In 1847, German inventor Carl Baunscheidt was sitting in his room in pain, his hand aching from arthritis. He was swatting at hungry mosquitos until he finally gave up and allowed one to bite his hand. As the wound swelled, he was surprised when felt a bit of relief.

“How, in a quite simple and natural manner, the morbid matter that may be found in the body, may be extracted from the suffering parts, and removed without the loss of blood,” Baunscheidt wrote about the experience in the 1865 edition of his book Baunscheidtism, or a new method of cure.

In other words, Baunscheidt was convinced that the bite, or “artificial pore,” allowed the pain and poisons in the body to leak out of the skin.  

This episode with the mosquito inspired Baunscheidt to create the Lebenswecker, or Resuscitator—a sleek ebony-wood staff with a spring that launches 30 thin, sharp needles. From the mid-19th century to well into the 20th century, people tried to cure everything from sleeplessness to yellow fever to epilepsy by puncturing different areas of the body with the homeopathic contraption. An oil, called Oleum Baunscheidt, was slathered over the small welts, creating blisters and pustules like fake insect bites.

“If you created these blisters and they oozed, then that oozing would be sickness coming out of your body,” says Kelsi Evans, an archivist at the University of California, San Francisco Library who came across a Resuscitator kit in the over 1,000-piece collection.

Baunscheidt had no professional medical training, yet he invented an assortment of medical devices. He built a smallpox vaccinator, a breast pump, and a bloodletting device called the Artificial Leech (a thin device that used the same mechanics of the Resuscitator with only one needle). But Baunscheidt’s fame and fortune came after he released the Resuscitator in 1848.

To support the use of his device, he developed an alternative medical practice he called Baunscheidtism, a form of homeopathy heavily influenced by the ancient Greek theory that the body is controlled by the four humors: black bile, yellow bile, phlegm, and blood. Many people and practitioners during Baunscheidt’s time believed that an imbalance of the four humors caused illness—an idea that allowed the technique of bloodletting to persist for thousands of years.

However, bloodletting was beginning to decline in popularity, and patients were not satisfied with the results of internal medicines and remedies, Baunscheidt wrote in his book. He reasoned that removing the “disease-producing substances” through stab wounds was a more direct, simple, and controlled treatment option.

Baunscheidt based his treatment on this balance and imbalance of secretions and liquids in the body, explains Evans. “The idea is basically using the pain from the device to distract and send your body’s illness to a location, or a concentrated space.”

Baunscheidt’s original Lebenswecker, which literally means “life awakener,” is a simple device. On one end of the staff, there is a loose, moveable piece connected to a tightly coiled metal spring. This controls the needles sheathed inside the barrel-shaped container. An operator pulls back the small handle about two inches to retract the needles and then releases to snap them forward and pierce the skin.

The Resuscitator was often sold in an $8.00 kit with Baunscheidt’s booklet and the bottle of the blister-causing oil. The Oleum Baunscheidt kept the wound open longer, allowing more rapid removal of the “evil” in the body, Baunscheidt explained. Immediately after being punctured by the Resuscitator, the oil was rubbed on with “a chicken feather or small pencil.” Within four to six minutes, the skin would alight with “an eruption resembling millet seeds,” patients feeling a “curious crawling sensation,” he wrote.   

For a more concentrated experience, users would dip the needles in the oil prior to application to receive an experience “kind of like an injection,” says Evans.

Baunscheidt declared that all ailments could be treated with the Resuscitator. For a toothache, one should pierce the nape of the neck, between shoulder blades, behind the ear, and on the side of the head where the toothache is found. Sleeplessness and baldness calls for punctures down the spinal column, while asthma requires application on the chest and ribs. Those with measles, influenza, or relapsed itch apply the Resuscitator over the entire posterior of the body and the abdomen.

While Baunscheidt provides suggestions for many diseases, testimonies reveal that users would experimentally stab themselves on all areas of the body until they felt a result. “People who were writing to him were trying it for all kinds of things,” Evans says. “There is a woman in here writing about her cramps, so she applied [the punctures] around her abdomen where the pain is.”

One patient, C.A. Munk from Fostoria, Ohio, wrote: “I have applied the Resuscitator to my little daughter, who has been almost entirely deprived of hearing; and with the happiest results. She now hears very well again. I have also used it three times already, in cases of throat-diseases, with excellent effect. In cases of headache it produced good results.”

