FAMOUS CASES
Urban Legends
Urban Legends...who
doesn't have a favourite one? What's yours?
One of my personal favourites
is the legend of "Bloody Mary." There are many variations of this one, but
the gist of it seems to be that if you stand in front of a mirror and chant
'Bloody Mary' (or 'Mary Worth' or 'I believe in Bloody Mary', etc.,) enough
times, she will either: appear in the mirror, claw your face, or kill you at
some point. Oddly enough, this is one urban legend that I do not really
believe in, but I am superstitious enough to have NEVER tried chanting ANY
name while looking in a mirror! I don't know anyone who has actually tried
this experiment, either--have any of YOU tried to
summon Mary? If so, what exactly happened? How old were you? Have you tried
this as an adult? Have you ever tried to summon anyone (or
anything) else by this method? I would love to talk about
it-just don't expect ME to try it...(NOTE:
If you scroll to the bottom of the
We Get Emails
page, and read the last entry, you'll see that someone was brave enough to
invoke Bloody Mary in an effort to ease their daughters' fears.)
Another favourite I have is
apparently a lesser-known one--a couple of people I actually KNOW have each
claimed the following happened to them, and told me about it. At the time,
they didn't know each other, and had never met. The only thing they had in
common was knowing me...and when they told me, they were unaware of the
others' experience...here goes:
Each were driving alone at
night. Down the road ahead there was a hitchhiker, standing with their back
to the car, but with their thumb out. As the car drew closer, the hitchhiker
suddenly turned their head to look at the driver. And, the hitchhiker was NOT
human. He was described to me as tall and thin, male, wearing a long coat.
He only turned his head toward the car, not his body. He had glowing red
eyes, and a horrific grin that was impossibly wide, that a human could not
possibly manage. Each driver of course did not pick up this hitchhiker, but
instead went on their way, anxiously checking the rear view mirror. One
friend only saw the hitchhiker remain on the road, getting smaller and smaller
in the mirror as the distance lengthened between her and him, but the second
driver saw the hitchhiker in his back seat, grinning that impossible smile
when he looked in the mirror. When he turned and looked directly into the
back seat, of course, he saw nothing. Each witness only had this happen to
them once, and at the time they talked with me, they didn't know of anyone
else who had gone through this experience. Have any of YOU ever heard of or
encountered this hitchhiker?
And, one more question:
Have any of you experienced the MAKING of a local urban legend? What do I
mean? Well... where I grew up, there was a story of a "phantom" or
"supernatural" deer. It didn't look like other deer, it was brown and white,
similar to a pinto horse in colouring. It was a buck, (this was based on it
having antlers) and people would see it cross the road in front of their car,
or in their yards. It didn't actually DO anything, it was just seen by
people. As time went on, it sort of developed a supernatural reputation,
supposedly being intelligent enough to try to communicate with people, but no
one understood what it was trying to tell them. It didn't speak, just looked
at them with expressive, almost human eyes...
However, this legend had the
background of an actual incident. 2 locals, who were brothers, were out
hunting deer. One of the brothers saw a good-sized buck, who was oddly
coloured, like a pinto horse. He shot the buck, and hit it, but it ran off.
Attempts to find it to take it out of its' misery were unsuccessful. They
never found it, and assumed it died from its' injuries. Shortly after this,
another local, a woman, was home at night, when she heard some dull thuds at
her back door. She investigated, and when she opened the door, there stood
the injured buck. She was appalled to see that it was starving to death, and
apparently it had come begging for food. Why was it starving? When the
hunter shot it, he hit it in the jaw, unhinging one side, so the entire jaw
hung down on one side, making it completely useless. The poor thing couldn't
eat, and in sheer desperation came to try to get help. Before she could do
anything, it became frightened and left. More attempts were made to find it
to end its suffering, but it was never found. For YEARS afterward there were
claimed sightings, LONG after even the remotest
possibility of the deer surviving...
(NOTE:) If you have any Urban
Legends you would like to know more about, or if you have witnessed the making
of one, I would love to have you send it in to be posted on the website...)
-Webmaster.