Mollie Fancher became known as the “Brooklyn Enigma” (an enigma is something mysterious and hard to understand). Then one day in 1912, the 70-year-old woman woke up. She lived three more years, but she remains an enigma. To this day, no one has ever fully explained what caused her long, strange sleep.
NEVERMORE
Every year on the nineteenth of January, a mysterious man sneaks into a locked graveyard in Baltimore, Maryland, and places three roses and a half-empty bottle of cognac on Edgar Allan Poe’s grave. Poe, author of dark poems and stories like “The Raven” and “The Tell-tale Heart,” died in 1849.
Jeff Jerome, curator of the Poe House and Museum, says the man first appeared in 1949. In 1993 the mystery mourner, who always wore a scarf and black hat, left a note that read, “The torch will be passed.”
In 1999, the fifty-first year, a new mourner appeared. This one followed the same ritual as the previous mystery man, placing the roses and cognac bottle on Poe’s grave. He put his hand on top of the tombstone and bowed his head for five minutes. And then he disappeared…into the fog.
SPOOKY SPOTS
Want to see a ghost? Visit scary Olde England—there are plenty of ghosts for everyone.
BORLEY RECTORY IN ESSEX
According to local legend, in the 17th century, a woman named Marie Laire was strangled by her husband and buried in the cellar of a monastery. Two hundred years later, Reverend Henry Bull unknowingly built Borley Rectory on the site where the monastery once stood. Marie Laire soon made her presence known. She often appeared at Reverend Bull’s window, staring at him with vacant eyes. Bull was so upset that he bricked up the window…but the ghostly legend grew:
• In 1923, new owners called in a psychic investigator, who witnessed vases flying into walls, keys leaping from their keyholes, and messages being tapped out on a mirror.
• When the Reverend Lionel Foyster moved into the rectory, messages began to appear on the walls asking Foyster’s wife, Marianne, to “please get help.”
• In 1939 a mysterious fire destroyed the house. Some local residents claimed to have seen a nun at an upper window peering out over the flames.
THE INDUSTRIAL MUSEUM IN DERBY. Built on the site of an old silk mill, the museum’s tower is haunted by the ghost of a little boy who worked at the factory and died when he was kicked down the stairs by one of the bosses. The staff often hear crying and run into the tower thinking there’s a lost child inside. But it’s always empty. Instead they find the elevator going up and down…by itself.
THE THEATRE ROYAL AT MARGATE. This theater doesn’t need to put on scary shows—it’s scary enough as it is. Many actors say they’ve heard a scream and seen an orange ball of light traveling across the stage before exiting through the stage door. An apparition sometimes appears in a box in the balcony and draws back the curtains if they are closed.
THE CROWN HOTEL IN YORKSHIRE. This 17th-century inn is now a three-star hotel that hosts a number of ghostly guests. The most famous: a waitress who was murdered by the chef and now wanders the corridors crying. A lady in a gown has been spotted in the lobby, where temperatures suddenly drop dramatically. One permanent resident of the hotel is often awakened by the ghost of a little girl sitting on her bed, and the ghost of the notorious highway robber Dick Turpin is heard galloping by outside.
TOMBSTONE TALES
If you’re ever in Ohio, stop by and say AHHH!
GREAT BALL OF MYSTERY
Marion Cemetery in Marion, Ohio, is home to the “Merchant Ball.” This 5,200-pound granite ball—the gravestone for the Charles Merchant family—rests solidly on a stone pedestal, but ever since 1898 it has rotated…all by itself. The family first noticed the phenomenon when a spot where the granite had not been polished suddenly appeared. They tried to stop the ball from spinning. They had a crane lift the 2½-ton stone and tar it back into place. But it continued to turn!
What causes the mystery movement? Some say a restless spirit moves the ball. Others think it’s a result of temperature changes, which make the base expand and contract. But that would leave scratches in the ball—there aren’t any. It seems to float on its pedestal.
There are other stone balls in the Marion Cemetery, but they don’t turn. The Merchant Ball remains an unsolved mystery.
ASHES TO ASHES?
Not everyone wants to end up six feet under. Edward Headrick, who invented the Frisbee, wanted his ashes molded into a Frisbee and tossed around. Here are some more ash-tonishing endings.
ASHES TO DIAMONDS. LifeGem Memorials turns dead people’s remains into diamonds. The concept is simple. Humans and diamonds are both made up of carbon. Add pressure and heat and you’ve got a gem that will last forever. What’s more, the average person’s ashes contain enough carbon to make 50 to 100 beautiful diamonds.
ASHES TO ART. Wayne Gilbert, an artist from Texas, has made the amazing (and gruesome) discovery that every person has a unique color—even after death. He found this out when he mixed a person’s ashes with resin…and color suddenly appeared. Now he turns people into paintings.
ASHES TO REEFS. Want to spend eternity with fish? Eternal Reefs mixes the ashes of deceased people with cement to create balls that are dropped into the ocean to create artificial reefs. The fish love the reefs.
ASHES TO SPACE DUST. A company called Celestis will launch the ashes of your loved one into deep space. “Families can look up into the night sky and know their loved ones are up there somewhere.”
