Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

This odd little story--which I suppose goes into the “bits of random weirdness” file--comes from the “New York Sun,” June 25, 1882:

The boarding house at 52 Willoughby street, Brooklyn, is one of a three-story, painted, brick row, on the south side, between Jay and Lawrence streets, a few doors only from the residence of Hugh McLaughlin, and is kept by Mr. and Mrs. William Swift, formerly of Boston, who leased it early in the present year.

The back parlor was let to a lady from Chicago, but about two months ago she suddenly went away, and the room, with a bedroom adjoining it, was rented to a young married couple, who yet occupy it. The room is very prettily furnished and ornamented with bric-a-brac. The walls are adorned with paintings and engravings, while the windows and doorways are heavily curtained. The following stories are told concerning these rooms: 

The couple had occupied the room only a few nights when the springs of a clock standing on the mantelpiece, and known to the trade as a carriage clock, began occasionally to vibrate with a sudden force, thereby transforming the ordinary tick into a sound likened to a prolonged mournful cry. This would occur while the occupants of the room were seated at the table, and sometimes it would break out in the middle of the night, when they were asleep. This peculiar noise has continued at irregular intervals ever since. The clock continued to keep good time, and there did not seem, on inspection, to be anything the matter with it.

Recently there has appeared in the room several times a floating, vaporous body which assumes the shape of a huge foot ball. It is of a dark color, and is transparent. It will start from a corner of the ceiling. take a downward course. and float slowly across the parlor, through the curtained doorway of the bedroom, and disappear under the bed.

In one instance it was discerned by a pet dog lying in his mistress's lap. With a bound the dog was upon the floor barking at it loudly. Two of the occupants of the room were riveted to their chairs, while the effect upon the third, who was lying sick in the bed, is described as like that of a severe electric shock. During the last few nights slight rappings have been heard.

On Thursday night the light was extinguished about 11 o'clock, and just as the couple had fallen asleep a loud pounding awakened them. The pounding ceased for a few seconds, only to be renewed in the shape of loud raps, which appeared to come from a small table by the fireplace. They sounded as though they were caused by a knuckle coming in contact with wood. The table is small, of common wood, and is covered with a cloth which would somewhat muffle the sound of a rap.

The raps heard were sharp and could not have been produced by striking upon the cloth. A thorough investigation failed to elicit any cause for the mysterious rappings, which were kept up almost without cessation until the dawn of day. There was also a rustling sound at intervals, as though something was moving through the air. The curtains trembled. 

The occupants of the house believe that a natural cause will eventually be found for the annoyance, but it is added that there are peculiar circumstances surrounding the affair which are very distressing.

Pastor Schupart Versus the Devil

Pastor Johann Gottfried Schupart (1677-1729) was one of the leading German Lutherans of his day, becoming Professor of Theology and eventually Rector at Giesing University.  However, the part of his career that has earned him a place in this blog deals with his lengthy battles with a supernatural force that he naturally described as “the devil,” but what we today would call an unusually violent and persistent poltergeist.

As we are now dealing with the subject of the fallen angels, and at the same time enquiring, "An Diabolus possit gere in corpus?"—I will tell what has happened to me—and I call the thrice-blessed Creator to witness that it is true—and I am prepared, upon demand, to substantiate it, not only with my own oath, but with the evidence of more than a hundred witnesses. I know well, it is true, that many old wives’ fables are mingled among the relations of ghostly happenings; but I earnestly assert, that in all my days I have never been superstitious, and have thought lightly of such things; but, though I kept no journal of the matter, I will relate what I remember. For six years I fought with the devil, and was never sure for one quarter of an hour that he would not wring my neck.

The beginning was so :—

I was lying asleep in bed in my cabinet, and my wife, who had a fever, was in the opposite bed, when, about one or two in the morning, some one or something came to the door, and gave it a blow hard enough to drive it into pieces. I sprang out of bed; but, though I had not been sound asleep, but only dozing, and though my wife was also much startled, I supposed that we had both dreamt it, and lay down again. And yet I had, none the less, my own thoughts about the matter, for a brother of mine, who was ill at the time, afterwards died. But I said to myself, “It’s only a dream!” and settled down again in bed. Then the door was struck again, just as hard as before, and I saw clearly that it was no dream; but I put it out of my mind.

Next evening, when the maid put the light on the table, the spirit struck it so that it fell a good distance off upon the floor, but continued standing and kept alight, which caused me much thought. And from that time forward these things went on. Stones, weighing six, eight, nine, ten pounds, were thrown at my head, as violently as if shot from a bow; they whistled through the air, and struck out the whole window—glass, lead and all. I was not touched by them, but I had to get new windows put in nearly every day. Often I did not take off my clothes for four weeks at a stretch. I was struck in the face, stuck with pins, bitten, so that men saw the marks of both rows of teeth; the two great teeth were there, and were as pointed and sharp as pins. After I had been at confession, I had always the greatest annoyances, and had, generally, after returning home, to pick up all my books, that had been thrown from the shelf and mixed up together. When I wanted to sleep, I had to lay one cheek on the pillow, and cover the other side with another pillow, to protect me from slaps in the face; even then I was pinched and even struck.

At last I used to set my back to the wall at night and read, and thus I read through Syen's Histoire de l’Eglise, four thick quartos. Once the house was set on fire, in seeming, as it were, and then I begged the Prince for a guard, urging that not only I, but other poor loyal subjects were endangered; and I said I wished to pick out honest and pious men, according to my own judgment; and this was granted me. And these guards saw how It beat me, and they got some boxes on the ear themselves, though they hit about them in the room with their swords.

In the presence of twelve persons, It struck my wife so hard on the cheeks that the sound was heard five rooms away. In another house, to which she had retired, I having gone out, she received, in the presence of three persons, more than fifty slaps on the face, till she said, "I might as well bear the blows in my own house as in another’s." But although the strokes resounded so terribly, they did not hurt as much as one would have supposed from the sound of them.

