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The Atlas Obscura Podcast

The World’s Largest Collection of Two-Headed Calves

The Atlas Obscura Podcast

SiriusXM Podcasts & Atlas Obscura

Places & Travel, Society & Culture

4.61.8K Ratings

🗓️ 14 August 2025

⏱️ 23 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Henry S. Rosenthal is the owner of what is likely the world’s largest collection of two-headed taxidermied calves. The collection is in San Francisco, and you can reach out to Henry at deepgort@gmail.com to make arrangements to see it.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

In September 2017, a calf was born in Kentucky.

0:06.5

Her name was lucky, and she had two heads.

0:13.5

Polycephaly, or having two heads,

0:16.3

is a condition that comes when an embryo does not entirely split.

0:21.6

It's pretty rare. Typically, embryos with this condition also don't survive long enough to even make it to a birth.

0:28.6

And if they do, they often live just a few days.

0:33.6

Lucky was different. She lived a few days, and then a few days longer, and then a few days longer, and then eventually, Lucky was just alive.

0:46.4

She was born on a farm that was owned by a family, and she became something of a beloved pet.

0:52.3

Lucky would nudge up against her humans when she wanted to be stroked.

0:56.4

She slept in the family's basement,

0:58.6

and the couple's five-year-old daughter would bring her blanket downstairs

1:01.6

and snuggle up next to her.

1:04.0

Eventually, the family decided to bring Lucky in for a surgery

1:07.9

that would potentially allow her to live a lot longer.

1:12.1

They set up a vet appointment and the local community raised $1,200 to help the family cover the cost.

1:19.6

Lucky died a week before her vet visit.

1:23.2

She had lived 108 days, the longest we know of that any two-headed calf has lived on this planet.

1:31.7

The family buried Lucky by a creek near their home.

1:39.2

Lucky's story feels pretty singular, and it is.

1:47.6

But she's certainly not the only two-headed calf in the world. And not all of them are born into families that give them a loving burial.

1:54.3

Recently, I heard about this museum, a very unusual one. It's a collection of taxidermied two-headed calves the largest collection of its kind

2:04.5

in the world about 50 specimens and so i wanted to know who made this place how did they

...

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