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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Gates_of_Hell] | [TOKENS: 678] |
Contents Seven Gates of Hell 40°02′23″N 76°39′42″W / 40.039671°N 76.661692°W / 40.039671; -76.661692 The Seven Gates of Hell is a modern urban legend regarding locations in York County, Pennsylvania. Two versions of the legend exist, one involving a burned insane asylum and the other an eccentric doctor. Both agree that there are seven gates in a wooded area of Hellam Township, Pennsylvania, and that anyone who passes through all seven goes straight to Hell. The location in question never housed an institution, while the doctor of the legend only constructed one gate to keep out trespassers. The property is privately owned, and visitors may be charged with trespassing. Myth There are two popular versions of the myth, each with numerous variations. One states that a mental institution used to be located on either Toad Road or Trout Run Road in Hellam Township, Pennsylvania, depending on the source. It was erected in a remote location so as to isolate people deemed insane from the rest of the world. One day in the 1900s, a fire broke out and firefighters could not reach the hospital in time to save it due to its remoteness. Many patients died in the flames, while others escaped and were soon beaten to death. According to this version, the gates were put up by the local search party to trap the remaining inmates. The second version states that an eccentric physician lived on the property and built several gates along a path deep into the forest. Both accounts agree that only one gate is visible during the day, but the other six can be seen at night. According to the legend, no one has ever passed the fifth gate, but if they passed all seven, they would go directly to Hell. Reality There used to be a road in Hellam Township named Toad Road, but it was wiped off the map after Hurricane Agnes in 1972. Toad Road ran along the Codorus Creek and led to the Codorus Furnace. Today, there are multiple gates on this property that can be found alongside Range Road and end at the old intersection between Trout Run, Range, and Toad Road. All can be seen day or night, contrary to what the legend says. The dense wooded area known as Trout Run contains the ruins of a flint mill, possibly mistaken for a burned-down asylum. This property is privately owned. Trespassers can be arrested and prosecuted. The only detail to back up this myth is the fact that Dr. Harold Belknap was a practitioner at West Side Sanitarium who lived along Toad Road. Belknap would often make threatening signs for any trespassers with toad-related humor written on them, which was allegedly how the road got its name. Notoriety The Seven Gates of Hell have received a fair amount of attention. Mike Argento wrote about it in the York Daily Record, and Matt Lake featured a section on the gates in his book, Weird Pennsylvania. Hellam Township published a page debunking the myths. Local resident Cheryl Englar reported a number of tourists searching for the gates, some harassing her and giving her cause to call the police. In media Toad Road, a 2012 independent psychological horror film, makes use of the legend. References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chimera_House] | [TOKENS: 441] |
Contents Chimera House The Chimera House (also known "13 Floor Money Back House"[citation needed], 13 Story Money Back Haunted House or the 13th Floor Haunted House) is an urban legend which typically involves a group of teenagers going out for a night on the town, only to stumble across a large, worn down multiple story building where they are offered to go through a haunted attraction that consists of "real" horrors inside. In the story, the teens are asked to pay a certain amount of money (anywhere from 20 to 100 dollars) and told they will receive a portion back for every floor they complete. The twist is that no one has ever completed the house, and the ones who tried never came back out. Rumors differ about the various horrors inside the house, from poisonous animals to deformed humans or other supernatural phenomenons. Accounts vary as to the exact number of floors in the house, but most accounts give the house 13 floors. Origins The legend is usually set in the south or mid-west since there are a large amount of open and unknown areas in those parts. The editor of Haunted Attraction Magazine believes the urban legend originally started in Kansas City while others have suggested that the legend was also inspired by real haunted attractions like Britannia Manor and Raven's Grin Inn. Although the Chimera House has never been proven to exist, some people still search fervently for it and several haunted attractions are asked if they are the infamous 13 floor haunted house every October. The legend of the Chimera House has been fueled by both hoaxes and haunted attractions that tried to cash in on the legend by offering refunds if certain conditions are met. The anthology Haunted Houses edited by Robert D. San Souci contains a short story inspired by the legend called "Chimera House," in which several inner-city kids are led to the infamous haunted attraction.[citation needed] Versions The Chimera House has been associated with various locations in the United States, including Detroit, Chicago, Ohio but also New York and Los Angeles. The second episode of Channel Zero revisited the premise of the story and called it the No-End House. References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pope_Lick_Monster] | [TOKENS: 989] |
Contents Pope Lick Monster The Pope Lick Monster (more commonly, colloquially, the Goat Man) is a legendary part-man, part-goat and part-sheep creature reported to live beneath a railroad trestle bridge over Pope Lick Creek, in the Fisherville neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky, United States. Numerous urban legends exist about the creature's origins and the methods it employs to claim its victims. According to some accounts, the creature uses either hypnosis or voice mimicry to lure trespassers onto the trestle to meet their death before an oncoming train. Other stories claim the monster jumps down from the trestle onto the roofs of cars passing beneath it. Yet other legends tell that it attacks its victims with a blood-stained axe and that the very sight of the creature is so unsettling that those who see it while walking across the high trestle are driven to leap off. Other legends hold that the monster is a human-goat hybrid, and that it was a circus freak who vowed revenge after being mistreated. In one version, it is said the monster escaped after a train derailed on the trestle. Another version commonly told by locals of the area claims that the monster is really the twisted reincarnated form of a farmer who sacrificed goats in exchange for Satanic powers.[citation needed] The legends have turned the area into a site for legend tripping. There have been a number of deaths and accidents at the trestle since its construction, despite the presence of an 8-foot (2.4 m) fence to keep thrill-seekers out. There is a common misconception that the trestle is abandoned and no longer used; in reality, the bridge carries a major rail artery into Louisville. Heavy freight trains cross the bridge several times daily, so it is easy for someone to get caught atop it while an oncoming train barrels down on them. Norfolk Southern Railway urged citizens not to climb the trestle, saying if caught they would be arrested. Media The monster was the subject of a 1988 film by Louisville filmmaker Ron Schildknecht called The Legend of the Pope Lick Monster. The 16-minute, $6,000 film premiered on December 29, 1988, at the Uptown Theater. Most of the film was shot at the Pope Lick Trestle, but scenes showing the characters up on the trestle were shot at another, safer location. Norfolk Southern Railway officials were very upset about the film, as they thought it would encourage teenagers to visit the trestles. They found one scene in particular dangerously misleading. In the scene, the main character, a high school student, narrowly escapes an approaching train by hanging off the side of the trestle. In reality, few people would have the strength to hang on for the 5 to 7 minutes it takes for a long train to clear the 772-foot (235 m) trestle; in addition, the vibrations from the train are so strong that the ground beneath the trestle shakes as the train passes.[citation needed] Because railroad officials were worried that the film would add to the death toll, Norfolk Southern issued a statement, read at the premiere, which warned of the trestle's dangers and informed the audience that anyone caught on the trestle could be prosecuted for trespassing. The story of the monster was featured in an episode of Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America titled "Ozarks". Deaths Several people have died on or near the train trestle at Pope Creek in pursuit of the Pope Lick Monster legend. In 1988, a 17-year-old young man, Jack “J.C.” Charles Bahm II, was hit and killed by a train, and another young man was injured while trying to cross the trestle. In 1994, a man was killed by a train after his ATV overturned on the trestle, trapping him on the track. In 2000, a 19-year-old man fell to his death after encountering a train. On April 23, 2016, a 26-year-old tourist, Roquel Bain, from Ohio died after being hit by a train while searching for the monster. Her boyfriend survived by hanging on the side of the trestle. On May 26, 2019, Savanna Bright, 15, was pronounced dead at the scene after she and another teenage girl, Kaylee Keeling, were on the train tracks near the Pope Lick trestle. Keeling survived and was taken to University of Louisville Hospital. See also References 38°11′31″N 85°29′16″W / 38.191953°N 85.487900°W / 38.191953; -85.487900 |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%E2%80%93Kennedy_coincidences_urban_legend] | [TOKENS: 668] |
Contents Lincoln–Kennedy coincidences urban legend There are many coincidences with the assassinations of U.S. presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy, and these have become a piece of American folklore. The list of coincidences appeared in the mainstream American press in 1964, a year after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, having appeared prior to that in the GOP Congressional Committee Newsletter. In the 1970s, Martin Gardner examined the list in an article in Scientific American (later reprinted in his 1985 book, The Magic Numbers of Dr. Matrix), pointing out that several of the claimed coincidences were based on misinformation. Gardner's version of the list contained 16 items; many subsequent versions have circulated much longer lists. A 1999 examination by Snopes found that the listed "coincidences are easily explained as the simple product of mere chance." In 1992, the Skeptical Inquirer ran a "Spooky Presidential Coincidences Contest." One winner found a series of sixteen similar coincidences between Kennedy and former Mexican president Álvaro Obregón. Another winner came up with similar lists for twenty-one pairs of U.S. presidents. For example, there were 13 similarities found between Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson. List The following are the list of "coincidences" that are commonly associated with the conspiracy, some of which are not true statements: Accuracy Analysis Some urban folklorists have postulated that the list provided a way for people to make sense of two tragic events in American history by seeking out patterns. Gardner and others have said that it is relatively easy to find seemingly meaningful patterns relating any two people or events. The psychological phenomenon of apophenia – defined as "the tendency to perceive order in random configurations" – has been proposed as a possible reason for the lists' enduring popularity. Most of the items listed above are true, such as the year in which Lincoln and Kennedy were each elected president, but this is not so unusual given that presidential elections are held only every four years. A few of the items are simply untrue: for example, Lincoln never had a secretary named Kennedy; Lincoln's secretaries were John Hay and John G. Nicolay. However, Lincoln's footman, William H. Crook, did advise Lincoln not to go that night to Ford's Theatre. David Mikkelson of Snopes points out many ways in which Lincoln and Kennedy do not match, to show the superficial nature of the alleged coincidences: For example, Lincoln was born in 1809 but Kennedy in 1917. Lincoln and Kennedy were both elected in '60, but Lincoln was already in his second term when he was assassinated; Kennedy was not. Also, neither the years, months, nor dates of their assassinations match. Although both were shot on Fridays, Lincoln did not die from his injuries until Saturday. Musical remembrance Buddy Starcher wrote a song, "History Repeats Itself," recounting many of these coincidences and parallels between the two presidents' careers and deaths. The song became an American Top 40 hit during the spring of 1966, and reached number two on the Country chart. Cab Calloway also scored a minor chart hit with the song that same year. See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_star_tattoo_legend] | [TOKENS: 328] |
Contents Blue star tattoo legend The blue star tattoo legend is an urban legend which states that a temporary lick-and-stick tattoo soaked in LSD and made in the form of a blue star, or of popular children's cartoon characters, is being distributed to unknowing children in any given area. Propagation The legend commonly surfaces in American elementary and middle schools in the form of a flyer which is distributed to parents by concerned school officials. In the past it was often in the form of poor quality photocopy, clearly many generations old, but it has now also become popular on Internet mailing lists and websites. The legend states that a temporary lick-and-stick tattoo soaked in LSD and made in the form of a blue star (the logo of the Dallas Cowboys is often mentioned), or of popular cartoon characters, such as Mickey Mouse and Bart Simpson, is being distributed to children in the area in order to get them "addicted to LSD" (see LSD § Addiction and dependence liability). Generally some attribution is given, typically to a well-regarded hospital or a vaguely specified "advisor to the president", and instructions are given that parents should contact police if they come across the blue star tattoos. Origin The legend possibly originated from the fact that an LSD solution is sometimes sold on blotter paper with various designs, including cartoons. No actual cases of LSD distribution to children in this manner have been documented. Although LSD does not penetrate through skin in sufficient quantities so as to induce a psychedelic experience, the concern was over children licking the tattoo paper before transferring to the skin. Other countries The legend has surfaced in many other places, including: See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choking_Doberman] | [TOKENS: 918] |