As things were so bad, I procured leave to include myself in the public prayers in the Church, and begged my hearers not to be scandalized, or to adopt sinful opinions, even if God should allow Satan to kill me, and I should be found lying dead in this place or in that. When I had evening prayers according to custom—for my congregation attended diligently—and the whole room was full of people who saw and heard all, I was, during the prayers, pricked, bitten, struck and pinched, till my wife and I had to cover our legs with the clothes of those sitting by us. Cords were thrown around my neck and my wife’s, so that, had we not been quick in pulling them off, we should have unquestionably been strangled. Of all my books, the Talmud had the most to suffer. The book of Church regulations was torn, also the prayer-books and hymn-books. It tore Hedinpro’s Testament and threw it at my feet. It tore the Gospel of St. John, and quod maxime notandum , when I was expounding the Epistle to the Romans in the course of my exordia, and had come to viii. 17 and 18.  It tore the leaf on which the text was—the leaf began with those verses—out of the book, so that, when I came into the pulpit, I had not got the text; but the leaf, torn into little pieces, was strewn on the bed of my wife, then lying sick at home.  Nothing was done to the Bible, save that the Fourth Chapter of the Prophet Isaiah was once splashed with ink.

Once when I was lying in bed, the carving-fork was flung at me, but only the handle struck me; the knife came immediately after the fork, but did me no damage. Another time this great knife was thrown at me again; I heard it come whistling like an arrow, and started; it hurt me, but did no material harm. Once I was sitting in my room in my shirt, and a very sharp little knife was hurled at my side; my wife heard it whiz by, and cried, “You’re surely hurt?” I looked, and there stuck the knife, but no harm had been done. And just as I was saying to my wife, that I clearly saw in this the Divine protection, a stone of a pound’s weight flew past my head, and smashed the window.

When I got into bed, I often lay down on pins, so that they bent, but they did not injure me. My pupils lodging in my house frequently found dirt and stones in their bags. The chairs were thrown about the room. I could see nothing, but one might mark something corporeal was at work, for once when I was going to church, my wig could not be found, and I could not have preached if, after sending to different persons, a certain Cammer-Rath had not lent me his. Now when I came into the pulpit with somebody else’s wig on, everybody at once supposed that some new misfortune had happened, and so, just after sermon, I was summoned to the Count, to dine with him. So I wanted to put on my new coat, but one of the sleeves was gone; I sent for my old one, but that too had only one sleeve. Meanwhile there was an uproar in the house, made by the cats and dogs, and the turtle doves that I kept in the sitting-room; it was as if they were all mad.

On the Monday, I said to my wife that I must have a coat in any case, and wanted to take the sleeve from the old coat and have it put into the new one; but when I took the coat, the sleeve was gone too, and there was I with two coats, which had only one sleeve between them. So I sent to the shop, for stuff to have a new suit made. Meanwhile, my wife went to the store-room, to see whether she had any cloth for lining left, and knelt down before a drawer. Then there fell something on her head, as heavily as if it had been a hundredweight, so that she began to cry out in a lamentable way; I rushed in, and there was my wife on her knees, with my stolen wig on her head. At this I fell into a state of excitement, and conjured the spirit, in a solemn manner, to bring me back the things it had taken—for all the hymn books were gone too. Just then I was called away to exhort a criminal, and told my wife that she should not stay in the house all alone, for the evil spirit would have to bring back the things, and it would not be well to let him do any more mischief. I had not been gone long—my wife was in the garden—when a terrible din began in my sitting-room, all the cats and dogs, the doves too, crying aloud, and tearing about. My wife rushed in, and saw a black bird, like a daw, fluttering about among our animals; she took heart, and resolved to kill it, but, as all the knives had had to be locked up, she had nothing to do it with; but she seized the spit, and thrust at the black bird. In that moment he vanished, my wife could not see whither; but blood lay in the spot where he had been, as I myself saw when I came home. The whole affair came into the courts, and my things were replaced, except the glasses, etc., that had been broken.

Once when I was summoned to court, I wanted first to eat a little sausage and salad. I ate only a small portion, and my wife took some also. In all my life I have never been so sick as this salad made me. My wife was also ill. The cat died, and the dog suffered after eating of it. Whether the devil had put in poison, and wanted to make away with me, I cannot now say, for some negligence or other circumstance may have been the cause; at any rate, this is what happened to me. 

Whenever I had a sword, I was safe from front attacks, for then It only threw things from behind me; but if I laid the sword aside, I received blows again.  When I was asleep, I was safe so long as two of the watchers held their swords over my face, but if they took them away, or ceased to brandish them, my torment began again. I used the Magic Balsam from the Prince’s Apothecary in Stuttgart, but it did no good.

Once when my wife's cheeks were all swollen, a surgeon sent me a book against magic. In this book I found a recipe, and had it made up at the apothecary’s. It was a fumigating powder. I laid it on the coals, and held my wife’s head over it by force, for she said she could not endure the pain the smoke caused her. I fetched a vessel, and drew from her mouth first a long black horsehair, and then much thread and other stuff, the full of half the vessel; the pains were then somewhat better, but as my wife still felt something, I held her head over the smoke again, and drew out such another horsehair; there was nothing more.

Once I was sitting and writing, when It took a bottle of brandy, and smashed it over me and my paper, so that I was quite "anointed” with the liquor. All this time I stayed in my house, and would not go for all the devil could do, though the authorities offered me another lodging. One day wanted to smoke, but my pipe and tobacco were gone. I managed to find them; the pipe had been filled. I was going to smoke, but noticing that the pipe was heavy, I cleaned it out, and found it full of dirt, with a little tobacco on the top. Curiously enough, It harmed no one in my house but my wife and myself, except a man who said, as he was keeping watch, and an uproar was going on upstairs, "If this wasn't a clergyman’s house, I should swear," and then, as in the heat of the moment he emitted a curse, a key hit him on the nose with a distinct sound.

