on the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Washington, D.C. Its thousands of specimens, many of which are hundreds of years old, chronicle the the history of medicine.Follow our galleries on Twitter @NYDNPhotos
![This replica of a jail chamber is on display at...]()
STEFFEN SCHMIDT/AP
This replica of a jail chamber is on display at the Anna Goeldi Museum in Mollis, Switzerland. In 1734, Goeldi was the last woman in Europe to be executed for witchcraft.
![To view a collection of 'crazy' art, visit the Gugging...]()
PUNZ/AP
To view a collection of 'crazy' art, visit the Gugging Museum in Klosterneuburg, Austria, which displays paintings and objects by psychiatric patients.
For weird, wacky and downright scary displays, check out these museums from around the world …