Contents Choking Doberman The Choking Doberman is an urban legend that originated in the United States. The story involves a protective pet found by its owner gagging on human fingers lodged in its throat. As the story unfolds, the dog's owner discovers an intruder whose hand is bleeding from the dog bite. Jan Harold Brunvand, a folklorist and professor emeritus of English at the University of Utah, wrote about this and other urban legends in his book The Choking Doberman and Other "New" Urban Legends published in 1984 by W.W. Norton & Company. He provided the reader with several varying accounts of the story. While the basic elements of the story remain the same in each version, the details, such as the number of fingers found, the breed of dog, and the condition of the intruder when discovered change slightly. The legend A woman goes out for the evening with friends. Upon her return, she is greeted by her pet Doberman choking in the hallway. Alarmed, she takes the pet to the veterinarian. The vet announces that he must perform a tracheotomy on the animal and he will call her when he has news. When the woman arrives home, the vet calls and tells her to leave the house at once. The dog was choking on three human fingers. The woman calls the police, who search the house. They discover the burglar, hiding in a closet, passed out from blood loss caused by having three fingers bitten off. In his book Brunvard cites a fable about Llewellyn the Great and his loyal dog Gelert as the oldest possible influence on the story. In the original legend, Llewellyn leaves his young son at home with Gelert while on a hunting expedition. Upon Llewellyn's return, the dog greets him with a bloody face; thinking the animal has eaten his child, Llewellyn immediately draws his sword and kills Gelert. However, Llewellyn's son is soon found alive near the dead body of a wolf, revealing Gelert had actually saved the child from harm. In her 1992 paper The Ambiguous Guardians, Adrienne Mayor cites the fifth century AD narrative The Omen of the Wolf as an earlier echo of both the Gelert fable and the urban legend as it is today. In this myth, the emperor Honorius's retinue was attacked by a pair of wolves. When the beasts were killed they were found to have a pair of human hands in their bellies. Their aggressive behavior—coupled with the awful last meal—were taken as a sinister sign and rumors lit a panic in Rome. The emperor's official propagandist, Claudian, attempted to counter the popular understanding of the sign with his poem The Gothic War. The first verifiable appearance of the legend is in the Phoenix New Times on June 24, 1981. From the article, in part: Gagging Dog Story Baffles Police It happened in Las Vegas. A woman returned from work and found her large dog, a Doberman, lying on the floor gasping for air. Concerned over the animal's welfare, she immediately loaded the pet into her car and drove him to a veterinarian. ... According to the story, police arrived at her house and found an unconscious intruder, sans fingers, lying in a closet. New Times learned of the story from an employee of a large industrial plant in the Valley. He said he had gotten the story third hand from another employee who in turn had said he heard from a woman whose relatives in Las Vegas knew the dog's owner. As of Friday New Times was not able to nail down the identity of the Doberman's mistress. According to a spokesman at the Las Vegas Sun, that paper, too, was very interested in breaking the story. Unfortunately, even though the story was all over Vegas last Thursday, the paper—and police—weren't able to dig up one shred of evidence to prove the incident ever occurred. "The police are baffled," the Sun spokesman said. Appearances and tie-ins outside the story Ronald B. Tobias cites the story as an example of oral tradition that through repeated retelling has become plot perfect. This story appears in the 1991 Judith Gorog novel On Meeting Witches at Wells.[citation needed] The story also appears in Season 1, episode 1 of Mostly True Stories?: Urban Legends Revealed from 21:00 to 28:55.[citation needed]: move to refs Books References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JATO_Rocket_Car] | [TOKENS: 1618] |
Contents JATO Rocket Car The account of the JATO Rocket Car was one of the original Darwin Awards winners: a man who supposedly spectacularly met his death after mounting a JATO unit (a rocket engine used to help heavy aircraft to take off) onto an ordinary automobile. It was originally circulated as a forwarded email. In 1996, after numerous inquiries, the Arizona Department of Public Safety issued a news release posted on their website concerning the story. It termed the story "an Arizona myth." The story was also debunked in 2003 on the pilot episode of MythBusters, titled "Jet Assisted Chevy". Usenet posting This is the text as it appears, possibly most frequently, in usenet repostings: And this year's nominee is: The Arizona Highway Patrol came upon a pile of smoldering metal embedded into the side of a cliff rising above the road at the apex of a curve. the wreckage resembled the site of an airplane crash, but it was a car. The type of car was unidentifiable at the scene. The lab finally figured out what it was and what had happened. It seems that a guy had somehow gotten hold of a JATO unit (Jet Assisted Take Off – actually a solid fuel rocket) that is used to give heavy military transport planes an extra 'push' for taking off from short airfields. He had driven his Chevy Impala out into the desert and found a long, straight stretch of road. Then he attached the JATO unit to his car, jumped in, got up some speed and fired off the JATO! The facts, as best could be determined, are that the operator of the 1967 Impala hit JATO ignition at a distance of approximately 3.0 miles [4.8 kilometers] from the crash site. This was established by the prominent scorched and melted asphalt at that location. The JATO, if operating properly, would have reached maximum thrust within five seconds, causing the Chevy to reach speeds well in excess of 350 MPH [560 km/h], continuing at full power for an additional 20–25 seconds. The driver, soon to be pilot, most likely would have experienced G-forces usually reserved for dog-fighting F-14 jocks under full afterburners, basically causing him to become insignificant for the remainder of the event. However, the automobile remained on the straight highway for about 2.5 miles [4.0 km] (15–20 seconds) before the driver applied and completely melted the brakes, blowing the tires and leaving thick rubber marks on the road surface, then becoming airborne for an additional 1.4 miles [2.3 km] and impacting the cliff face at a height of 125 feet [38 m], leaving a blackened crater 3 feet [0.9 m] deep in the rock. Most of the driver's remains were not recoverable; however, small fragments of bone, teeth and hair were extracted from the crater, and fingernail and bone shards were removed from a piece of debris believed to be a portion of the steering wheel. History The original Darwin Awards were fictitious. Both were contained[clarification needed] in a 1990 version of the JATO Rocket Car urban legend[citation needed] posted to the rec.models.rockets Usenet newsgroup. When this urban legend was debunked, it was specifically pointed out that the mentioned Darwin Awards were fictitious. It contained a reference to the 1985 mention of a Vending Machine Tipover Darwin Award. It was Paul Vixie who wrote this introduction to the JATO urban legend that first included the term "Darwin Award". Vixie credits Charles Haynes with making the (informal) Darwin Award Nomination, but it was Vixie's specific wording, with the first sentence crediting Haynes stripped off, that was actually circulated and referred to the Darwin Awards as if they actually existed and were common knowledge, though the message was not widely circulated until it was reformatted. It remained fairly dormant until 1995, when the message surfaced again[citation needed] in rec.pyrotechnics with the email header stripped off the introduction, though the main story is still indented. Three days later the introduction is fully integrated into the story and it appeared on rec.humor in a form that made it a truly infectious meme. Shortly after it was reposted in 1995, it quickly began to spread, being posted on Usenet 24 times within the next month. In 1996 the legend was further embellished with references to the year of manufacture of the car and G-Forces and to the form which was widely circulated via email (55% of all postings on usenet which included "JATO Rocket Darwin Award impala" also included "g-forces". Cult of the Dead Cow, a hacker group and ezine, published an extensive elaboration in 1998 that claims to explain how the story came into being, describing the most common details of the Rocket Car legend. Four males under 25 engaged in scouting, welding, drinking, and Rube Goldberg engineering to build a rocket rail car after they happened upon JATOs in a junk pile. Supposed author CarInTheCliff also describes the car's only test plus the elements he has added while discouraging repeats by example. In this account it is also claimed that the story had first circulated long before 1990. The Darwin Awards meme was also spread by Wendy Northcutt, who collected the Darwin Awards on a public website in 1993, and circulated new stories in a regular newsletter. The MythBusters investigation To test the story – the very first myth they tackled – Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage, with help from honorary MythBuster Erik Gates, procured a 1966 Chevrolet Impala, and after they were unable to obtain actual JATOs, they substituted three model rockets in succession to produce an equivalent amount of thrust (3,000 horsepower [2,200 kW] for 15 seconds). They also installed a rocket rack and reinforced the car so that the rockets would not tear off the roof, and even made use of a hydraulic system that the previous owner had installed on the car to lower the front of the car and make it more aerodynamic. However, when tested in the Mojave Desert, the car did not go anywhere near the 300 miles per hour (480 km/h) reported in the original story, and failed to become airborne. The program has revisited the story twice, in 2007's "Supersized Myths" (the rockets exploded on the ramp) and their 10th Anniversary episode "JATO Rocket Car: Mission Accomplished?". The 12 motors were built by John Newman, Rick Maschek, and others with one motor first being static tested, successfully, at the FAR site (Friends of Amateur Rocketry) to avoid another explosion. On the two cars used, the motors were stacked vertically to keep the cars going straight in the event one or more of the motors did not ignite. The car was weighted towards the front in an attempt to improve its aerodynamic stability but no attempt was made to ensure the thrust vector of the rocket pack was being applied through the center of gravity (CG) of the car. The thrust vector proved to be far too high above the CG causing the car to immediately nosedive as it left the ramp and smash into the ground. The still firing motors propelled the car up into the air a second time, where it did a rotation until smashing into the ground. Dodge Coronet TV ad To advertise the stopping power (rather than speed) of the 1958 Dodge Coronet's 'total contact' brakes, a JATO bottle was fitted to a Coronet and it was driven at speed across the El Mirage dry lake. This commercial was broadcast during the Dodge-sponsored Lawrence Welk Show. See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richmond_Vampire] | [TOKENS: 597] |
Contents Richmond Vampire The Richmond Vampire (also called locally the Hollywood Vampire) is an urban legend from Richmond, Virginia. Local residents claim that the mausoleum of W. W. Pool (Dated 1913) in Hollywood Cemetery holds the remains of a vampire. Supposedly Pool was run out of England in the 19th century for being a vampire. Oral legends to this effect were circulating by the 1960s. They may be influenced by the architecture of the tomb, which has both Masonic and ancient Egyptian elements, and double Ws looking like fangs. Because this cemetery is adjacent to Virginia Commonwealth University, the story became popular among students, especially from the 1980s onward. It was first mentioned in print in the student newspaper Commonwealth Times in 1976. The Church Hill Tunnel Since 2001, the vampire story has been combined with the collapse of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railroad's Church Hill Tunnel under Church Hill, a neighborhood of eastern Richmond, Virginia, which buried several workers on Friday, October 2, 1925. This part of the story did not show up online until 2001 and was first reported in print in 2007 in Haunted Richmond: The Shadows of Shockoe. It is absent from earlier accounts. According to this newer story, the tunneling awakened an ancient evil that lived under Church Hill and brought the tunnel crashing down on the workers. Rescue teams found an unearthly blood-covered creature with jagged teeth and skin hanging from its muscular body crouching over one of the victims. The creature escaped from the cave-in and raced toward the James River. Pursued by a group of men, the creature took refuge in Hollywood Cemetery (2.2 miles away), where it disappeared in a mausoleum built into a hillside bearing the name W. W. Pool. According to Gregory Maitland, an urban legend and folklore researcher with the paranormal research groups Night Shift and the Virginia Ghosts & Haunting Research Society, the "creature" that escaped the tunnel collapse was actually the 28-year-old railroad fireman, Benjamin F. Mosby (1896-1925), who had been shoveling coal into the firebox of a steam locomotive of a work train with no shirt on when the cave-in occurred and the boiler ruptured. Mosby's upper body was horribly scalded and several of his teeth were broken before he made his way through the opening of the tunnel. Witnesses reported he was in shock and layers of his skin were hanging from his body. He died later at Grace Hospital and was buried at Hollywood Cemetery. Contemporary written records do not include any of these alleged details. Mosby's obituary simply says that he "was fatally scalded when the C. & O. tunnel under Jefferson Park caved in" and died "Friday night at 11:40 o'clock at Grace Hospital". See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sewer_alligator] | [TOKENS: 1567] |
Contents Sewer alligator The sewer alligator is an urban legend about alligators that are said to live in sewers outside alligators' native range. Some cities in which sewer alligators have supposedly been found are New York City and Paris. Accounts of fully grown sewer alligators are unproven, but small alligators are sometimes rescued from sewers. Stories date back to the late 1920s and early 1930s. The New York Times reports that the city rescues several alligators each year. Some are taken directly from homes where people keep them illegally. These small alligators can be bought online in other states and shipped legally when they are tiny. Other alligators are found outdoors, where they attract a lot of attention, though usually they are above ground. Escaped or abandoned alligators may survive for a short time in New York’s sewers. However, they cannot live there long-term because the sewers are too cold and contain harmful bacteria from human waste. Sewer workers say there is no hidden population of alligators living underground. Legend The legend of alligators inhabiting the sewer system of New York City is a widely circulated urban myth. It suggests that alligators navigate the city's sewers, preying on rats and other refuse, and posing a threat to sewer workers, who are said to carry firearms for protection. According to the lore, these alligators are often described as large and vicious, with some attributing a lack of pigmentation to their purported status as "albinos." The urban myth has permeated popular culture, featuring in various forms of media including books, television shows, and movies. It has also inspired hoaxes and artistic projects, and is commemorated in the city with a quasi-holiday known as Alligator in the Sewer Day, celebrated on February 9. Following reports of sewer alligators in the 1930s, the story built up over the decades and became more of a contemporary legend. It is questionable how accurate the original stories are, and some have even suggested they are fictions created by Teddy May, who was the Commissioner of Sewers at the time. Interviews with him were the basis of the first published accounts of sewer alligators. In their honor, February 9 is Alligators in the Sewers Day in Manhattan. A similar story from 1851 involves feral pigs in the sewers of Hampstead, London. As late as the middle of the 20th century, souvenir shops in Florida sold live baby alligators (in small fish tanks) as novelty souvenirs. Tourists from New York City would buy a baby alligator and try to raise it as a pet. When the alligator grew too large for comfort, the family would proceed to flush the reptile down the toilet. The most common story is that the alligators survive and reside within the sewer and reproduce, feeding on rats and garbage, growing to huge sizes and striking fear into sewer workers. In Robert Daley's book The World Beneath the City (1959) he comments that one night a sewer worker in New York City was shocked to find