Only once was I hurt by a knife, in the lower part of my leg; and I had an old sword lying in a press; this It took and threw at my wife, slightly injuring her foot; when she took the blade and wanted to shut it up again, It tore it out of her hand, and threw it maxima cum vehementia into the press, so that it stuck there. Then I took it into my hand, Saying, “Herr Teufel, if you have power, take it out of my hand," but nothing happened, so I shut the sword up again. It often took my jug of wine away, and brought it back; I drank it and suffered no harm. The rest I cannot now remember. But some time I will put it all down, and have a discussion upon it. I would not have missed the experience for three thousand reichsthaler, for it taught me the power of prayer; but I would not go through it again for that sum, either. You must not think that this went on continually for six years, for it would have been impossible to bear it; but from time to time it ceased, for eight days to a fortnight, now and then for four weeks, and once for a quarter of a year; after that it would be more violent. After my wife had hurt the bird with the spit, we had peace for a long time.

This is all. I call God the Almighty and Omniscient to witness that these things occurred as stated. How or in what manner it was done I do not know. In all my days I saw nothing, but heard and felt enough; and so I leave the matter to every man’s mature consideration.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this Friday's Link Dump!  Our host for this week is the glamorous Princess Mickey, one of history's best-dressed felines.

What the hell were Roman dodecahedrons?

The turbulent life of Lady Margaret Logie.

The King of Denmark visits Milan, 1474.

Some really tough pioneer women.

Secret messages on an obelisk.

The parliamentary career of an 18th century Earl.

Headline of the week?

America's city of poets.

A stolen cat goes to court.

Physical evidence that Roman gladiators really did fight animals.

Yet another sign that ancient humans were more sophisticated than we thought.

Related: ancient humans sketched dinosaurs.

Veterans reflect about VE Day.

The ghost who testified against her murderer.

Recently discovered frescoes at Pompeii.

Strange markings in a Tunisian desert.

A medieval cemetery in Wales is confusing the hell out of archaeologists.

AI in ancient Greece?

The Banshee of Blissville.

Papal funeral rites, 1878-1922.

A brief history of guacamole.

First-hand accounts of the California Gold Rush.

A really weird Martian rock.

An undeservedly obscure Indian archaeologist.

The pub which boasts of owning a fossilized pie.  Yum.

A 19th century Bengal Army officer.

Some impressive ancient jewelry.

Free love and murder.

Why do we call it "painting the town red?"  It turns out, we dunno.

The Jersey Shore shark attacks of 1916.

That's all for this week!  See you on Monday, when a pastor is visited by the Devil.  In the meantime, here comes trouble!

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Bring on the flying laundry!  The “London Times,” July 5, 1842 (via Newspapers.com):

Wednesday forenoon a phenomenon of most rare and extraordinary character was observed in the immediate neighbourhood of Cupar. About half-past 12 o'clock, whilst the sky was clear, and the air, as it had been throughout the morning, perfectly calm, a girl employed in tramping clothes in a tub in the piece of ground above the town, called the common, heard a loud and sharp report over her head, succeeded by a gust of wind of most extraordinary vehemence, and of only a few moments’ duration. On looking round she observed the whole of the clothing, sheets, etc., lying within a line of a certain breadth, stretching across the green, driven almost perpendicularly into the air.

Some heavy wet sheets, blankets, and other of like nature, after being carried to a great height, fell, some in the adjoining gardens, and some on the high road, at several hundred yards' distance; another portion of the articles, however, consisting of a quantity of curtains, and a number of smaller articles, were carried upwards to an immense height, so as to be almost lost to the eye, and gradually disappeared altogether from sight in a south-eastern direction, and have not yet been heard of.  At the moment of the report which preceded the wind, the cattle in the neighbouring meadow were observed roaming about in an affrighted state, and for some time after they continued cowering together in evident terror. The violence of the wind was such that a woman, who at the time was holding a blanket, found herself unable to keep hold, and relinquished it in the fear of being carried along with it! 

It is remarkable that, while even the heaviest articles were stripped off a belt, as it were, running across the green, and while the loops of several sheets which were pinned down were snapped, light articles lying loose on both sides of the belt were never moved from their position.

"A Friendly, Sportive Hobgoblin"

Everard Feilding

The following tale comes to us courtesy of barrister/psychic researcher (not a combo one sees every day) Everard Feilding, in the form of two letters he sent his friend Hereward Carrington, who published them in the 1951 book “Haunted People.”  It is a rather delightful poltergeist account, complete with a supernatural snipe hunt!

Transylvania,

Jan. 26, 1914

Dear Carrington,

Your letter has just reached me in the middle of the most extraordinary adventure I have ever had. Last year, Crookes received a fantastic letter from a Hungarian lawyer, telling him of certain amazing things that had been happening to him and begging to be investigated. I was then ill and couldn’t come, but this time, finding myself within measureable reach, from Warsaw, I decided to come.

It felt like Dracula—a journey to a mysterious land, to stay in a country village with an unknown person round whom things equal to Home’s phenomena (if 1/10 of what he said was true) were happening. I didn’t know whether he was a lunatic or a liar, but I came.  And my journey has been repaid. I leave tomorrow, after about ten days in this country, with the mediums, ie., the lawyer and his wife, to hunt for buried treasure in Brittany! I shall spend a few days with Schrenck-Notzing, and also with la Tomezyk, with him, in Munich, and shall then take my mediums on, through Brittany, to London.

My lawyer has a Jinn. No less. A friendly, sportive hobgoblin, late a Roumanian, and now the most desirable imp that anyone could wish for. For most of the facts I have to depend on the lawyer, an excitable, very middleclass person, formerly much addicted to wine, gambling and women, good-hearted, hospitable, a spendthrift, hopelessly unbusiness-like, and absolutely staggered by the goings-on of his imp.