GHOST HUNTER
Who you gonna call? Nancy, of course.
In the 1970s, Professor Nancy Acuff was driving home from her job at East Tennessee University when she hit what she later called a “time warp.” Suddenly she was transported back in time to the 1800s. Her home was gone and in its place stood a log cabin. She watched a man on horseback gallop up to the cabin door and yell for someone to come out. When a young boy appeared, the rider whirled around and galloped back down the road. Then, just as suddenly, everything changed back to the 1970s.
When a similar incident occurred a year later, Acuff did some investigating and concluded that the “man” was her home’s previous owner, Jacob Storm, the first mayor of Blountville, Tennessee. Word of Professor Acuff’s ghost hunting spread and soon she was getting calls from people with haunted homes of their own.
Acuff believes there is a difference between spirits and ghosts. Ghosts always do the same thing at the same location, but spirits are generally the souls of dead relatives who have some message or warning they want to impart. And Professor Acuff is there to receive it.
BAD GHOSTS!
Go on, spend the night here—we dare you.
The Ancient Ram Inn is an 800-year-old inn built on a pagan burial site in England. What scares most visitors is the creepy feeling that the spirits here are not friendly. John Humphries, who has lived there for 30 years, says he has been pushed against walls, knocked over, and had his bed shaken. Once he even felt something clawing at his bed like an animal.
But it is the Bishop’s Room that frightens most people away. According to Julie Hunt, a well-known ghost hunter, the room is home to five phantoms, including a cavalier, a monk, and a witch.
In 1999 she took this photograph of a blurry figure in the room, which she believes is conclusive evidence of ghostly activity in the Ancient Ram Inn.
TA MOKO
The Maoris—the native people of New Zealand—were legendary warriors of the South Pacific. Ta moko is Maori for “to be tattooed.” They awed their enemies with their amazing tattoos.
WHO GOT TA MOKO
All high-ranking Maori were tattooed as a rite of passage into adulthood. When young men and women reached age 12 or 13, girls tattooed their chins and boys got a full-face tattoo. The tattoos told not only a person’s social status but also what tribe and clan he came from—even what he did for a living. The designs were so unique that during the 18th century, Maori men would sign legal documents by pressing their faces against the paper like a signatur
e. Most young Maoris tattooed only their faces but they often added tattoos to other parts of their bodies to mark important events in their lives. North Auckland warriors were famous for the double spirals tattooed from their butts to their knees. Ta moko was an incredibly painful ordeal that could last for days. But everyone tried to get through it. Why? Because not to have moko made you a real loser in Maori society.
HOW TA MOKO WAS DONE
The ta moko artist would study a young Maori’s face for hours, even days, working out a design. Then he carved deep cuts into the skin with a bone chisel. Only the Maori did tattoos in this way (other Polynesians like the Samoans and Hawaiians used needles, which is the way most tattoos are made today). Next he dipped the chisel into a mixture of burned kauri tree gum and caterpillars and tapped the sooty powder into the grooves in the skin.
“OW! THAT HURTS!”
The pain a young Maori endured was so intense that friends and relatives would play flutes and chant poems to keep his mind off it. Sometimes the Maori would pass out or, even worse, quit, which shamed him for life. But getting the tattoo was just the first part of the ordeal. Once the tattoo artist was finished, leaves from the karaka tree were put on the cuts to help them heal, and that process took months. Nothing was allowed to touch the swollen wounds, which could get infected, so the Maori was fed liquid food and water through a wooden funnel. Depending on where the tattoos had been placed, he might not be able to get up and move around. But six months later the young Maori was usually fit enough to walk proudly out among his or her people with a totally new look.
THE AMITYVILLE HORROR
This story was the subject of a best-selling book and a very creepy movie. Is it truth…or fiction?
On November 13, 1974, six members of the DeFeo family were murdered by their oldest son, Ronald, in their home in Amityville, New York. One year later, George and Cathy Lutz and their three children moved into that home. Twenty-eight days later, the Lutz family moved out.
Here are the reasons why.
HOW TO READ TEA LEAVES
Learn the ancient Chinese art of tasseography and unlock the secrets of your future.
SUPPLIES
• A plain, light colored tea cup and saucer. Make sure the cup has a wide opening and narrow base.
• A teaspoon of loose tea
• Hot water
INSTRUCTIONS
1. Put the loose tea in an empty cup. (If you have only tea bags, cut open two bags and pour the contents into the cup.)
2. Fill cup with hot water. Let the tea steep for a few minutes.
3. Sip the tea. While you’re drinking, think of a question.
4. Stop drinking before you get to the last few drops of tea. There should be one or two teaspoons of liquid and the tea leaves at the bottom of cup.
5. Swirl the cup counterclockwise three times with your left hand (or right hand if you’re left-handed).
6. Immediately after swirling, turn the cup over onto the saucer. Drain the liquid. Then turn the cup over with the handle pointing toward you.
READING THE TEA LEAVES:
1. The handle is Home. Anything you see here is bound to strike close to home.
2. The rim is the Present.
3. The walls are the Immediate Future.
4. The bottom is the Distant Future.
Reading tea leaves is like seeing shapes in the clouds. Use the guide below to interpret the shapes. Start at the handle and work your way down to the bottom.