a large albino alligator swimming toward him. Weeks of hunting followed. The Journal of American Folklore has this to say on the subject: "According to May, sewer inspectors first reported seeing alligators in 1935, but neither May nor anyone else believed them. "Instead, he set men to watch the sewer walkers to find out how they were obtaining whisky down in the pipes." Persistent reports, however, perhaps including the newspaper item discovered by Coleman, caused May to go down to find out for himself. He found that the reports were true. "The beam of his own flashlight had spotlighted alligators whose length, on the average, was about two feet." May started an extermination campaign, using poisoned bait followed by flooding of the side tunnels to flush the beasts out into the major arteries where hunters with .22 rifles were waiting. He announced in 1937 that the 'gators were gone. Reported sightings in 1948 and 1966 were not confirmed. However, there is no mention of "blind albino" alligators, and May suggests that the baby alligators were dumped down storm drains rather than "flushed down the toilet". An additional reference to the sewer alligator exists in Thomas Pynchon's first novel, V. It fictionalizes the account, stating Macy's was selling them for a time for 50 cents. Eventually the children became bored with the pets, setting them loose in the streets as well as flushing them into the sewers. Rather than poison, shotguns were used as the remedy. Benny Profane, one of the main characters in the book, continues to hunt them as a full-time job until the population is reduced. A 1973 children's book, The Great Escape: Or, The Sewer Story by Peter Lippman anthropomorphizes these alligators and has them dress up in disguise as humans and charter an airplane to fly them home to the Florida swamps. Some claims go further to suggest that, after the alligator was disposed of at such a young age, it would live the majority of its life in an environment not exposed to sunlight, and thus it would apparently in time lose its eyesight and the pigment in its hide and that the reptile would grow to be blind and completely albino (pure white in color with red or pink eyes). Another reason why an albino alligator would retreat to an underground sewer is its vulnerability to the sun in the wild; as there is no dark pigment in the creature's skin, it has no protection from the sun, which makes it very hard for it to survive in the wild. Some people even spoke of mutant alligators living in the sewers which have been exposed to many different types of toxic chemical waste which altered them, making them deformed and sometimes even larger and with strange colouring. A gigantic mutant alligator based on these myths appears in the 1980 film Alligator. One 1927 account describes an experience of a Pittsburgh Bureau of Highways and Sewers employee who was assigned the task of clearing out a section of sewer pipe on Royal Street in the Northside Section of the city. The account reads, "[He] removed the manhole cover and began to clear an obstruction when he realized that a set of 'evil looking eyes' was staring at him." He then removed a 3-foot (0.91 m) alligator and took it home with him. There are other numerous recent media accounts of alligators occupying storm drains and sewer pipes, all from states in the southern US. In Paris, France, a Nile crocodile was captured by firefighters in the sewers below the Pont Neuf bridge on March 7, 1984. The crocodile, named Eleonore (or Eleanore), lived at the Aquarium in Vannes and died in May 2022. A 2-foot (0.61 m) baby alligator was caught in August 2010 by the NYPD in the sewers in Queens. However, it is unlikely that a fully grown adult would survive for long in New York, due to the cold winter temperatures. Real alligators in sewers Alligators are occasionally sighted in the drains and sewers of Florida, due to many of these waste outlets' backing out onto the swamps. During storm surges and in the colder winter months, alligators sometimes shelter in convenient drains and hunt for rats to supplement their diet. A 2024 study using wildlife cameras to investigate storm sewers around Alachua County documented the presence of 35 species of wildlife, including alligators. See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headless_Rider_urban_legend] | [TOKENS: 531] |
Contents Headless Rider urban legend Headless Rider (首なしライダー Kubinashi Rider) is a Japanese urban legend of a motorbike rider with a missing head. Legend A piano wire is stretched across a road at neck height, causing a motorcyclist to become decapitated as a result of running into it at high speed. However, the bike remained upright and continued traveling for some time with the headless rider still on board. The rider becomes a ghost and continues to ride down the same road every night (or at the time/anniversary of the death). The decapitation is sometimes attributed to falling objects from road signs, guardrails, or trucks. The reason for the appearance is often stated to be that the rider is still searching for the murderer or his missing head. There is also an urban legend of a 'headless biker gang', in which a group of headless riders explode on the mountain roads of Mount Hiko in Fukuoka Prefecture. There is also a variation in which severed heads are said to fly in, mostly with cries of despair, in a different location to where the motorbikes appear. It is not clear whether or not they are accompanied by helmets in this case. Origin Rumors of headless riders only really took off after the release of the film Stone (1974) in Australia (released in Japan in 1981). The film contained a scene in which a rider's head is chopped off by a wire stretched across a road, and this is said to have spread in connection with rumors of motorcycle accidents in various parts of the country. The urban legend is said to have originated from an actual accident in which a person annoyed by a biker gang used a rope stretched across a road as an obstruction, causing the rider(s) to crash. There are various theories about the original accident, but some say that it was actually just an accidental fatal motorbike accident there that was passed on in an amusing manner. Some believe that it originated when a motorcyclist wearing a dark colored, full-face helmet on a dark road was mistakenly identified as a headless rider. In fact, some riders wearing dark colored helmets have mentioned being mistakenly reported as a headless riders. There are also reportedly some fun-loving riders who deliberately wear black, full-face helmets (which have been treated to reduce light reflections) at night in order to achieve this effect. Others say that witnesses may have also mistaken a person on a supersport type motorcycle, which positions the rider in a leaning-forward prone position on top of the fuel tank, as being a headless rider. See also References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aka_Manto] | [TOKENS: 1533] |
Contents Aka Manto Aka Manto (赤マント; "Red Cloak"), also known as Red Cape, Red Vest, Akai-Kami-Aoi-Kami (赤い紙青い紙; "Red Paper, Blue Paper"), or occasionally Aoi Manto (青マント; "Blue Cloak"), is a Japanese urban legend about a masked spirit who wears a red cloak, and who appears to people using toilets in public or school bathrooms. Accounts of the legend vary, but one consistent element of the story is that the spirit will ask the occupant of a toilet, a question. In some versions, he will ask if they want red or blue toilet paper, though other versions identify the choices as a red or a blue cloak, or as a red or a blue cape. Choosing either option will result in the individual being killed, so the individual must ignore the spirit, or reject both options and flee, in order to survive. Just as the individual is about to wipe, he will ask them "Red toilet paper or blue toilet paper?". If they choose red, he will slash them, resulting in a quick death with their clothes being soaked red in blood. But if they choose blue, he will strangle them, resulting in a slow death while turning their face blue. If an individual tries to trick him by saying yellow, he will dunk their head into the toilet water and hold them there until they drown. If an individual says another color other than red, blue, or yellow, they will be dragged to the underworld. The legend and its variations Aka Manto is described as a male spirit, ghost, or yōkai who haunts bathrooms late at night. Aka Manto is often said to haunt female bathrooms specifically, and in some versions of the legend, he is said to haunt the furthest wall in an individual's bathroom. The spirit is said to wear a flowing red cloak and a mask that hides his face, and is sometimes described as being handsome and charming beneath his mask. The true identity of the Aka manto has ranged from that of a serial killer to a ghost who appears as a tall man with a sickly, bluish-white face. According to legend, if a person is sitting on a toilet in a public or school bathroom, Aka Manto may appear, and will ask them if they want red or blue toilet paper. Depending on the version of the story, the spirit may ask them to choose between a red cloak and a blue cloak, or between a red cape and a blue cape. If they choose the "red" option, they will be lacerated in such a manner that their dead body will be drenched in their own blood. The specific manner in which the person is lacerated differs depending on the account of the legend, including the person being stabbed or flayed. If the individual chooses the "blue" option, the consequences range from that person being strangled to all of the person's blood being drained from their body. In some versions of the story, the choices are between red and white paper, with the former resulting in a red tongue rising up out of the toilet to lick the student from below, and the latter resulting in a white hand fondling them from below. If an individual attempts to outsmart Aka Manto by asking for a different color of toilet paper, cloak, or cape, they will be dragged to an underworld or hell as a result. In some versions, choosing a "yellow" paper, cloak or cape will result in the occupant's head being forced into the toilet, sometimes until they drown. Those who bring toilet paper with them into the stall find that it vanishes before they can use it, allowing Aka Manto to present them with its options. Ignoring the spirit, or replying that one does not want or prefer either kind of paper, makes the spirit leave. In some accounts, rejecting both options and running away from Aka Manto will also result in the individual's survival. In some versions, the Aka manto is a hairy yōkai called a kainade who lives in the toilet. In the kainade’s case, a hairy arm of the chosen color will rise out of the toilet and fondle the student’s behind. History Author and folklorist Matthew Meyer has stated that the Aka Manto has been recorded as a schoolyard rumor dating back as early as the 1930s. In that time, the word manto commonly referred to a sleeveless kimono-style jacket, whereas in the modern-day, manto is the Japanese word for cloak or cape. Because of this, different generations have had differing views of Aka Manto's supposed physical appearance. According to a theory, around 1935, in an elementary school in Osaka, there was a rumor that a man in a cloak would appear in a dimly lit clog box in the basement, and it took a year or two for this to spread to Tokyo, and from there it is said that the story of the red cloak was born. In Ōkubo, Tokyo in the early 1900s during the Shōwa era, it was said that the red cloak was a vampire, and that there were corpses here and there that had been attacked by the red cloak. In 1940, it spread to Kitakyushu, and was even rumored among Japanese elementary school students living in the Korean Peninsula under Japanese rule. In popular culture Akagami-Aogami appears as the monster of the week in the second episode of the 2000 anime series Ghost Stories. The 2003 video game Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow features an enemy known as "Killer Mantle", which may have been based on the Aka Manto legend. The Legend of Zelda franchise has several variations on the Aka Manto, in the games Oracle of Ages, Skyward Sword, and Majora's Mask. It serves mostly the same purpose in all three games, in which it is found in a lavatory at night, and will ask for paper (or simply mutter threatening phrases at the player in Oracle of Ages.) In Skyward Sword, it can be found in the Knight Academy bathroom at night and will ask for paper, which the player can acquire through various side quests. In Majora’s Mask, the hand will do something much to the same effect, and in Oracle of Ages it simply serves as part of the trading quest.[citation needed] The 2019 video game Aka Manto, developed and published by Chilla's Art, is based on the legend. In the 2021 South Korean television series Squid Game, players are recruited to a deadly tournament by a man who invites them to play the Korean children's game ddakji for cash. He offers them the choice of a red or a blue paper tile, but this choice does not affect the outcome. Hwang Dong-hyuk, the show's director, confirmed in an interview that this was a reference to the Aka Manto legend. In the 9th episode of the South Korean series Hotel Del Luna, a ghost is seen asking the hotel owner whether he preferred red or blue toilet paper. He makes a remark questioning how long she has been asking this question since he first heard of it during his childhood. Aka Manto appears as a boss in the 2023 role-playing video game World of Horror. See also References Further reading |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Zegrus] | [TOKENS: 929] |
Contents John Zegrus John Allen Kuchar Zegrus (ジョン・アレン・カッチャー・ジーグラス, Jon Aren Kacchā Jīgurasu) is the reported name of a man detained in 1960 in Japan for alleged document fabrication. He was dubbed the "Mystery Man" (ミステリー・マン, Misuterī Man) by Japanese news at the time, and became a prototype for some urban legends. Incident In October 1959, a man recorded as John Allen Kuchar Zegrus, 36, entered Japan with his Korean wife. Three months later, he was arrested by the Tokyo Metropolitan Police, suspected of identity fraud. He tried to cash a 200,000-yen cheque and a $140 (around 50,400 yen at the time) traveller's cheque at the Japanese office of Chase Manhattan Bank, and 100,000 yen at the Japanese office of Bank of Korea. The case was investigated by Atsuyuki Sassa of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department Public Security Bureau (TMPD Public Security Bureau), who would later write about Zegrus in his memoirs. Although his passport contained the stamps of Japanese embassies in different East Asian countries, the passport was determined to be counterfeit. Moreover, a visa was issued by the Japanese embassy in Taipei (now reorganized as the Japan–Taiwan Exchange Association). According to the records, Zegrus said he was "born in the US, moved to the UK through Czechoslovakia and Germany, and attended high school there. During World War II, he was a pilot of the Royal Air Force, and was once captured by the Germans. After the war, he lived in Latin America. Later, he became a spy for the Americans in South Korea, served as a pilot in Thailand and Vietnam, and after that, he worked for the United Arab Republic. He arrived in Japan for a secret mission, which included recruiting Japanese military volunteers for the United Arab Republic." Eventually, after contacting the mentioned countries, it was ruled that the information was not based on any facts, and the seals in his pseudo-passport were proven to be fabricated. On 10 August 1960, Tokyo District Court reviewed the case and sentenced Zegrus to one year in prison. After the announcement, he tried to commit suicide by cutting his veins with a piece of glass secretly brought by him to the court. After his release, Zegrus was deported from Japan to Hong Kong, from where he was recorded to enter the region.[citation needed] His wife was deported to South Korea. Urban legends In the August 15, 1960 issue of The Province, a Canadian newspaper, the story was reported with some alterations. In an article titled "Man with his own country", the newspaper claimed that John Allen Kuchar Zegrus was "a naturalized Ethiopian and an intelligence agent for Colonel Nasser", and carried a passport "issued at Tamanrasset, the capital of Taured south of the Sahara". Taured is likely Tuareg misspelled, and Tamanrasset is an actual province in Algeria. A text in "Taured language" written with Latin characters was also cited by the newspaper. Earlier on 29 July 1960, the story in this form was mentioned in the British House of Commons, when it was cited by Robert Mathew as an argument that "passports are not very good security checks". The case was once again mentioned in the books by Jacques Bergier. According to his version of the story, a person from Taured, a country in Eastern Africa which "stretched from Mauritania to Sudan and included a large part of Algeria", was arrested in 1954 in Japan during a passport check. He was placed in a psychiatric hospital, where it was revealed that he came to "buy arms for the true Arab Legion". In 1981, the story was mentioned in a book, The Directory of Possibilities, by Colin Wilson and John Grant, with Tuareg misspelled again as Taured. Finally, a story featured on various Japanese websites dedicated to urban legends and occult stories tells that a "man from another dimension" arrived at Haneda Airport in 1954. He possessed a passport from the fictional country "Taured". When asked to point out his home nation on a map, he pointed to Andorra. He was placed in a hotel with two guards for investigation, but was nowhere to be found the following morning. References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_Black_of_Wat_Samian_Nari] | [TOKENS: 1643] |