This creature first started operations at a time when, for lack of pence, the lawyer wanted to commit suicide. He suddenly found money in his pocket which he knew wasn’t there before. He thought he must have stolen it in a fit of aberration. Then money began to drop on to the table, and he thought he was mad. Then stones fell beside him as he walked out, and then gradually all sorts of things were chucked into his room at all hours of the day and night. Bromide tablets fell on his bed when he couldn’t sleep; bottles of Schnapps in his carriage of a cold night; cigarettes out of the air when he had run out of them, and cigars bearing the Emperor’s monogram!

As things materially eased then, the character of the phenomena changed, and now the things are mostly ancient and useless tagrags and bobtails, ranging from bottle-tops to an elderly pump, about 50 lbs. in weight and 4 feet long, slabs of marble, 5-foot poles, pieces of wood, heavy iron screws, pincers, knives, wire lampshades, toy animals--all hurtle into the room at unexpected moments…And they do: I have seen lots of them.  Two minutes after I first entered his room, a 5-foot pole fell at the other end of it--he and I being alone in it, and he at the opposite end (a room 30 ft. long.)  On another occasion, I being the first to enter the room, a 4 ft. pole jumped out at me from a corner which I was facing at a distance of 3 feet--the lawyer at the time just entering the door.  A glass fell very softly at my feet, the lawyer not being in the room at all, and the nearest person being not within 12 feet of me.  Cigarettes fall out of the air.  Objects which are put under the table change places, or disappear altogether within, once, one minute of having been put there, notwithstanding that we (he and his wife and I) are all sitting sideways with our feet well outside the legs of the table.  A rusty table-knife falls in the middle of the room while we are all sitting writing at the table.  The same 5 ft. pole before mentioned falls very gently at a distance of 6 ft. from the lawyer, sitting with me at the table.  If he had thrown it (as I tested) it would have made a devil of a noise.  Rappings all about the wall and quick rappings on the table, perhaps not evidential, but probably true, are heard.  And so on.  I am therefore tempted to believe the bigger things he tells me of, i.e., the pump which I have seen, and the marble slabs, which I have not.  The dinner table jumps up constantly at meals, again not strictly evidential, but I think true, as it could only be done by his wife, a frail little woman, with her feet under the chair, and I’m sure she doesn’t do it.

The Jinn communicates by Ouija, an alphabet on a card and a bottle-top into which he and his wife each put a finger, with enormous rapidity.  In addition to this is a romantic story, by writing, of a former incarnation, when he was a German Baron called Schindtreffer, who lived in Mindelheim, Bavaria--a place he says he never heard of--in 1700.  And further, of 9 cases of money and jewels and papers, said to have been sent with his son to Brittany in 1713, and buried in a particular place to avoid an attack by robbers.  A map is given of the exact whereabouts, with details of rivers and small villages, and the present aspect of the country.  An ordinance map having been sent for, these villages and rivers are found to exist.  And now nothing will satisfy him but to start forth and hunt, and another lawyer is putting up the journey money, partly because he is smitten with the romance of the thing, and partly to share in the possible treasure.  And I am to go too, to translate, as they can’t speak a word of French.  All kinds of family details are given of the Schindtreffer affair, including an “apport” of a photograph of a picture, said to be in the Munich gallery, of his then-wife, and brought by her!  This we shall investigate first.  We’ll see!

As ever,

E.F.

N.B. I don’t believe the Brittany story, but I do believe in the Jinn.

A short time later, Carrington received a follow-up report:

Just returned from Transylvania.  The lawyer and his wife, and I hope the Jinn too, are coming to stay with me here for a few days.  If he produces a pump in my dining room I shall be pleased.

My Transylvanians have gone, and I am left hopelessly puzzled by the whole business.  There were a considerable number of phenomena here, though nothing at all like they were in Hungary.  Nearly all could (though in some cases with great difficulty) be attributed to the wife.  They nearly all came at unexpected moments, and it was thus impossible to control them.  There was also fraud, e.g., when a snipe, which was found on the dinner-lamp (on indications of the spook at the end of dinner) was traced as having been bought by the wife in a neighboring shop.  At the same time, the circumstances of this “apport” are otherwise so curious--the lamp having previously been examined by the servant before dinner, and the snipe being so very obvious once it was seen--that it is almost unthinkable that it should have escaped observation.

If one accepts the possibility of a poltergeist, it is possible to suppose that part of the phenomenon, namely the purchase of the snipe, was carried through normally by the medium, and the remainder, namely the apport, by the spook.  She said she did not remember anything about the purchase, but in hypnosis I recovered the memory.  She said she was sitting in the park, and that her sister came to her and insisted upon her going with her, and bought the snipe, and then took it away after returning with her to the park.  Her husband, who was present, appeared amazed at this, and said he had no knowledge of any sister, and certainly none in London.  She then said that the sister was sitting in a chair in the room, and got up and went towards her, and then appeared to pursue a phantom round the room, upsetting everything as she went, ending up at the window, apparently very much frightened, and saying that her sister was outside, laughing at her.  Questioned after awakening, she said that she had an elder sister with whom she had not been on good terms, and who had died some ten years ago.  In hypnosis I also recovered the memory in similar conditions of another attempt to purchase something which she knew normally I had been unable to trace.

All this looks very much like double personality action, and therefore in the realm of subconscious and not conscious fraud, in a trance condition.  She does, as a matter-of-fact, fall very readily into trances, e.g., when I play the piano she falls spontaneously into a trance and dances, but her husband says that this is the first time he has any knowledge of a trance occurring outside the house.

As a result of five weeks’ intimate seeing of the people, I am more inclined to believe in their honesty than otherwise, but in view of the fraud it is impossible at present to put forward such a theory, excepting to anyone already familiar with these curious hypnoid conditions--and who has not seen, as I have, a certain number of phenomena under really good control.