TASSEOGRAPHY “SYMBOLS”
Elephant: Wisdom
Bird: Good news
Mountain: An obstacle or challenge
Sun: Joy and power
Moon: Fame and riches
Airplane or train: Travel
Eyeglasses: Study the situation thoroughly
Octopus: Overwhelming; too much to do
Fish: Good news from far away
Heart: Love
Cat: Treachery
Key: Problem solved
Knot: An argument
Lock: Something to be solved or opened
Volcano: A situation about to erupt
Coins: Prosperity
Mouse: Thief nearby
Letters: First letter of someone’s name
Spider: Unexpected inheritance
Dog: Faithful friend
Clouds: Wishes coming true
Teardrop: Disappointment or sadness
WILL POWER
People have left some pretty strange requests in their wills.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
Robert Louis Stevenson, the author of Treasure Island, left his birthday to a good friend who had always complained about being born on Christmas.
A CLASS ACT
Edwin Forrest was a leading stage actor in the 1800s who left all his money to the Actors Fund to establish a retirement home for his fellow actors. But he had two conditions: 1) They had to do a reading of Shakespeare on Shakespeare’s birthday; and 2) The Declaration of Independence had to be read every 4th of July.
TAKE THAT!
An Australian named Lord Francis Reginal left one shilling to his wife “for tram fare so she can go somewhere and drown herself.”
NO MONKEYING AROUND
Patricia O’Neill got angry at her husband and left her estate to her chimp, Kalu. The ape’s take: $100 million!
MONEY FOR HER MAKER
A woman in Cherokee County, North Carolina, left her entire estate to God. The court told the county sheriff to try to find the beneficiary. A few days later the sheriff returned and submitted this report: “After due and diligent search, God cannot be found in this county.”
HIGHWAY TO HEAVEN
Sandra West was a wealthy socialite from Beverly Hills who left her brother $3 million, provided that he buried her in her lace nightgown and sitting in her Ferrari, with the seat at a comfortable slant. So that’s what he did—but then he poured concrete over the Ferrari so no one would be tempted to dig her up and drive the car away.
BIG AND SMALL
The world’s longest will was 95,000 words long. The tiniest will was written on the back of a postage stamp.
PUSHING UP DAISIES
These are from real gravestones—really!
THE HAUNTED PAINTING
On February 2, 2000, a California couple put a very strange item up for sale on eBay: a haunted painting. An art dealer originally found the painting behind an abandoned brewery and sold it to them. They hung the 24- by 36-inch painting in their living room…and that’s when the trouble began. One morning their four-year-old daughter announced that the “children in the picture were fighting.” The couple claimed to have caught the ghosts in the painting in action with a motion-triggered camera. And now they wanted to get rid of it.
As word of the auction spread across the Web, more than 13,000 people viewed the painting. Some people swore that looking at it made them physically ill, as if they were possessed by an evil spirit. No one knows what the family originally paid for the picture, but they sold it for $1,025.
GOT GHOSTS?
Think there may be ghosts in your house? Here’s how experts say you can tell.
TEN TELLTALE SIGNS THAT YOUR HOUSE IS HAUNTED
• You feel a cool breeze even though the windows are closed.
• You hear voices that come from nowhere and you feel like someone is watching you.
• You hear footsteps walking in and out of empty rooms.
• You smell roses, oranges, or an “electric” odor.
• Jewelry, shoes, tools, and other small items are moved from one location to another…but nobody (nobody human, that is) moved them.
• Lights and electrical appliances turn on and off by themselves.
• Your bedcovers are thrown off you.
• You feel a warm touch on your back or shoulders. (The touch of a ghost is always warm, never cold.)
• You receive repeat phone calls from a caller who never identifies himself.
• You s
ee flashes of light or movement out of the corner of your eye, yet when you look there’s nothing there.
GHOSTBUSTING TIPS
Okay, so you know you’ve got ghosts. Now what do you do? Here are five tips.
1. TALK TO THE GHOST. Let him know that this is your house and he must stop bothering you or leave immediately. Shout if you must.
2. SHOE SHUFFLE. Put your shoes at the foot of your bed, with one shoe pointing one way and the other pointing in the opposite direction. This confuses the ghosts and they leave.
3. GET THE DIRT. Take a scoop of dirt from the path to your front door and dump it in a nearby graveyard. The ghosts will follow.
4. PAINT YOUR FRONT DOOR RED. Ghosts won’t enter a home with a red door.
5. GET OUT THE VACUUM. If all else fails, clean your house. Ghosts don’t like clean homes.
SOLD!
Surfing the Internet? Some pretty strange things are being sold on eBay.
ITEM: A ghost and his former cane.
STORY: Mary Anderson placed her father’s “ghost” up for auction when her son, Collin, told her that his grandpa had come back to haunt him. She had only one request for the winning bidder: “I would like you to write a letter after you’ve received the cane (and the ghost) to my son, letting him know that his grandfather is there with you and you’re getting along great.”
Uncle John's Creature Feature Bathroom Reader For Kids Only! Page 16