Contents Women in Black of Wat Samian Nari The Women in Black of Wat Samian Nari is a Thai urban legend that revolves around the ghosts of two women dressed in black, who are said to appear near the front of Wat Samian Nari in Bangkok late at night. It is considered one of the most famous contemporary urban legends of Bangkok. Description The legend of the 'Women in Black' first began to circulate around the 1990s. Witnesses commonly describe the women as beautiful figures dressed entirely in black. They were often seen in Bangkok's nightlife districts, such as RCA or Ratchadaphisek, hailing a taxi after midnight and asking to be taken to Wat Samian Nari. During the ride, the two women would remain completely silent. They never spoke to each other and kept their eyes fixed straight ahead. Some drivers later admitted that they felt uneasy, sensing something was not quite right. A few even tried to start a conversation, but the women never replied. When the taxi finally arrived at the temple gates, the passengers would suddenly vanish without a trace. Confused and frightened, some drivers stepped out of their cars, only to be horrified by what they saw. The two women were crawling across the railway tracks that run past the temple, their bodies drenched in blood and severed in half, dragging themselves forward in a dreadful and anguished manner. Some versions of the story claim that the two women were sisters dressed in black because they were on their way to their mother's funeral, but they died before ever reaching it. Others say that when a driver dropped them off, he suddenly saw the women standing outside his window, staring in at him with pale faces and blood-red eyes, with dark streams of blood trickling down. A taxi driver reported that he once received a 50-baht bill as the fare, and the woman declined to take any change. The next morning, when he opened his wallet, the banknote had inexplicably turned into a leaf. There are also those who insist that even if one never encounters the apparitions directly, strange things still happen when passing in front of Wat Samian Nari. Whether in broad daylight or in the dead of night, engines are said to mysteriously sputter or stall for no apparent reason. Reported sightings In 2005, the popular paranormal television program Horror Hour, broadcast on Channel 7, hosted by Kanchai Kamnerdploy and Kapol Thongplub, featured the story of the Women in Black of Wat Samian Nari. The show invited two taxi drivers who claimed to have personally encountered the women. Sketches were drawn from their memories, revealing one woman with short hair and another with long hair. The drivers confirmed that the sketches resembled what they saw with an accuracy of 80 to 90 percent. One of the taxi drivers was so disturbed by the experience that he gave up the profession altogether. In the program, additional information was revealed: the women were sisters with the surname Tipsuksri, named Chulee and Sulee. They had died in the early 1990s after being struck by a train in front of Wat Samian Nari. The tragedy was so shocking that it was reported on the front pages of local newspapers. Another man who reportedly encountered the two women was Sutthipong Eiamsa-ard. His experience was similar to that of the two taxi drivers, but it is believed to have taken place around 2000. The encounter left him so shocked that he lost consciousness and later awoke in a hospital. Since that incident, Sutthipong has suffered from an irregular heartbeat and has had to rely on medication. Even at the time when the program featured his story, he was still under treatment and dependent on the medicine. In a separate incident, a man recalled passing Wat Samian Nari one night in 1997. While he had stopped his car to relieve himself on the roadside, his wife suddenly came to tell him to look back at their vehicle. To his horror, he saw two women dressed entirely in black standing beside the car, staring at their child who was sitting alone in the back seat. Moments later, the women vanished before his eyes, leaving an unforgettable impression. In June 2024, Thairath Studio interviewed Somkiat Sapchalerm, a reporter from Pathum Thani who claimed he was the first to publicize the story of the two Women in Black. At the time, he was driving a late-night taxi in northern Bangkok, near Chatuchak and Bang Sue. One night, he picked up two women dressed entirely in black. The two of them had somehow gotten into the car in such silence that he was startled, not even knowing when it had happened, and in that stillness their presence felt unnervingly heavy. Only the long-haired woman spoke, softly uttering the word "Wat Samian" to indicate their destination. She sat in the front beside him, her body slightly turned toward the window and her face always looking away from him, never changing position throughout the ride, while the short-haired woman sat silently in the back, completely invisible in the rearview mirror. Near the temple, he intended not to drive in, but the car moved to stop in front of the crematorium. The meter showed around 30 baht, and the long-haired woman said "30." Then, both vanished mysteriously. Unaware that they were not human, he asked an old man walking by if he had seen them. The man replied, "Those two girls again ? Forgive them." Somkiat gradually realized that the two women were not human the next day. His daytime taxi partner said he had no passengers all day, yet another driver reported seeing the women sitting in Somkiat's car the entire day. He later recounted the story via a public phone on a popular ghost radio show hosted by Kapol Thongplub, receiving overwhelming responses. Messages came in like "The scariest story of the night" and "Where is this driver? What's the car number?" A year later, after quitting taxi driving, he returned to work and tuned in to the same show, which was discussing his case. He called in because another man, a company employee, reported a similar encounter. The host arranged a three-way conversation, and Somkiat learned the truth: the two women were not sisters but friends, dressed in black to hurry to the cremation of the long-haired woman's boyfriend. They rode a motorcycle together, but the bike stalled on the railway tracks just as a train approached, killing them instantly. The old man they had met was not alive either, but the temple's deceased undertaker. Somkiat's encounter occurred around 1992. Research In 2020, Channel 9 MCOT HD news investigated the legend of the Women in Black at Wat Samian Nari. The temple, located in Lat Yao, Chatuchak, northern Bangkok, is over 100 years old, dating back to King Rama V's reign. A canal Khlong Prem Prachakon runs alongside, and the northern railway line and Kamphaeng Phet 6 Road pass in front. At night, the area is particularly dark and quiet. A tuk-tuk driver who has worked in the area for over ten years said he had heard the story but never encountered anything. One taxi driver reportedly saw a woman in black waving for a ride at night five years ago, but she vanished suddenly. The abbot, who has served for over 50 years, said he has heard the tale since taking office 30 years ago, but he, the monks, and local residents have never seen anything. He believes it is merely a story passed down by word of mouth. While train accidents in front of the temple have occurred, there is no evidence of any ghost. Furthermore, searches of Khaosod's archives back to 1997 revealed no reports of a train accident killing women in two halves in front of the temple. See more References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ourang_Medan] | [TOKENS: 1941] |
Contents Ourang Medan SS Ourang Medan was a reported ghost ship and proposed urban legend of the 1940s. The vessel was supposedly discovered adrift after briefly broadcasting an SOS. The ships that responded to the SOS were reported to have discovered all the crew dead with their eyes open and their faces frozen in shock, as if they were witnessing a horrific scene. As they subsequently prepared to tow the Ourang Medan to port, a fire reportedly broke out in the hold resulting in its eventual sinking, hiding it and its mysteries forever. The most prominent version of the story places the vessel in the Dutch East Indies (modern Indonesia) in the Straits of Malacca waters, while other versions of the tale place the vessel around the Marshall Islands or Solomon Islands. The story was initially reported in Italy in 1940 and the UK in 1940, before similar stories were repeated in 1948 and later again in 1952. The inability of researchers to identify the vessel in any official records, along with the inconsistent reporting of the location, and other details that change from version to version, has led to speculative coverage in mystery publications such as the Fortean Times. SS Ourang Medan The word Ourang (also written Orang) is Malay or Indonesian for "man" or "person", whereas Medan is the largest city on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, giving an approximate translation of "Man of Medan". Accounts of the ship's accident have appeared in various books and magazines, mainly on Forteana. Their factual accuracy and even the ship's existence, however, are unconfirmed, and details of the vessel's construction and history remain unknown. Searches for any official registration or accident investigation recorded have proven unsuccessful. Story The 1940 version of the story told of a distress signal being sent out in an area south of the Solomon Islands. The first received stated “SOS from the steamship Ourang Medan. Beg ships with shortwave wireless get touch doctor. Urgent.” This was followed by “Probable second officer dead. Other members crew also killed. Disregard medical consultation. SOS urgent assistance warship.” After giving her position, the final message received was an incomplete phrase “crew has…”. Vessels responding to the Ourang Medan received no reply. The 1940 version of the story describes rescue vessels approaching the ship listing in the water, and upon boarding locating multiple crew dead at their posts. As they investigated further into the ship, explosions were reportedly heard and so the rescuers abandoned the ship, and watched it subsequently go ablaze and sink into the Pacific. By 1948, the story was embellished with further details. According to one version of the story, at some point of time in or around June 1947, two American vessels navigating the Straits of Malacca, the City of Baltimore and the Silver Star, among others passing by, picked up several distress messages from the nearby Dutch merchant ship Ourang Medan. (Vincent Gaddis and other sources list the approximate date as early February 1948). A radio operator aboard the troubled vessel is reported to have sent the following message in Morse code: "S.O.S. from Ourang Medan * * * We float. All officers including the captain, dead in chartroom and on the bridge. Probably whole of crew dead * * *." After a few more incoherent dots and dashes, the words "I die." were received. No further communications were received. When the Silver Star crew eventually located and boarded the apparently undamaged Ourang Medan in an attempt at a rescue, the ship was found littered with corpses (including the carcass of a dog) everywhere, with the dead bodies found sprawled on their backs, the frozen (and allegedly badly-frightened) faces of the deceased upturned to the sun above with mouths gaping open and eyes staring straight ahead, with the corpses resembling horrible caricatures. No survivors were located and no visible signs of injuries on the dead bodies were observed. Just as the ship was to be prepared for a tow by the Silver Star to a nearby port, a fire then suddenly broke out in the ship's No. 4 cargo-hold, forcing the boarding party to hastily evacuate the doomed Dutch freighter, thus preventing any further investigations to be carried out. Soon after, the Ourang Medan was witnessed exploding before finally sinking. Some versions of the story attribute further details to the sole survivor, an unnamed German, of the Ourang Medan crew, who swam to safety, and was subsequently found by an Italian missionary and natives on Taongi Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The man, before perishing, tells the missionary that the ship was carrying a badly stowed cargo of oil of vitriol, and that most of the crew perished because of the poisonous fumes escaping from broken containers. According to the story, the Ourang Medan was sailing from an unnamed small Chinese port to Costa Rica, and deliberately avoided the authorities.[citation needed] Hypotheses Bainton and others hypothesize that Ourang Medan might have been involved in smuggling operations of chemical substances such as a combination of potassium cyanide and nitroglycerin or even wartime stocks of nerve agents. According to these theories, sea water would have entered the ship's hold, reacting with the cargo to release toxic gases, which then caused the crew to succumb to asphyxia and/or poisoning. Later, the sea water would have reacted with the nitroglycerin, causing the reported fire and explosion. Another theory is that the ship was transporting nerve gas which the Japanese military had been storing in China during the war, and which was handed over to the U.S. military at the end of the war. No U.S. ship could transport it as it would leave a paper trail. It was therefore loaded onto a non-registered ship for transport to the U.S. or an island in the Pacific.[citation needed] Gaddis puts forward the theory that an undetected smouldering fire or malfunction in the ship's boiler system might have been responsible for the shipwreck. Escaping carbon monoxide would have caused the deaths of all aboard, with the fire slowly spreading out of control, leading to the vessel's ultimate destruction. Contemporaneous coverage The earliest incarnation of the story occurs in Il Piccolo, the local paper of Trieste, in a series of “I drammi del mare” (Dramas of the Sea) written by Silvio Scherli in October 1940. Scherli was a maritime radio operator and freelance journalist. A month later, newspaper reports of the incident appeared in British newspapers the Daily Mirror and the Yorkshire Evening Post. These initial reports placed the ship in proximity of the Solomon Islands, omit the rescue vessels names, and the SOS messages are different from later reports. The origin of the story is described as the Associated Press, and reported from Trieste in Italy but attributed to a Merchant Marine Officer. In 1948, a series of three articles appeared in the Dutch-Indonesian newspaper De locomotief: Samarangsch handels- en advertentie-blad (February 3, 1948, with two photographs duplicated from the Il Piccolo article, February 28, 1948, and March 13, 1948). The source for these stories are given as Silvio Scherli of Trieste and introduce new details about the incident not previously included in 1940s reporting including the significantly altered SOS and the addition of the surviving sailor who (on his deathbed) tells a missionary about the events, who subsequently recounted them to Scherli. The Dutch newspaper concludes with a disclaimer: "This is the last part of our story about the mystery of the Ourang Medan. We must repeat that we don't have any other data on this 'mystery of the sea'. Nor can we answer the many unanswered questions in the story. It may seem obvious that the entire story is a fantasy, a thrilling romance of the sea. On the other hand, the author, Silvio Scherli, assures us of the authenticity of the story." In October 10, 1948, the story was published in The Albany Times of Albany, New York and references its original source as the Dutch newspaper Elsevier's Weekly. The story was repeated in the May 1952 issue of the Proceedings of the Merchant Marine Council, published by the United States Coast Guard. Silvio Scherli is said to have produced a report on Trieste "Export Trade" on September 28, 1959. Skepticism Several authors note their inability to find any mention of the case in Lloyd's Shipping Register. Furthermore, no registration records for a ship by the name of Ourang Medan could be located in various countries, including the Netherlands. While author Roy Bainton states that the identity of the Silver Star, reported to have been involved in the failed rescue attempt, has been established with a high probability, the complete lack of information on the sunken ship itself has given rise to suspicion about the origins and credibility of the account. Ships logs for the Silver Star did not show a record of any such rescue attempt. Bainton and others have put forward the possibility that accounts of, among others, the date, location, names of the ships involved, and circumstances of the accident might have been inaccurate or exaggerated, or that the story might be completely fictitious. References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elvis_sightings] | [TOKENS: 3171] |