The best controlled phenomena here were a rapid drumming on the table during dinner, exactly as though one were drumming with one’s fingers, although the hands were visible and the feet controlled--not concurrently, but immediately after--and seemed far away from any contact.  Besides, the noise was one which could not be made with the feet as far as I am aware.

I went with them last week to Brittany.  The man said he could not resume his ordinary work without having visited the place.  Excepting the names of small places, nothing was found correct, and he returned to Hungary much disappointed.  He appeared frightfully concerned about his wife’s “unconscious” fraud, and seemed terrified lest in this presumably trance condition she should do dishonest actions.  He begged me again to visit him in Hungary, and to carry-on the control in a still more rigorous manner, if the phenomena continue, and to bring someone with me to help.  I do wish you were here…

Unfortunately, the outbreak of WWI prevented any further investigation of the “Jinn,” which apparently ceased its operations after the lawyer and his wife returned to Transylvania.  Unsurprisingly, but disappointingly,  the Schindtreffer “buried treasure” was never located.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to the latest Link Dump!

Our host for this week stole a pig, and away did run!

Reptiles are smarter than you might think.

The many lives of Anne Frank.

Scientists may have found Noah's Ark.  Or maybe not.  We shall see.

Solving the mystery of a missing mountain climber.

The Easter Bunny's controversial history.

1891 sea combat in the Pacific.

Science has found a way for humans to talk to dolphins.  Poor dolphins.

What it was like to be a medieval court jester.

A shocking autopsy.

The global deluge of circa 4000 B.C.

A look at the Revolutionary War from the British perspective.

A too-realistic Santo Cristo.

A Derbyshire ghost riot.

A mysterious "portal" on Mars.

The color purple doesn't really exist, which just shows you can't trust anything anymore.

Three Ice Age fireplaces.

One of ancient history's greatest military commanders.

An ancient "mystery town" in Egypt.

The gruesome (and difficult) business of collecting the bodies of victims of the Titanic.

The wild life of photographer Peter Beard.

When people moved to Florida for the buried pirate treasure.

A police station's cat mascot.

A look at "phantom trains."

It's not all that easy to become a fossil.  Assuming that's your life's dream, of course.

You know, if my boyfriend was about to be executed for murdering his mother, I'd figure I had quite a lucky escape.  But I guess that's just me.

The complicated story behind a lawyer's disappearance.

The musician's resurrected brain.  This is one of the creepier stories I've read in quite some time.  Thanks, Science!

We may now know how King Tut died.

A warehouse laborer for the East India Company.

That's all for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll go on a buried treasure hunt with a poltergeist.  In the meantime, here's an English dance tune.

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

This tale of a trouble-making bridge in New Jersey appeared in the “Pittsburgh Commercial,” February 3, 1874:

The local reporter of the Bedford Inquirer, with the fate of Ananias staring him in his mind's eye, puts in print the following story of a haunted bridge: 

And now we stumble upon a mystery in Harrison township. About six miles west of this place is a bridge known as Kinton's bridge, which spans the Juniata, and is a spot of no mean significance in the history of the township. By many of the citizens, for many years, this bridge has been dreaded and there are those who, rather than cross it, would wade the sparkling stream at a temperature of 20 deg.; not that the superstructure is faulty, nor that there is any petty jealousy because Smith or Jones built the bridge, but because it is believed that the devil or some other body or thing who has not the interests and happiness of the citizens at heart, wields a terrible, evil, magic influence over it. Many wonderful, and if they did not come from men of unquestionable veracity, we would say slightly incredible stories are told concerning what has happened in this famous bridge, but as we have not the space to recount them all, we will give the latest sensation. One afternoon, some time since, a farmer started with a load of corn to Mann's Choice, and on his way had to pass through the bridge.

He was a man not given to fear nor to the belief in spooks, ghosts and hobgoblins. He arrived at the town in safety, unloaded his corn and started for home. Just as the sun was disappearing in the western horizon, his wagon, drawn by two powerful horses, entered the bridge, when all of a sudden they came to a halt--whack went the whip about the legs of the fiery steeds, who strained every nerve to go forward, but it was a dead stall. The driver dismounted and examined the wagon, found that it had not caught against anything, and proceeded to lead his team, but to his great astonishment the wagon would not move. He unhitched the horses, led them out of the bridge and tied them to a fence.

He then returned with the intention of backing the wagon out, but he found that the wheels were firmly set, tree tongue was immovable, and the light bed which he had handled many a time without assistance, was so solidly fixed that he could not move even the one corner. Night came on and with it anathemas loud and deep, he declared he could not go home without his wagon, to be laughed at by his neighbors. The services of a man and boy, who lived near the bridge, were brought into requisition. They had a lantern. The trio did all in their power to loose the wagon, but it remained as stationary as though it were a part of the bridge.

Finally they gave up in despair. The farmer had already mounted his horse preparatory to starting for home when the chains attached to the tongue rattled. He went back--the magic spell was broken, and the wagon followed in the wake of the horses as though nothing had occurred. The affair created a wonderful sensation in the neighborhood, and to this day is a dark mystery. 

So late as one night last week two young men in a buggy, drawn by a powerfully built family horse, approached the bridge, and when about two-thirds through, their progress was suddenly and mysteriously stopped.

The horse put forth his best licks, but the buggy remained firm. The gentlemen alighted and discovered that their vehicle had grown fast to the bridge and would not give anywhere. After half an hour's pulling and tugging, they concluded to unhitch and go home. When the horse was about half unhitched the buggy became loose, and they went on their way rejoicing. We do not pretend to give any reasons for these mysteries, but we are willing to swear that we get our information from as reliable men as Bedford county can produce, and that they are candid in their convictions.

A Sea Lion Named Alice

"You see," resumed Laura, "I really have some grounds for supposing that my next incarnation will be in a lower organism. I shall be an animal of some kind. On the other hand, I haven't been a bad sort in my way, so I think I may count on being a nice animal, something elegant and lively, with a love of fun.”

