ReligiousTolerance.org has tallied more than 80 examples. Among them:

1792: Date some in the Shaker movement calculated as the end of the world

1953: In “The Great Pyramid, Its Divine Message,” David Davidson predicted the end of the world as August 1953.

1988: NASA scientist Edgar Whisenaut’s book “88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Occur in 1988” sold 4 million copies. Rapture didn’t happen.

1997: The Sacerdotal Knights of National Security claimed the CIA captured and interrogated a space alien in eastern Missouri; the aliens spilled plans for a devastating attack on Earth slated for Nov. 27 of that year.

2000: Edgar Cayce predicted a cosmic storm and wild temperature swings would kill millions.

2002: Via mass e-mail, Orthodox Christian Paul Smirnov warned that God would send an asteroid to destroy Hollywood on March 24, in time for the Oscars.