Contents Elvis Presley death conspiracy theories Since Elvis Presley's death on August 16, 1977, various false and discredited conspiracy theories have circulated stating that he may still be alive. "Elvis sightings" from people incorrectly claiming to have seen him after this date are a phenomenon both as an ironic meme and also as part of a genuine belief for some. In the early 1980s, the possibility of Presley still being alive was a niche topic discussed by a fringe demographic of fans in underground zines. It crossed over into widespread media attention in 1987 after a woman named Louise Welling falsely claimed to have seen Elvis at a Burger King in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The absurdity, "Middle America-ness" and the sound of the name "Kalamazoo" made for an ironic, light story in newspaper and television outlets. Theories and misinformation on the topic were then widely popularised by authors Gail Brewer-Giorgio and Major Bill Smith, who were given a platform by American and international media. Two TV specials that perpetuated these theories, The Elvis Files and The Elvis Conspiracy, aired internationally in 1991 and 1992. Since then, popular interest in the topic has waned but "Elvis sightings" have stayed resonant as a part of pop culture. The conspiracy theory itself has become iconic as an example of the "genre" and a forerunner of the post-truth era, going on to influence many other theories including QAnon. History and evolution of the conspiracy theories Presley died on August 16, 1977. His death is easily verifiable. Presley's body was found in his ensuite bathroom at Graceland by his girlfriend Ginger Alden, who raised the alarm and quickly summoned his father Vernon Presley and close friend Joe Esposito, as well as his daughter Lisa Marie Presley, who were all first-hand witnesses. The body was then transported to the Memphis Baptist Hospital, where medical personnel produced both a death certificate and an autopsy report on file with the State of Tennessee. The earliest known "Elvis sighting" was the very next day at the Memphis International Airport where a man resembling him supposedly gave the name "Jon Burrows" when boarding an international flight. This was the name Presley travelled under during his lifetime, and searching for uses of this name post-1977 became a recurring theme of the conspiracy theory. In 1978, author Gail Brewer-Giorgio published a novel entitled Orion based on Presley's life but with an ending in which the main character fakes his own death. At the same time, an album was released on Presley's former label Sun Records featuring a masked singer named "Orion" with a voice similar to Presley's. Some interpreted the release of the book and album together as meaning that Presley was still alive and had begun recording as "Orion". The singer was in fact Jimmy Ellis, with the Sun Records brand identity having been sold to Shelby Singleton since its iconic 1950s heyday. Brewer-Giorgio claimed at the time to have no connection to Ellis or this other use of "Orion". In later years, she would even claim that Ellis and Singleton had violated her copyright. However, in the 2015 documentary Orion: The Man Who Would Be King, both Ellis and Brewer-Giorgio say they worked together on the "Orion" phenomenon in advance of both the book and album coming out. Ellis claims that Brewer-Giorgio approached him after a performance and told him "You are Orion." In 1979, a two-part TV special investigating Presley's death entitled The Elvis Cover-Up aired on 20/20, hosted by Geraldo Rivera. The "cover-up" referred to was an attempt to hide Presley's dependence on prescription medication and the role this played in his death, which the special documents thoroughly. The second part directly implicated Presley's former doctor, George C. Nichopoulos. Rivera does not imply at any time in this special that Presley may still be alive. However, a common misinterpretation of the special's title unintentionally lay the groundwork for a belief that this may be the case. Brewer-Giorgio would later capitalise on this by citing the special as evidence Presley was alive, at a time when it was not easily available to be viewed. Meanwhile, Ellis went onto some success performing as "Orion" while masked, including to some fans who genuinely believed that he was in fact Presley. However, the novel Orion fell out of print and did not succeed. Brewer-Giorgio blamed this on deliberate publisher neglect and claimed that the reason behind this was that she had "gotten too close to the truth". This theory became the basis for her next "non-fiction" book, The Most Incredible Elvis Presley Story Ever Told! In the early 1980s, a recording began to circulate among fans that purported to be a recent interview with a living Presley discussing his life in hiding. The man on the tape tells the interviewer that he has been travelling internationally and has grown a beard "to keep from being recognised". An album of the same man singing was also released, entitled Do You Know Who I Am?, credited to "Sivle Sings Again" or "Sivle Nora" ("Elvis" and "Elvis Aron" spelt backwards). The album contained new versions of various Presley songs plus a cover of Eddie Rabbitt's 1980 hit "I Love A Rainy Night". During "Loving You", the singer stops the band to say that "somebody" just told him about the 1981 attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan. The voice on these tapes was actually David Darlock, who later claimed that he was commissioned by the Eternally Elvis fan club who told him it was all intended for a fictional production. In 1987, a woman named Louise Welling claimed to have seen Presley at a Burger King in Kalamazoo, Michigan. This was picked up widely in newspapers, radio and television as it made for an attention-grabbing story, partly due to the "Middle America"-ness of the location and the sound of the name "Kalamazoo". The incident led to increased publicity for Elvis sightings and the conspiracy theory in general. Brewer-Giorgio appeared widely on television throughout 1988 discussing her theory. She was given a platform by Oprah Winfrey, Larry King and Rivera, all of whom helped elevate the conspiracy theory to international prominence. Amidst the hype, The Most Incredible Elvis Presley Story Ever Told! was picked up by Tudor Books and reprinted in an expanded edition as Is Elvis Alive? This edition came bundled with a cassette of the Darlock recording, interspersed with commentary by Brewer-Giorgio speculating as to whether it may be Presley's voice, which it was not. The book was a significant commercial success, and Orion was also reprinted by Tudor. Record producer Major Bill Smith was also a prominent figure in perpetuating the conspiracy theory. Smith authored a book entitled Memphis Mystery on the subject and claimed to be in current communication with Presley, releasing recordings that were purportedly of his voice recorded after 1977. On one occasion, Smith even went as far as to bring a man he falsely claimed to be Presley on air to do a live radio interview and take questions from callers. The interview can be heard on a cassette released by Smith, Elvis Lives. In late 1988, record label LS Records released the song "Spelling on the Stone", sung by an unknown vocalist purporting to be Presley. The song's narrative suggested that Presley had not actually died, and that he was trying to communicate this to the world by deliberately misspelling his middle name "Aron" as "Aaron" on the tombstone at Graceland. In reality, the "spelling on the stone" is of no consequence as Presley used both spellings of his middle name interchangeably throughout his lifetime, including on his divorce certificate which clearly features "Aaron" in his own handwriting. Even if the tombstone was "misspelled", which it was not, the conspiracy theory adds an unlikely supposition that the reason for this is that Presley chose not just to fake his own death - also deliberately making it appear as if he had died on the toilet no less - but also to leave clues for others to interpret. Nevertheless, airplay received by "Spelling on the Stone" on country music formats caused a number of listeners to call in to radio stations and report sightings of the singer after hearing the song, while program directors of said stations debated whether or not the song's vocal track was actually Presley. The middle name spelling also became a common feature of the conspiracy theory. The semi-humorous Weekly World News tabloid ran hyper-exaggerated and sensationalised stories about Presley being alive for several years beginning in the late 1980s. These stories supposedly tracked Presley on his travels throughout the US and Canada, becoming an iconic part of the Weekly World News brand. In 1989, Rivera hosted a TV special entitled Wanted: Elvis Dead or Alive in which he challenged Brewer-Giorgio and Smith about their claims and expressed anger that his work on The Elvis Cover-Up a decade earlier had been taken out of context. Darlock also appeared and told the live audience that he was the voice on the cassette that came with Is Elvis Alive?, even producing the contract he originally signed to record the tape for what he claims he was told was a fictional production. To demonstrate his ability to impersonate Presley, Darlock then held a mock seance - only as entertainment, without making any supernatural claims - by focusing his gaze on Rivera's watch until the hands stopped, then rubbing his temples and concentrating. He then told the audience, in character as Presley: It started when I was just a baby, just an infant baby. I learned a lot about music. I learned how to play the guitar. And that's the type of thing that I've been doing a lot. But um, in the past twelve years there's been a lot of times that people believe that I'm still living. And naturally, that's not true. And as far as growing beards and this and that to keep from being recognised - I kept a secret. I kept a secret deep down inside. And it's not pressed between any pages like it found a place to hide. Thank you. In 1991, a live TV special entitled The Elvis Files, hosted by former Presley co-star Bill Bixby, aired internationally. It featured Brewer-Giorgio and others discussing the false claims of Presley's possible faked death, and investigated numerous Elvis sightings. Amongst other misinformation, this special featured the "spelling on the stone" argument plus several 1980s-era photos that purportedly depicted Presley - including one of a man resembling him in the poolhouse at Graceland, and another man spotted alongside Reverend Jesse Jackson and Muhammad Ali. The men in these photos turned out to be Presley associate Al Strada and Larry J. Kolb respectively. Author Monte Nicholson also appeared to discuss his novel The Presley Arrangement about Presley faking his own death, which he claimed had also "disappeared" from bookstores. A sequel special, The Elvis Conspiracy, aired in 1992. Brewer-Giorgio did not appear as she had fallen out with Bixby and the producers. Nicholson appeared again to discuss a false and misleading correlation between a number of "Elvis sightings" and a supposed paperwork trail of Presley's social security number being used in various places after his death. The Elvis Conspiracy contained references to an FBI operation from 1977 called Operation Fountain Pen that involved Presley and a criminal organisation called The Fraternity, details of which had recently been uncovered from declassified documents. Combining this with the fact Presley had been gifted a badge granting him the status of an honorary FBI agent after visiting Richard Nixon in 1970, the special hypothesised that Presley may have gone into hiding after 1977 to work as a secret agent. While both Operation Fountain Pen and The Fraternity are based in fact, the operation only concerned fraud against Presley's father Vernon, who had been scammed by the group into paying inflated amounts for maintenance on one of Presley's jets. This combined with the fact that Presley's status as "an FBI agent" was strictly an honorary title means that there is no compelling argument that he may have faked his death for the purposes of being undercover. The special also walked back and debunked numerous claims from the first, and featured interviews with real-life Presley associates Joe Esposito and Larry Geller, before ultimately coming to the conclusion that Presley was in fact dead. This displeased Brewer-Giorgio, who threatened to sue the producers. Bixby had also hosted the two specials while himself dying of cancer. In his final months he directed The Woman Who Loved Elvis, a sympathetic and humanistic view of a Presley fan, before his death in 1993. In late 1992, the Weekly World News announced that Presley had finally died. A follow-up article declared that this had also been a hoax. Since the early 1990s, mainstream interest in the conspiracy theory has waned but "Elvis sightings" have continued both as a source of humor and from an increasingly fringe demographic of believers. In 1995, R. Serge Denisoff published a book entitled True Disbelievers: The Elvis Contagion about the origins and history of the conspiracy theory. After many years performing as "Orion", Ellis opened a pawn shop where he was shot and killed during an armed robbery in 1998. In 1999, Brewer-Giorgio published her final book, Elvis Undercover: Is He Alive and Coming Back? Amongst other misinformation, this book claimed Presley may have been an extra in the 1998 film Finding Graceland. That same year, some claimed to have seen Presley at Legoland California. In January 2015, a fake news website claimed that an 80-year-old homeless man in San Diego named Jessie had been posthumously identified by DNA evidence as Presley. A groundskeeper working at Graceland was claimed to be Presley in 2016. One persistent rumour held that Presley was visible as an extra in the 1990 film Home Alone, wearing a turtleneck and a sports jacket during a scene shot at an airport. The man turned out to be Gary Richard Grott, who died of a heart attack in February 2016. Another false "sighting" that has survived to the 2020s as an earnestly-believed conspiracy theory holds that Presley may be living as preacher Bob Joyce, despite the fact that Joyce is clearly significantly younger than a living Presley would be. Brewer-Giorgio died on January 25, 2025, in Georgia. Conspiracy theories about Presley's supposed faked death are considered a forerunner of many others both in pop culture and the political arena, including that Michael Jackson may still be alive and the idea that Avril Lavigne has been replaced as well as the 9/11 truth movement, QAnon and COVID denial. In popular media References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_the_Colonel] | [TOKENS: 1253] |