~Saki, “Laura”

In life, Alice Parsons was an estimable, if ordinary woman, the last person one would think of as potential Strange Company material.  After she died, however, her life took a marvelous turn for The Weird.

Alice and her husband of many years, Lee, were both from Mississippi, but since 1917, they lived in California and the Pacific Northwest, where Lee worked as a salesman and saw sharpener.  Although they had no biological children, they raised their orphaned great-niece and nephew, Selma and Lee Darnell, whom they loved as their own.

In September of 1965, Alice died at their home in Santa Cruz, and Lee arranged to send her body to her home town of Terry, Mississippi, for burial.  At the same time, the Boyd Science Museum in San Rafael, California, was awaiting the arrival of a sea lion that was also being shipped from Santa Cruz.  This was when Fate arranged that the young sea lion and the elderly housewife would be forever entwined.

During the shipping process, the bill of lading that was meant to accompany Alice’s corpse somehow wound up in the crate containing the sea lion.  When the animal arrived at the museum, the employees were both intrigued and extremely confused.  Who was Alice Parsons, and why was a sea lion named in her honor?  They shrugged and decided to roll with it.  From then on, the creature was known as “Alice.”  

In March 1966, the famed San Francisco newspaper columnist Herb Caen somehow learned of the sea lion with an unusual moniker, and he thought the quirky little tale worthy of mention.  His column reached the eye of Selma Darnell, who was working at Harrah’s Club in Reno.  The next day, she flew into San Rafael to meet her relative’s namesake.  After spending the day gazing at the sea lion in the little enclosed pool and feeding Alice chunks of fish, Selma came to a momentous conclusion.  That mixup of shipping tags was, she now felt, no accident.  Somehow, her late aunt “had something to do with the switching,” because Alice’s soul now resided in this sea lion.  The only thing that puzzled Selma was that in life, Aunt Alice couldn’t swim.  Selma soon returned, this time with the sea lion’s widower.  Lee accepted the news that his wife of 55 years was now an aquatic mammal with an equanimity and broad-mindedness that did him credit.  “I consider it a compliment,” he said.

Selma was even more pleased with the unexpected reunion.  “We think it is beautiful,” she sighed.  She and her uncle vowed that they would often come back to visit their transmigrated loved one.

"San Rafael Independent Journal," April 14, 1966, via Newspapers.com

Alice became a justly well-known and popular member of the museum.  In November 1966, she made headlines by jumping her fence one night in order to do some sightseeing around San Rafael, until the lure of fish enabled rescuers to recapture her.  (She did the same escape act the following April, causing the museum to put in a higher fence around the pool.)  

Alice Parsons passed away--again--on July 14, 1969.  Where her soul went next, I unfortunately cannot say.

Weekend Link Dump

 

Welcome to this week's Link Dump!

We'll even get poetic.

Some home decor from the Tudor era.

Leigh Hunt, the critic that royalty just couldn't shut up.

This week in Russian Weird:  An alien revenge massacre in Siberia?  And the CIA figures in all this.  Because of course they do.

Related: An astronomer struggles with the UFO mystery.

A "layer-out" of the dead.

Princetonians saved "The Great Gatsby," although I for one wish they hadn't.  I had to read it in college (and write a paper about it!) and I absolutely hated the damn thing.  If you've never read it, don't, unless you enjoy pretentious writing about boring and extremely unpleasant people making each other's lives miserable.

Eerie digital scans of the Titanic.

A new clue about the history of metallurgy.

A mysterious death in Pennsylvania.

Remembering the 160th anniversary of the end of the Civil War.

The memorials that tell the history of an English manor.

B.F. Skinner and babies in boxes.

The complicated history of Bergen-Belsen.

The Scottish village that's a UFO hotspot.

In which Mary II writes to William III.

The English city that has a strange underground world.

Creating a Martian time machine.

The life of an 18th century soldier.

The wild world of 19th century journalism.

An ex-monk turned princely con man.

Meanwhile, scientists want to digitally recreate worm brains, thus proving that it takes all sorts to make the world.

Ghosts and the "Stone Tape Theory."

A wife murders her husband...in the middle of a courtroom.

The Battle of Azaz, 1125.

A visit to Stepney, 1963.

A first-person account from a Titanic survivor.

Why we can't get away from unicorns.

The mudlarks of the Thames.

Where we get the phrase, "Hell in a handbasket."

The mystery of "Japan's Atlantis."

That's it for this week!  See you on Monday, when we'll look at one very special sea lion.  In the meantime, here's...uh, this.

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

This curious little story--unique in Fortean circles as far as I know--appeared in the “Cleveland Leader,” April 7, 1875:

The Schenectady Union of March 30th tells this extraordinary story:

A few days ago a phenomenon of a very singular nature occurred at the residence of a Mr. Veeder at No. 37 Albany street. Mrs. Veeder at the time was engaged at her household duties, and all of a sudden she was astonished and confounded, according to her statement, by what seemed to be a flash of light that filled the room for a moment with a brilliant illumination. She was so overcome by the strange occurrence that she screamed at first, but the light having disappeared, she regained her composure, and to her still greater astonishment, happening to cast her eyes toward the ceiling of the kitchen where she was at the time she saw the mark of a child’s foot on the wall overhead. She stood a moment contemplating the object on the ceiling when she saw another mark precisely like the first begin to develop itself on the ceiling, which soon appeared in full, being the print of a child’s foot corresponding exactly to the other one. 

She became alarmed and rushed from the room. Proceeding to a neighbor’s, she called in another woman, and both watched the curious affair. Soon other footprints developed themselves on the wall when another lady was called in, but the footprints continued to multiply. 