Contents Curse of the Colonel The Curse of the Colonel (Japanese: カーネルサンダースの呪い, romanisation: Kāneru Sandāsu no Noroi) is a Japanese urban legend that held that the ghost of the KFC founder, Colonel Sanders, placed a curse on the Hanshin Tigers baseball team. The curse was said to be placed on the team because of the Colonel's anger over treatment of one of his store-front statues, which was thrown into the Dōtonbori River by Hanshin fans before their team's 1985 Central League pennant. As is common with sports curses, the Curse of the Colonel was used to explain the team's failures in subsequent years. Some fans believed the team would never win another Japan Series until the statue was recovered. They appeared in the Japan Series three more times and lost in 2003, 2005 and 2014 before winning in 2023. Comparisons are often made between the Hanshin Tigers and the Boston Red Sox, who were said to be under the Curse of the Bambino until they won the World Series in 2004. The Curse of the Colonel has also been used as a bogeyman threat to those who would divulge the KFC recipe. History The Hanshin Tigers are located in Kansai, the second-largest metropolitan area in Japan. They are considered the underdogs of Nippon Professional Baseball, in opposition to the Yomiuri Giants of Tokyo, who are considered the kings. The fans flock to the stadium no matter how badly the Tigers play. In 1985, the Hanshin Tigers faced the Seibu Lions and had a surprise first victory in the Japan Series, largely due to the efforts of their star slugger, the American Randy Bass. A riotous celebration gathered at Ebisu Bridge in Dōtonbori, Osaka, on October 16, three weeks before the Japan Series. Supporters yelled the players' names; with every name, a fan resembling a member of the team leaped into the canal. Lacking a Caucasian person to imitate Bass, the crowd seized a plastic statue of Colonel Sanders from a KFC and tossed it off the bridge as an effigy. Like Bass, the Colonel had a beard and was not Japanese. According to the urban legend, this began the Curse of the Colonel, which stated that the Tigers would not win the championship again until the statue is recovered. After their success in the 1985 series, the Hanshin Tigers began an 18-year losing streak placing last or next-to-last in the league. Brief rallies in 1992 and 1999 brought hope to fans, but they were followed with defeat. Numerous attempts to recover the statue failed, including the use of divers and dredging. Fans apologized to the store manager. Although the leap into Dōtonbori canal and the Curse of the Colonel is usually associated only with a Hanshin Tigers victory, in 2002, when Japan beat Tunisia in the World Cup, some 500 fans jumped into the canal as a celebration, in spite of heavy police security. A Colonel Sanders statue was taken from the storefront of a KFC in Kobe and its hands were cut off, supposedly in imitation of Sharia law. In 2003, the Tigers had an unexpectedly strong season. Their chief rivals, the Yomiuri Giants, lost their star player Hideki Matsui to the New York Yankees, while the Tigers saw the return of pitcher Hideki Irabu back to NPB after playing with the Texas Rangers. The Tigers won the Central League to qualify for the Japan Series, and many newspapers speculated that the Curse of the Colonel had finally been broken. However, the Tigers lost the Japan Series to the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks, so the curse remained intact. Fans were enthusiastic about winning the Central League, and repeated the celebratory leap into Dōtonbori Canal. However, instead of the individual leapers representing the players, over 5,300 fans plunged into the canal. Many KFC outlets in Kobe and Osaka moved their Colonel Sanders statues inside until the series was over to protect them from rabid Tigers fans. The replacement Colonel Sanders statue in the Dōtonbori KFC branch was bolted down to prevent a repeat of the incident. 24-year-old Hanshin Tigers fan Masaya Shitababa drowned in the canal during the 2003 celebration, with all reports being that he had been shoved in by the revelers. To prevent future incidents, the Osaka city council ordered the construction of a new Ebisubashi bridge beginning in 2004, which will make it more difficult for fans to take the celebratory leap should the Curse of the Colonel be broken and the Tigers win again. The Colonel was finally discovered in the Dōtonbori River on March 10, 2009. Divers who recovered the statue at first thought it was only a large barrel, and shortly after a human corpse, but Hanshin fans on the scene were quick to identify it as the upper body of the long-lost Colonel. The right hand and lower body were found the next day, but the statue is still missing its glasses and left hand. It was said that the only way the curse could be lifted was by returning his long-lost glasses and left hand. The statue was later recovered (with replacement of new glasses and hand) and returned to KFC Japan. The KFC restaurant that the statue originally belonged to no longer exists, but a cardboard cut-out replica of the statue was placed in the branch near Koshien Stadium during the 2023 playoff run. The curse was broken in 2023 when the Tigers won Game 7 of the 2023 Japan Series for their first NPB championship since 1985. Fans again gathered and celebrated in Dōtonbori after the 2023 title win and threw a fan cosplaying as the Colonel into the river in reference to the curse. On March 8, 2024, KFC Japan held a burial ceremony for the statue, citing difficulties in maintaining the statue's condition. See also References External links |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kokkuri] | [TOKENS: 799] |
Contents Kokkuri Kokkuri (こっくり, 狐狗狸) or Kokkuri-san (こっくりさん) is a Japanese game popular during the Meiji era that is also a form of divination, partially based on Western table-turning. The name kokkuri is an onomatopoeia meaning "to nod up and down", and refers to the movement of the actual kokkuri mechanism. The kanji used to write the word is an ateji, although its characters reflect the popular belief that the movement of the mechanism is caused by supernatural agents (ko 狐, kitsune; ku 狗, dog/tengu; ri 狸, tanuki). The modern version is similar to a Ouija board. Ancient kokkuri The word kokkuri refers to the game and physical apparatus, while kokkuri-san refers to the being that is summoned: it is considered by the Japanese to be some sort of animal spirit that is a mix between a fox, dog, and raccoon. These three animals are meant to reflect the dual nature of the being, justifying its different personality traits: the fox being a trickster or teacher, and the raccoon being both a bearer of mischief and good fortune. Kokkuri-san is believed to possess the apparatus in order to communicate with humans. The physical mechanism is composed of three bamboo rods arranged to make a tripod, upon which is placed a small pot lid or platter, which is covered by a cloth. In some versions, tags are inserted into each of the three rods, with the words kitsune, tengu, and tanuki, respectively; in others, the words are merely traced with a finger on the bottom of the plate. Three or more people will place both their hands upon the kokkuri (lined-up, as in table-turning) and ask the spirit a question, which that spirit will in theory answer by moving (or not moving) the legs underneath the plate. Japanese folklorist Inoue Enryō wrote about the kokkuri phenomenon, denouncing it as mere superstition, yet his efforts did not succeed in de-popularizing the game. Some scientific figures of the age attempted to explain the phenomena with the more scientific sounding yet ultimately equally mysterious term "human-electricity;" these same figures claimed the cloth used should always be of a white or gold color. Blue cloth was (incorrectly) said to hamper the human-electricity's passage. The human-electricity needing a passage, it was stated the game required participants to place both hands on the apparatus, with finger tips touching - as in Western table-turning. The game is sometimes referred to as Okatabuki, Angel-san or Cupid-san. Modern kokkuri Modern kokkuri has changed heavily from its original form, now resembling the much more common Ouija board, but played with a sheet of paper. A torii is drawn in the top-center of the paper, with the words 'Yes' and 'No' written on either side; a letter grid (most often hiragana) is placed underneath the torii, along with the numbers 0-9. A small coin (most commonly the ten yen) is used as a planchette. Unlike the Western Ouija board, kokkuri has slight differences in playthrough. Before playing, a door or window must be propped open to allow the spirit to enter the room, and must be closed when the spirit leaves. In addition, the implements must be expended during the first 24 hours after the game is played; the paper must be burned, the ink in the pen used to draw on the paper must be used up, and the coin should be spent in a financial transaction. This modern version is sometimes referred to as Spirit of the Coin. In popular culture See also References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inunaki_Village_(legend)] | [TOKENS: 961] |
Contents Inunaki Village The Inunaki Village (Japanese: 犬鳴村, Hepburn: Inunaki-mura; lit. 'Howling Village') is a 1990s Japanese urban legend about a fictional village-sized micronation that rejects the Constitution of Japan. The legend locates the village near the Inunaki mountain pass [ja] in Fukuoka Prefecture. A real Inunaki Village, not connected to the legend, did exist from 1691 to 1889. Legend The village is described as "small and easy to miss" in a forest located in Fukuoka Prefecture, to the east of the Inunaki Mountain next to the most upstream tributary of Inunaki Gawa and the western edge of Wakamiya. The residents of the village refused to accept the Constitution of Japan and the legitimacy of the extant Japanese government. Near the village entrance is a handwritten sign reading: "The Japanese constitution is not in effect past here." A small side road past Old Inunaki Tunnel leads toward the village. According to the legend, "sometime in the early 1970s" a young couple on their way to Hisayama by car went into the forest seeking help when their car's engine broke down. They entered the seemingly-abandoned Inunaki Village, where a "crazy old man" greeted them and then murdered them with a sickle. In another story, a telephone booth near the Inunaki bridge receives a call from Inunaki Village every night. People answering the call are transported to the village, and die from a curse that causes them to first lose control of their body and mind. The real Inunaki Village According to Edo Period historical records, the real Inunaki Village (33°41′25″N 130°33′30″E / 33.69028°N 130.55833°E / 33.69028; 130.55833), officially referred to as Inunakidani Village (犬鳴谷村), was established by a dispatch group of the Fukuoka Domain in 1691. Bunnai Shinozaki was appointed as the village headman. The village exported ceramic products and steel. A coal mine was added later. The Inunaki Gobekkan castle was founded in 1865 under the recommendation of Kato Shisho. In April 1889, Inunakidani was integrated into the nearby Yoshikawa Village with the introduction of the town and village system (町村制, Chosonsei). Subsequent amalgamations eventually created the city of Miyawaka. The Inunaki Dam, completed in 1994, submerged the site of Inunakidani in 1986. Residents of the village were relocated to Wakita. Origin and spread The area of the Old Inunaki Tunnel has been considered to be haunted due to nearby murders. The tunnel's construction was completed in 1949. A new tunnel was constructed nearby in 1975. The unused old tunnel became dangerous due to a lack of maintenance. On 6 December 1988, five young men abducted and tortured a factory worker whose car they wanted to steal, burning him to death with gasoline inside the old tunnel. The perpetrators were arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment. The entrances to the old tunnel were sealed. In 2000, a dead body was found in a nearby dam. The first online mentions of the Inunaki Village urban legend date back to 1999, when Nippon TV received a letter from an anonymous person, which described the legend of the couple murdered in the village and urged the Nippon TV crew to visit the place. The anonymous letter was titled "The Village in Japan That Isn't Part of Japan". In popular culture The legend of Inunaki Village inspired several pieces of media. A horror film Howling Village [ja] (犬鳴村) directed by Takashi Shimizu, based on the legend, was released in February 2019. The release of the film contributed to the popularity of the Old Inunaki Tunnel, leading to an increase in trespassing and vandalism in the area. In November of the same year, a horror game titled Inunaki Tunnel [ja] was released on Steam. The story also inspired a 2016 anime television series The Lost Village (迷家-マヨイガ-) and The Story of the Mysterious Tunnel (トンネルの奇譚) manga by Junji Ito. See also References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavender_Town] | [TOKENS: 2092] |
Contents Lavender Town Lavender Town (Japanese: シオンタウン, Hepburn: Shion Taun; Shion Town) is a fictional village in the 1996 video games Pokémon Red and Blue. Stylized as a haunted location, Lavender Town is home to the Pokémon Tower, a burial ground for deceased Pokémon and a location to find Ghost-type Pokémon. The background music of Lavender Town is renowned for adding to the town's creepy atmosphere. In the 2010s, it gave rise to the "Lavender Town Syndrome" creepypasta, a fictional story about hundreds of Japanese children committing suicide after listening to the track from high-pitched tones that only they could hear. Lavender Town has become well known for the variety of creepypastas associated with it, which have been analyzed. Appearances Lavender Town is a village that can be visited in Pokémon Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, sequels Gold, Silver, Crystal, and the remakes thereof. Lavender Town is the player's first encounter with the concept of Pokémon dying, and is one of a few towns in the Kanto region not to feature a gym. It is home to the Pokémon Tower, a graveyard filled with mourning trainers and hundreds of tombstones for deceased Pokémon. In Lavender Tower the player character can come across the Ghost-type Pokémon Gastly and Haunter. The tower is the only place where they are available for capture. During the story of Red, Green, Blue, and Yellow, the player utilises the item Silph Scope to deal with and view the Ghost-type Pokémon. The village is haunted by the spirit of dead Marowak, murdered by the villainous Team Rocket, which is searching for its orphaned Cubone, a type of Pokémon that can be found at the tower. Lavender Town is also home to Mr. Fuji, a kind elderly man who looks after abandoned and orphaned Pokémon. He went to the tower to calm the Marowak's spirit, but Team Rocket held him hostage until the player drove them out of the tower. In gratitude, Mr. Fuji gives the player the Poké Flute item, which the player then uses to wake up Snorlax, which is required to make progress in the game. Cubone's story is expanded on in the remake Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee! by having the player assist in reuniting the Cubone with its mother. The Pokémon Tower was replaced by the "Kanto Radio Tower" in Pokémon Gold and Silver, although a smaller burial site called the "House of Memories" is now present. The Pokémon Tower appears in the 23rd episode of the first season of the Pokémon anime series titled "The Tower of Terror", where Ash, Misty, and Brock search for Ghost-type Pokémon for the Gym battle against Sabrina. Lavender Town also appears in the Pokémon Adventures and The Electric Tale of Pikachu manga series. Lavender Town later features in Pokémon Origins' second episode, which focuses on re-telling Cubone and Marowak's subplot from the games. The chiptune background music of Lavender Town in Pokémon Red, Blue, Green and Yellow versions has garnered much interest due to some listeners finding it unsettling. The town's theme uses many sharp, atonal notes, which creates an eerie atmosphere. In Pokémon Gold, Silver and Crystal versions (and in their remakes Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver), the Lavender Town theme music was recomposed into a happier tone as, per the game's storyline, the Pokémon Tower was demolished and replaced with the Kanto Radio Tower. It was later remixed again for Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee!, and was re-recorded as "Lavender Night" for the Pokémon Go Halloween events in 2017. Lavender Town's theme was later used in the song "Ghost Dive" by Polkadot Stingray as part of Project Voltage, a collaboration between Pokémon and Vocaloid that took place starting in 2023. Lavender Town Syndrome creepypastas In the early 2010s, an urban legend claimed that hundreds of Japanese children had committed suicide in the 1990s as a result of the music in the game, speculating that binaural beats and high-pitched tones only audible to children caused headaches and erratic behavior that led to their deaths, with other "recorded" side effects including insomnia, violent behavior, and brain hemorrhaging. It has been said that the western releases of Red and Blue were edited to exclude these high frequencies. A fabricated illness was dubbed "Lavender Town Syndrome", also abbreviated as "LTS", (with the phenomenon also being referred to as "Lavender Town Tone", "Lavender Town Conspiracy", and "Lavender Town Suicides") and the original story went viral after a creepypasta version of the story was spread on websites such as 4chan. Various people have added details to make the story more convincing over time, such as photoshopping images of ghosts and the Pokémon Unown (a species of Pokémon resembling the alphabet, which are used to spell "leave now") into spectrogram outputs of the Lavender Town music. Certain versions claim that the games’ director, Satoshi Tajiri, wanted the tone in the game to "annoy" children instead of cause harm. Other creepypastas carried links to the Lavender Town Syndrome. The creepypasta "Lavender Town and Pokémon 731" linked the Syndrome to a Pokémon programmer attempting to brainwash children for military purposes, only for the process to fail, resulting in the children's suicides. It also featured an unofficial Pokémon species titled "Pokémon 731," which appeared in corrupted cartridges of the games. Pokémon 731 would later go on to inspire other fan creations associated with Lavender Town. Examples included the Buried Alive, a half-buried zombie that was supposedly a scrapped "final challenge" for the Pokémon Tower area, the White Hand, a highly detailed, decaying hand that would cause those who viewed it to become violently ill, and the GIF animation Haunting.swf. These were meant to be representative of 731, and some later creepypastas would merge the three together into a single story. Other creepypastas gave varying fictitious accounts about the Syndrome, with one linking it to Satoshi Tajiri's childhood traumas, while another depicted a composer attempting to recreate the "original" Lavender Town melody and dying after completing it. The spread of Lavender Town Syndrome is believed to be due to its association with the Dennō Senshi Porygon incident. The episode resulted in many children across Japan suffering from seizures, and its correlation with Lavender Town Syndrome's events being considered to have provided "grounding" for the creepypasta. Patricia Hernandez of Kotaku also stated that the incident supposedly taking place in Japan would have required a proficiency in Japanese to fact-check, resulting in the incident being hard to verify and thus more realistic. The paper "'Lavender Town Syndrome' Creepypasta: A Rational Narration of the Supernatural" described the creepypastas as being used to re-enchant the games for older fans of the series who had grown up on the original games; it felt as though the corruption of this childhood aspect was used in order to convey an element of horror in the story. The various creepypastas' attempts to rationalize their supernatural phenomenon via the usage of a mix of fake and real documentation was additionally stated to add a layer of realism to the stories, making them more convincing and engaging for those interacting with the stories, while also building the creepypastas' mythical aspects. Mark Hill of Kill Screen additionally stated that the ability for fans of the creepypastas to be able to add their own variations to the tale aided in its spread, as it allowed the story to be retold in a variety of different fashions. Reception Den of Geek writer Aaron Greenbaum wrote that Lavender Town proved to be highly memorable, stating that the unsettling atmosphere and theme music of the area helped ideas such as creepypastas involving the area flourish and embed themselves in the minds of players. Patricia Hernandez of Kotaku stated the creepypastas related to Lavender Town worked primarily because of the Lavender Town theme already being a theme that elicits an uneasy feeling in listeners. She stated that while Lavender Town's various unique aspects— such as the burial grounds, possessed trainers, and the revelation that Pokémon could die— were unsettling and memorable on their own, she found that these aspects, in conjunction with the real-world feasibility of the creepypastas, allowed them to take on a strong following. The story involving the ghost of the Marowak in Lavender Tower has been praised. TheGamer's Stacey Henley highlighted the story as one of the Pokémon franchise's strongest and earliest narratives, though felt later references that implied this story affected all members of the Cubone and Marowak species diluted its narrative impact. Cian Maher of Bloody Disgusting highlighted the expanded emphasis of the story in Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Let's Go, Eevee!, praising the focus on Cubone's plot and the resolution with its mother. He stated that the shift in focus from horror to the storytelling helped make Cubone, normally considered a "scary" element of the franchise, have an investing and engaging storyline. While Maher found Lavender Town's horror to mostly subdued in the games, he felt that the replacement of the horror with the Cubone story helped tell "a cathartic tale telling the story of the bond shared between parent and child," with the aspects of horror from the original games being "flipped on their head." The book Death, Culture, & Leisure: Playing Dead analyzed this storyline for its depiction of ghosts, describing how the contact involved with talking to ghosts was capable of bringing healing for both parties in the story. They highlighted how it showed the dead not as "inanimate or hostile bodies," but as separate beings with their own agency still remaining from when they were alive. They described the event as being an emotional high point in the game. References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Room_Curse] | [TOKENS: 492] |
Contents Red Room Curse The Red Room Curse (Japanese: 赤い部屋, Hepburn: Akai heya) is an early Japanese Internet urban legend about a red pop-up ad which announces the forthcoming death of the person who encounters it on their computer screen. It may have its origin in an Adobe Flash horror animation of the late 1990s that tells the story of the legend. Legend While browsing the Internet, the victim will be presented with a red pop-up with text saying "Do you like | ?" (Japanese: あなたは～好きですか?, romanized: Anata wa ~ sukidesuka?). The pop-up will reappear after trying to close it, with text coming out of the vertical line. Over time, the sentence will be completed, reading "Do you like the red room?" (Japanese: あなたは赤い部屋が好きですか?, romanized: Anata wa akai heya ga sukidesuka?). Variations of the legend differ on what happens next. According to the most common one, the screen will turn red, displaying a list of names of the Red Room's victims. The target will sense a mysterious presence behind them, after which they will lose consciousness. They will later be found dead in their home, with the walls of the room in which they are discovered "painted red with blood". A lesser known variation states that the target will instead have a crack appear somewhere on their body which quickly grows in size, splitting them apart. Origin and spread In the late 1990s, a Japanese interactive Adobe Flash horror animation, considered to be the origin of the Red Room Curse urban legend, was uploaded to GeoCities. It told the story of a young boy who was cursed and died after seeing the pop-up. The legend of the curse gained notoriety in 2004 due to the Sasebo slashing – the murder of a 12-year-old schoolgirl by an 11-year-old classmate referred to as "Girl A" at an elementary school in Sasebo. "Girl A" was reported to be a fan of the Red Room Curse animation, having the video bookmarked on her computer at the time of the murder. The webpage in question is no longer live. A short film titled The Red Room Curse inspired by the urban legend was released in 2016. See also References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yamashita%27s_gold] | [TOKENS: 2215] |
Contents Yamashita's gold Yamashita's gold, also referred to as the Yamashita treasure, is the name given to the alleged war loot stolen in Southeast Asia by Imperial Japanese forces during World War II and supposedly hidden in caves, tunnels, or underground complexes in different cities in the Philippines. It was named after the Japanese general Tomoyuki Yamashita, dubbed as "The Tiger of Malaya", who conquered Malaya within 70 days from the British. Though there are accounts that claim the treasure remains hidden in the Philippines and have lured treasure hunters from around the world for over 50 years, its existence has been dismissed by most experts. The rumored treasure was the subject of a complex lawsuit that was filed in a Hawaiian state court in 1988 involving a Filipino treasure hunter, Rogelio Roxas, and the former Philippine president, Ferdinand Marcos. Looting of gold Prominent among those who have argued for the existence of Yamashita's gold are Sterling Seagrave and his wife Peggy, who wrote two books related to the subject: The Yamato Dynasty: The Secret History of Japan's Imperial Family (2000) and Gold Warriors: America's Secret Recovery of Yamashita's Gold (2003). The Seagraves contend that looting, including more than 6000 tonnes of gold, was organized on a massive scale, by both yakuza gangsters such as Yoshio Kodama, and the highest levels of Japanese society, including Emperor Hirohito. The Japanese government intended that loot from Southeast Asia would finance Japan's war effort. The Seagraves allege that Hirohito appointed his brother, Prince Yasuhito Chichibu, to head a secret organization named Kin no yuri (金の百合; "Golden Lily"), after a poem that the Emperor had written. It is purported that many of those who knew the locations of the loot were killed during the war, or later tried by the Allies for war crimes and executed or incarcerated. Yamashita himself was convicted of war crimes and executed by the United States Army on February 23, 1946, in Los Baños, Laguna, the Philippines. According to the Seagraves, numerous Golden Lily vaults were found by Edward Lansdale and Severino Garcia Diaz Santa Romana[a] in caves north of Manila in the high valleys and the 'M-Fund [ja]', which was named after Major General William Marquat, was established from Santa Romana and Lansdale's work.[b] Sterling Seagrave alleged that Santa Romana (Santy) tortured Yamashita's driver Major Kojima Kashii to obtain the probable locations of the loot.[citation needed] The Seagraves wrote that Lansdale flew to Tokyo and briefed MacArthur and his Chief of Intelligence Charles Willoughby, later flew to the United States to brief Clark Clifford and returned with Robert Anderson to inspect several caves in the Philippines with Douglas MacArthur. More than 170 tunnels and caves were found. Ray Cline believes that both Robert Anderson and Paul Helliwell created 176 "black gold" banking accounts in 42 countries after moving the loot by ship to support future United States operations.[citation needed][c] The stolen property reportedly included many different kinds of valuables looted from banks, depositories, other commercial premises, museums, private homes, and religious buildings. It takes its name from General Tomoyuki Yamashita, who assumed command of the Japanese forces in the Philippines in 1944. According to various accounts, the loot was initially concentrated in Singapore, and later transported to the Philippines. The Japanese hoped to ship the treasure from the Philippines to the Japanese Home Islands after the war ended. As the War in the Pacific progressed, United States Navy submarines and Allied warplanes inflicted increasingly heavy sinkings of Japanese merchant shipping. Some of the ships carrying the war booty back to Japan were sunk in combat. The Seagraves and a few others have claimed that American military intelligence operatives located much of the loot; they colluded with Hirohito and other senior Japanese figures to conceal its existence, and they used it as "Black Gold" to finance American covert intelligence operations around the world during the Cold War. These rumors have inspired many hopeful treasure hunters, but most experts and Filipino historians say there is no credible evidence behind these claims. In 1992, Imelda Marcos claimed without evidence that Yamashita's gold accounted for the bulk of the wealth of her husband, Ferdinand. Many individuals and consortia, both Philippine and foreign, continue to search for treasure sites. A number of accidental deaths, injuries and financial losses incurred by treasure hunters have been reported. The National Museum of the Philippines is responsible for the issuance of treasure hunting permits and licenses. Treasure skeptics Ricardo Trota Jose, history professor from the University of the Philippines, has questioned the theory that treasure from mainland Southeast Asia was transported to the Philippines: "By 1943 the Japanese were no longer in control of the seas... It doesn't make sense to bring in something that valuable here when you know it's going to be lost to the Americans anyway. The more rational thing would have been to send it to Taiwan or China." Philippines National Historical Institute chairman and historian Ambeth Ocampo commented: "Two of the wealth myths I usually encounter are the Yamashita treasure and gossip that the Cojuangco fortune was founded on a bag of money..." Ocampo also said: "For the past 50 years, many people, both Filipinos and foreigners, have spent their time, money and energy in search of Yamashita's elusive treasure." Professor Ocampo noted "What makes me wonder is that for the past 50 years, despite all the treasure hunters, their maps, oral testimony and sophisticated metal detectors, nobody has found a thing." Rogelio Roxas lawsuit In March 1988, a Filipino treasure hunter named Rogelio Roxas filed a lawsuit in the state of Hawaii against the former president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos, and his wife Imelda for theft and human rights abuses. Roxas claimed that in Baguio in 1961 he met the son of a former member of the Japanese army who mapped for him the location of the legendary Yamashita Treasure. Roxas claimed a second man, who served as Yamashita's interpreter during World War II, told him of visiting an underground chamber where stores of gold and silver were kept, and who told of a golden buddha kept at a convent located near the underground chambers. Roxas claimed that within the next few years he formed