This curious development went on until the ceiling of the kitchen was almost covered with these tracks crossing the wall in different lines of direction, and soon after similar marks were seen in quite a number on the ceiling of an adjoining bedroom. The marks in both rooms were all of a child’s foot and were all of the same size and precisely alike in all respects. The ceiling, like all others at this time of the year, is more or less colored and the marks on the wall look like white spots of the foot shape. The marks are still on the wall although some of them have been rubbed off.

The Poltergeist of Ringcroft

The following are the most relevant extracts from a pamphlet published by the Reverend Alexander Telfair in 1695:  "A true relation of an apparition expressions and actings of a spirit which infected the house of Andrew Mackie in Ring-Croft of Stocking, in the paroch of Kerrick, in the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, in Scotland."  It is a fascinating account of what we today would call one particularly destructive poltergeist.

Telfair prefaced his narrative by expressing his reluctance to appear "in print, to the view of the world."  However, his modesty was overcome by "the conviction and confutation of that prevailing spirit of atheism and infidelity in our time, denying, both in opinion and practice, the existence of spirits, and consequently a heaven and a hell; and imputing the voices, apparitions, and actings of good or evil spirits, to the melancholic disturbance or distemper of the brains and fancies of those who pretend to hear, see, or feel them."

In other words, Rev. Telfair was anticipating our modern world's insistence that alleged paranormal activities are "all in your head," and blowing a big raspberry.

After providing a long list of local worthies who were ready and eager to attest to the truth of his story, Telfair begins:

Whereas many are desirous to know the truth of the matter as to the evil spirit and its actings, that troubleth the family of Andrew Mackie in Ringcroft of Stocking, and are liable to be misinformed, as  I do find by the reports that come to my own ears of that matter, Therefore that satisfaction may be given, and such mistakes may be cured or prevented: I, the minister of the said Parish (who was present several times, and was witness to many of its actings, and have heard an account of the whole of its methods and actings from the persons present, towards whom, and before whom it did act) have given the ensuing, and short account of the whole matter, which l can attest to be the very truth as to that affair.

In the month of February, 1695, the said Andrew Mackie had some young beasts, which in the night-time were still loosed, and their bindings broken; he taking it to be the unruliness of the beasts, did make stronger and stronger bindings of withes and other things; but still all were broken. At last he suspected it to be some other thing, whereupon he removed them out of that place; and the first night thereafter, one of them was bound with a hair-tedder to the back of the house, so strait that the feet of the beast only touched the ground, but could not move no way else, yet it sustained no hurt. Another night, when the family were all sleeping, there was the full of an back-creel of peats set together in midst of the house-floor, and fire put in them; the smoke wakened the family, otherwise the house had been burnt; yet nothing all the while was either seen or heard. 

Upon the 7th of March there were stones thrown in the house, in all the places of it, but it could not be discovered from whence they came, what, or who threw them: after this manner it continued till the Sabbath, now and then throwing, both in the night and the day, but was busiest throwing in the night time.

Upon the Sabbath, being the 11th of March, the crook and potclips [implements for cooking pots]were taken away, and were a wanting four days, and were found at last on a loft where they had been sought several times before. This is attested by Charles Macklelane of Colline, and John Cairns in Hardhills. It was observed that the Stones which hit any person, had not half their natural weight, and the throwing was more frequent on the Sabbath, than at other times: and especially in time of prayer, above all other times, it was busiest, then throwing most at the person praying. The said Andrew Mackie told the matter to me upon Sabbath after sermon; upon the Tuesday thereafter I went to the house, did stay a considerable time with them, and prayed twice, and there was no trouble: then I came out with a resolution to leave the house, and as I was standing speaking to some men at the barn-end, I saw two little stones drop down on the croft at a little distance from me; and immediately some came crying out of the house, that it was become as ill as ever within, whereupon I went into the house again, and as I was at prayer, it threw several stones at me, but they did no hurt, being very small: and after there was no more trouble till the 18th day of March, and then it began as before, and threw more frequently greater stones, whose strokes were surer where they hit: and thus it continued to the 21st.

Then I went to the home and stayed a great part of the night, but was greatly troubled; stones, and several other things were thrown at me.  I was struck several times on the sides and shoulders, very sharply, with a great staff, so that those who were present heard the noise of the strokes: that night it threw off the bedside, and rapped upon the chests and boards as one calling for access.  This is attested by Charles Macklelane of Colline, William Mackminn, and John Tait in Torr.  That night, as I was once at prayer, leaning on a bed-side, I felt something pressing up my arm, and casting my eyes thither, perceived a little white hand and arm from the elbow down, but presently it vanished: it is to be observed, that notwithstanding all that was felt and heard, from the first to the last of this matter, there was never any thing seen, except that hand I saw, and a friend of the said Andrew Mackie's said he saw as it were a young man, redfaced, with yellow hair, looking in at the window; and other two or three persons, with the said Andrew his children, saw, at several times, as it were a young boy, about the age of 14 years, with gray cloths, and a bonnet on his head, but presently disappeared; as also what the three children saw sitting by the fireside. 

April. 3. It whistled several times, and cried wisht, wisht, this is attested by Andrew Tait. Upon the 4th of April, Charles Macklelane of Colline land-lord, with the said Andrew Mackie, went to a certain number of ministers met at Buttle, and gave them an account of the matter; whereupon these ministers made public prayers for the family, and two of their number, viz. Mr Andrew Howart, minister of Kells, and Mr John Murdo, minister of Corsmichael, came to the house and spent that night in fasting and praying : but it was very cruel against them, especially by throwing great stones, some of them about half an stone weight. It wounded Mr Andrew Ewart twice in the head, to the effusion of his blood, it pulled off his wig in time of prayer, and when he was holding out his napkin betwixt his hands, it cast a stone in the napkin, and therewith threw it from him: It gave Mr John Murdo several sore strokes; yet the wounds and bruises received did soon cure. 