a group to search for the treasure, and obtained a permit for the purpose from a relative of Ferdinand, Judge Pio Marcos. In 1971, Roxas claimed, he and his group uncovered an enclosed chamber on state lands near Baguio where he found bayonets, samurai swords, radios, and skeletal remains dressed in a Japanese military uniform. Also found in the chamber, Roxas claimed, were a 3-foot-high (0.91 m) golden-colored Buddha and numerous stacked crates which filled an area approximately 6 feet x 6 feet x 35 feet. He claimed he opened just one of the boxes, and found it packed with gold bullion. He said he took from the chamber the golden Buddha, which he estimated to weigh 1,000 kilograms, and one box with twenty-four gold bars, and hid them in his home. He claimed he resealed the chamber for safekeeping until he could arrange the removal of the remaining boxes, which he suspected were also filled with gold bars. Roxas said he sold seven of the gold bars from the opened box, and sought potential buyers for the golden Buddha. Two individuals representing prospective buyers examined and tested the metal in the Buddha, Roxas said, and reported it was made of solid, 20-carat gold. It was soon after this, Roxas claimed, that President Ferdinand Marcos learned of Roxas' discovery and ordered him arrested, beaten, and the Buddha and remaining gold seized. Roxas alleged that in retaliation to his vocal campaign to reclaim the Buddha and the remainder of the treasure taken from him, Ferdinand continued to have Roxas threatened, beaten, and eventually incarcerated for over a year. Following his release, Roxas put his claims against Marcos on hold until Ferdinand lost the presidency in 1986. But in 1988, Roxas and the Golden Budha Corporation, which now held the ownership rights to the treasure Roxas claims was stolen from him, filed suit against Ferdinand and wife Imelda in a Hawaiian state court seeking damages for the theft and the surrounding human rights abuses committed against Roxas. Roxas died on the eve of trial, but prior to his death he gave the deposition testimony that would be later used in evidence. In 1996, the Roxas estate and the Golden Budha Corporation received what was then-largest judgment ever awarded in history, $22 billion, which with interest increased to $40.5 billion. In 1998, the Hawaii Supreme Court held that there was sufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that Roxas found the treasure and that Marcos converted it. However, the court reversed the damage award, holding that the $22 billion award of damages for the chamber full of gold was too speculative, as there was no evidence of quantity or quality, and ordered a new hearing on the value of the golden Buddha and 17 bars of gold only. After several more years of legal proceedings, the Golden Budha Corporation obtained a final judgment against Imelda Marcos to the extent of her interest in the Marcos estate in the principal amount of $13,275,848.37 and Roxas' estate obtained a $6 million judgment on the claim for human right abuse. The jury in this lawsuit ultimately concluded that Roxas found a treasure, and although the Hawaiian state court was not required to determine whether this particular treasure was the legendary Yamashita's gold, the testimony relied upon by the court in reaching its conclusion pointed in that direction. Roxas was allegedly following a map from the son of a Japanese soldier; Roxas allegedly relied on tips provided from Yamashita's interpreter; and Roxas allegedly found samurai swords and the skeletons of dead Japanese soldiers in the treasure chamber. All this led the United States Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal to summarize the allegations leading to Roxas' final judgment as follows: "The Yamashita Treasure was found by Roxas and stolen from Roxas by Marcos's men." Events surrounding the excavation In December 1969, rumors spread that gold bars had been found in the mountains about 40km away from Manila. In June 2018, local police arrested 17 people, including 4 Japanese, including a 15-year-old boy, and 13 Filipinos, for illegal mining on Capones Island for treasure.[citation needed] In popular culture See also Notes References Sources |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biringan] | [TOKENS: 670] |
Contents Biringan Biringan is a mythical city said to lie invisibly between the municipalities of Gandara and Pagsanghan in the province of Samar, Philippines. Described as ultramodern, engkantos ("enchanted beings") populate the city. Seven portals are said to be scattered across Samar. A few of people have claimed to have seen the city, with folk stories stating that the witnesses have been the victims of demon possessions. There was a legend that a satellite image showed large gold deposits in the alleged area near Biringan, leading the Japanese to create mining efforts in the area which led to accidents. Biringan is well-known over Samar with numerous movies based around the mythical city. Legend The ultramodern city is said to be located in the province of Samar specifically near Gandara and Pagsanghan. According to the local folklore, the population of Biringan comprises supernatural beings: the engkanto ("enchanted beings"), and their progeny with humans. The engkanto are described as shapeshifters who can adopt human form. In human form, they are identified by the absence of a philtrum. The name itself, Biringan, originates from "Hanapán ng mga nawáwalâ" (transl. The place where the lost are found) in the local Waray language. The city is also alleged to contain gold. According to folklore, there are seven portals leading to the city that are scattered across Samar, one of which is said to be located at an old tree on the grounds of Northwest Samar State University in Calbayog. the city. Some seafarers have claimed to have seen a "dazzling city of light" on moonless nights, lasting a few minutes. According to folk stories, most of the people who claim to have seen the city have been the victims of demonic possession. History and cultural impact Folklore about the city began circulating in the 1960s as there was a legend surrounding an American shipment for expensive construction materials which was allegedly addressed to Biringan, confusing the staff. There was a legend that a Japanese company believed that there were rich deposits of gold and uranium in the area through satellite images. They began work immediately, setting up a large work site in the town of San Jorge, but accidents plagued the project from the start, forcing the company to shut down operations and abandon the project to avoid bankruptcy and cut their losses. The city was featured on the Mel & Joey talk show with a story from an alleged witness. When the internet became popular, the myth spread there as people who claimed to be from Biringan commented in posts related to the mythical city. The 2009 Filipino supernatural horror film T2, directed by Samar native Chito S. Roño, is loosely based on the legend of Biringan. The 2018 Filipino film Gusto Kita With All My Hypothalamus by Dwein Baltazar discusses a person attempting to walk to Biringan in search of his mother. Swipe Right To Disappear, a film discussing Biringan from Cebu was featured in the 2019 Metro Manila Film Festival. An upcoming film about Biringan was also announced by Mentorque Productions in 2024. See also References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Loyon] | [TOKENS: 428] |
Contents Le Loyon Le Loyon, also known as the Ghost of Maules, is an urban legend concerning a supposed humanoid figure that was said to roam the forest near the village of Maules (Sâles), Switzerland. Le Loyon was described as a tall humanoid creature dressed in a military or camouflage boilersuit, a cloak and a gas mask which covers its entire head. Appearance Supposed eye-witnesses described Le Loyon as a tall humanoid figure standing at around 190 centimeters (6'3") tall. It wears a dark (black or dark gray) boilersuit and covers itself with a greenish camouflage cloak. Most notably, it wears an old gas mask that covers its entire head. Sightings The first sightings of Le Loyon date back to the late 1990s or early 2000s. In one of the reported sightings, a local woman claimed to have seen Le Loyon picking flowers on the trail and was startled to be seen by her. There are several theories concerning Le Loyon's identity, for example – some claim it might be a mentally ill woman, a gigantic man, someone suffering from a skin condition, or a survivalist. In September 2013, a Swiss French-language newspaper Le Matin published the first known photograph of Le Loyon, taken by an unnamed amateur photographer. After the photo began to circulate online, Le Matin reported that Le Loyon's cloak and gas mask were supposedly found in the Maules Forest, along with a note written by Le Loyon, titled "Death Certificate and Testament of the Ghost of Maules". The note claimed that Le Loyon knew of the viral photograph, and was displeased with the unwanted attention it brought to the forest. Since then, there have been no more reported sightings of Le Loyon in the Maules Forest. One of the theories claim that the figure was an eccentric local who was afraid of being linked to Le Loyon, and abandoned their costumed walks as a result. However, the way the note was worded led some to believe that Le Loyon had died by suicide. References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_yet_it_moves] | [TOKENS: 639] |
Contents And yet it moves E pur si muove or Eppur si muove [epˈpur si ˈmwɔːve] ('And yet it moves' or 'Although it does move') is an Italian phrase commonly attributed to the Italian physicist and astronomer Galileo Galilei (1564–1642). The Catholic Church persecuted Galileo for promoting the Copernican model of the Solar System in which the Earth moves around the Sun, which contradicted Catholic orthodoxy that the Earth remained fixed in the center of the universe. According to popular legend, Galileo muttered this in 1633 after the Roman Inquisition forced him to recant his claims, though this is likely apocryphal. History According to Stephen Hawking, some historians believe this episode might have happened upon Galileo's transfer from house arrest under the watch of Archbishop Ascanio Piccolomini to "another home, in the hills above Florence". This other home was also his own, the Villa Il Gioiello, in Arcetri. The earliest biography of Galileo, written by his disciple Vincenzo Viviani in 1655–1656, does not mention this phrase, and records of his trial do not cite it. Some authors say it would have been imprudent for Galileo to have said such a thing before the Inquisition. The event was first reported in English print in 1757 by Giuseppe Baretti in his book The Italian Library:: 357 The moment he was set at liberty, he looked up to the sky and down to the ground, and, stamping with his foot, in a contemplative mood, said, Eppur si muove, that is, still it moves, meaning the Earth.: 52 The book became widely published in Querelles Littéraires in 1761. In 1911, the words E pur si muove were found on a painting which had just been acquired by an art collector, Jules van Belle, of Roeselare, Belgium. This painting is dated 1643 or 1645 (the last digit is partially obscured), within a year or two of Galileo's death. The signature is unclear but van Belle attributed it to the seventeenth century Spanish painter Bartolomé Esteban Murillo. The painting would seem to show that some variant of the Eppur si muove anecdote was in circulation immediately after his death, when many who had known him were still alive to attest to it, and that it had been circulating for over a century before it was published. However, this painting, whose whereabouts is currently unknown, was discovered to be nearly identical to one painted in 1837 by Eugene van Maldeghem, and, basing their opinions on the style, many art experts doubt that the van Belle painting was painted by Murillo, or even that it was painted before the nineteenth century. United States Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia gave an "E pur si muove" award to district court judges whose opinions were overturned by appellate courts but later vindicated by the Supreme Court. References |
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[SOURCE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Tights] | [TOKENS: 833] |
Contents White Tights White Tights, White Pantyhose or White Stockings (Russian: белые колготки, beliye kolgotki; Lithuanian: baltosios pėdkelnės; Latvian: baltās zeķbikses; Estonian: valged sukkpüksid) is a Russian urban legend about female sniper mercenaries fighting against Russian forces in various armed conflicts from the late 1980s. The legend describes these women as blond Amazon-like nationalistic biathletes turned anti-Russian mercenaries. They come predominantly from the Baltic states, but subsequent variations of the legend have diversified the ethnic composition of the snipers, including Ukrainian and Russian women in their midst. The name "White Tights" originates from the white-coloured winter sports attire these snipers were wearing and was first coined during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. Origins The phenomenon was first reported during the late 1980s, with female Baltic irregulars being rumoured fighting with the resistance in the Soviet–Afghan War. There also were legends of them participating in the Transnistria War, but Russian author Yulia Shum argues that there is no evidence for this and that these rumors appeared as a product of a propaganda campaign. It appeared first in the English-language media only in conjunction with the post-Soviet First and Second Chechen Wars. Attempts have been made to link the alleged presence of the "White Tights" in the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, not only with the special forces and intelligence services of the Baltic states, but also to the positive relations Chechen leader Dzhokhar Dudayev enjoyed with both the Government of Estonia and Lithuanian politician Vytautas Landsbergis. Sergey Yastrzhembsky, the Kremlin Press Secretary during the early phase of the Second Chechen War, argued that female Baltic snipers actually existed based on evidence from GRU military intelligence, who "don't make mistakes". The Government of Estonia has asked for the evidence behind the claims and sent diplomatic notes twice to Russia without receiving an official answer. Later conflicts In November 2008, Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Russian Prosecutor General's Investigative Committee, has suggested that mercenaries from the Baltic states were among those known to have participated on the Georgian side during the Russo-Georgian War, including a female sniper from Latvia. There were reports of snipers from other countries; these reports resurrected the rumours of "White Tights" operating in the Caucasus. A spokesman for the Latvian Ministry of Defence, Airis Rikveilis, rebutted Bastrykin's statements as follows: "We had thought that the ghost of the 'White Tights' had died in the Russian press, but now we see that it still roams Russia." On 2 May 2014, Sergey Golyandin, a correspondent of the Russian news outlet LifeNews in Ukraine, reported unconfirmed information about Baltic women snipers in action against pro-Russian forces during the siege of Sloviansk: One minute ago APCs arrived and cannon fired at the BZS checkpoint, situated between Kharkiv and Rostov. Self-defense forces had to be moved out of there. The commander of the checkpoint arrived and said that besides the APCs firing they were also shot by snipers and from what he heard the snipers were women who spoke in some Baltic language. Currently the information has not been verified, these are only words of the BZS checkpoint commander. In popular culture White Tights have also appeared in the Russian popular media, such as in Alexander Nevzorov's 1997 film Purgatory [ru]. In the film, two Lithuanian "biathletes" are portrayed as sadistic mercenary snipers fighting for the Chechen rebels. A much more sympathetic character of a Lithuanian female sniper appeared in Andrei Konchalovsky's 2002 film House of Fools, portrayed by Cecilie Thomsen. See also References |
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