There were none in the house that night escaped from some of its fury and cruelty: That night it threw a fiery peat among the people; but did no hurt, it only disturbed them in time of prayer: and also in the dawning, as they rose from prayer, the stones poured down on all who were in the house to their hurt: this is attested by Mr Andrew Mewart, Mr John Murdo, Charles Macklelane, and John Tait. 

Upon the 5th of April: It set some thatch straw in fire which was in the barnyard:  At night the house being very throng with neighbours, the stones were still thrown down among them : as the said Andrew Mackie his wife went to bring in some peats for the fire, when she came to the door she found a broad stone to shake under her foot, which she never knew to be loose before: she resolved with her self to see what was beneath it in the morning thereafter. Upon the 6th of April, when the house was quiet, she went to the stone, and there found seven small bones, with blood, and some flesh, all closed in a piece of old suddled [soiled] paper; the blood was fresh and bright, the sight whereof troubled her, and being afraid, laid all down again; and ran to Colline his house, being an quarter of a mile distant: but in that time it was worse than ever it was before; by throwing stones and fire balls, in and about the house, but the fire as it lighted did evanish: in that time it threw an hot stone into the bed betwixt the children, which burnt through the bed cloaths.

Upon the 9th of April, the bones were sent to the ministers, who were all occasionally met at Kirkcudbright, they appointed five of their number, viz. Mr John Murdo, Mr James Monteith, Mr John Mackmillan, Mr Samuel Spalding, and Mr William Falconer, with me, to go to the House, and spend so much time in fasting and praying as we were able.

Upon the 10th of April we went to the house, and no sooner did I begin to open my mouth, but it threw stones at me, and all within the house, but still worst at him who was at duty: it came often with such force upon the house that it made all the house to shake, it brake an hole through the timber and thatch of the house, and poured in great stones: it gripped, and handled the legs of some as with a man’s hand; it hoisted up the feet of others while standing on the ground, thus it did to William Lennox of Mill-house, myself, and others; in this manner it continued till ten o clock at night, but after that there was no more trouble. 

The 16th it continued whistling, groaning, whisling [whispering], and throwing stones in time of prayer; it cryed Bo, Bo, and Kick, Cuck, and shook men back and forward, and hoisted them up as if it would lift them off their knees. This is attested by Andrew Tait.

The 20th it continued throwing stones, whisling, and whisting with all its former words: when it hit any person, and said, Take you that till you get more, that person was sure immediately of another; but when it said, Take you that, the person got no more for a while. This is attested by John Tait.

The 21st, 22nd, 23rd, it continued casting stones, beating with staves and throwing peat-mud in the faces of all in the house, especially in time of prayer, with all its former tricks. The 24th being a day of humiliation appointed to be kept in the parish for that cause; all that day, from morning to night, it continued in a most fearful manner without intermission, throwing stones with such cruelty and force, all in the house feared lest they should be killed.

The 26th, it threw stones in the evening, and knocked on a chest several times as one to have access; and began to speak, and call those who were sitting in the house witches, and rakes, and said it would take them to hell.

Upon the 27th it set the house seven times in fire. The 28th, being the Sabbath, from sun rising to sun setting, it still set the house in fire; as it was quenched in one part, instantly it was fired in another: and in the evening, when it could not get its designs fulfilled in burning the house, it pulled down the end of the house, all the stone work thereof, so that they could not abide in it any longer, but went and kindled their fire in the stable.

Upon Tuesday's night, being the 3rd of April, Charles Macklelane of Colline, with several neighbours, were in the barn; as he was at prayer he observed a black thing in the corner of the barn, and it did increase, as if it would fill the whole house; he could not discern it to have any form, but as if it had been a black cloud, it was affrighting to them all; and then it threw bear chaff and other mud upon their faces, and after did grip several who were in the house by the middle of the body, by the arms and other parts of their bodies, so strait, that some said, for five days thereafter they thought they felt these grips: after an hour or two of the night was thus past there was no more trouble. This is attested by Charles Macklelane, Thomas Mackminn, Andrew Paline, John Cairns and John Tait. 

Upon Wednesday's night, being the 1st of May, it fired a little sheephouse; the sheep were got out safe, but the sheep house was wholly burnt. Since there hath not been any trouble about the house by night or by day. Now all things aforesaid being of undoubted verity, therefore I conclude with that of the Apostle, 1 Pet. v. 8, 9, "Be sober, be vigilant, because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour: Whom resist, steadfast in the faith.”

Telfair could offer only one possible explanation for why the Mackie household was so bedeviled:

"Whereas one Macknaught, who sometimes before possessed that house, did not thrive in his own person or goods. It seems he had sent his son to a witch-wife, who lived then at the Routing-bridge, in the parish of Iron-gray, to enquire what might be the cause of the decay of his person and goods. The youth, meeting with some foreign soldiers, went abroad to Flanders, and did not return with an answer. Some years after, there was one John Redick in this parish, who, having had occasion to go abroad, met with the said young Macknaught in Flanders, and they knowing other, Macknaught enquired after his father and other friends; and finding the said John Redick was to go home, desired him to go to his father, or who ever dwelt in the Ring-croft, and desire them to raise the door-threshold, and search till they found a tooth, and burn it, for none who dwelt in that house would thrive till that was done. The said John Redick coming home, and finding the old man Macknaught dead, and his wife out of that place, did never mention the matter, nor further mind it, till this trouble was in Andrew Mackie's family, then he spoke of it, and told the matter to myself. Betwixt Macknaught's death, and Andrew Mackie's possession of this house, there was one Thomas Telfair, who possessed it some years; what way he heard the report of what the witch-wife had said to Macknaught's son, I cannot tell; but he searched the door-threshold, and found something like a tooth; did compare it with the tooth of man, horse, nolt [cattle], and sheep, (as he said to me), but could not say which it did resemble, only it did resemble a tooth. He did cast it in the fire, where it burnt like a candle, or so much tallow; yet he never knew any trouble about that house by night or by day, before or after, during his possession."