By 1854, the Resuscitator was widely popular. It was a common item in Germany and the United States, and testimonies reveal that there were Resuscitator users in Canada, Scotland, Chile, and Italy.

Competitors and profiteers made imitations of both the device and the oil. Baunscheidt was extremely protective over the recipe of the Oleum Baunscheidt, and kept it a secret. While the original contents remain unknown, today the oil is described as toxic.

Around the mid-1900s, the Resuscitator craze began to dwindle. German editions of Baunscheidt’s booklet were published until the 1940s, but foreign copies tapered off drastically. Today, Baunscheidt’s practice and the Resuscitator are widely discredited. Physiologically, there is nothing that ties stabbing the skin and forming a blister with healing any kind of illness, explains Evans.  

Yet Baunscheidt’s Resuscitator is a unique device that differs from the many bloodletting and homeopathic contraptions invented during the 1800s. “The Lebenswecker is an interesting tool because it looks like a bloodletting tool, but it’s in fact not really tied with the blood,” Evans says. “It’s tied more with this morbid matter, the idea that the blisters are going to release the sickness rather than blood.”

Behold, the mottled brown, menacing monkey slug. During the fall months, this carpeted creature writhes, wriggles, and inches across apple trees, birches, chestnut, hickories, oaks, and… mailboxes.

In the clip above, a monkey slug, species Phobetron pithecium, is captured in action. Set to dramatic horror music, its body slowly shimmies across the grey metal ridges of a mailbox like a little ball of beige fluff.

The monkey slug is a species of legless caterpillar, but you would not want this larva to crawl across your fingers: the thick fuzz covering the sharp angled spines contain stinging hairs. While some people have willingly touched the monkey slug to see how painful its sting is, you probably shouldn’t pick one up, especially if you have sensitive skin.

Found from New England to Mississippi and Arkansas, these critters can grow to an inch long, shedding their carpet skin as their bodies enlarge. It’s hard to imagine now, but eventually this slug will become an ochre-winged hag moth (although the dark black body and veined wings may still give you the chills).

Beneath all the fuzz and vicious-looking spines is something that appears much more alien. At the 1:13-minute mark, the videographer bravely flips over the monkey slug, revealing the undulating tentacles of its yellow, translucent legless body.

Perhaps the only animal courageous enough to challenge a monkey slug is another monkey slug. Watch this face-off posted by The Caterpillar Lab:

Every day we track down a Video Wonder: an audiovisual offering that delights, inspires, and entertains. Have you encountered a video we should feature? Email ella@atlasobscura.com.

Stuffing things in one's coat is a classic and time-honored method of theft, often perpetrated by children stealing gum and baseball cards. But have a look at this gentleman, who police in Great Britain allege, got a little more ambitious on Sunday, stuffing a Venetian blind into his coat and walking out of a home furnishings store in Northampton, England. 

It was pretty subtle and wasn't noticed by anyone.

Just kidding. Staff at the store gave chase, but the thief dropped the blind and escaped. 

No humans were injured in the alleged theft. "The blind was damaged as a result," stated police.

If you know this man or are this man, Northamptonshire police are interested in speaking to you. And maybe also having a laugh.

In 1992 a bomb exploded in the City of London along St. Mary Axe, destroying the Baltic Exchange, a historic trading center for the maritime markets. In 1995, as the site was being cleared for new construction, an archeological investigation discovered the remains of a young girl estimated to be 1,600 years old, from a time when the City of London was the Roman settlement of Londinium.

The girl’s remains were carefully removed to the Museum of London, where she bided her time as redevelopment plans for the site struggled through fits and starts. It took another nine years, but finally 30 St. Mary Axe opened in 2004, quickly earning the nickname “the Gherkin.”

For three more years the girl waited patiently at the museum, until April of 2007 when she was returned to her Londinium resting place. Rather than have her languish in a dusty storeroom, the developers of the Gherkin requested the she be reburied on site, and there was a service at St. Botolphs Church in Aldgate. A procession through the city streets followed, and a celebration with musicians approximating ancient Roman tunes. The Lord Mayoress of the City of London was there to spread rose petals on the grave site, marked with a marble slab decorated with a laurel wreath.

There was a dedication of a simple memorial set into the marble benches along Bury Street. The inscription reads, in both English and Latin: “To the spirits of the dead / the unknown young girl / from Roman London / lies buried here.”

She was a teenager at the time she died, somewhere between 13 and 17 years old. With the benefit of carbon dating and identifying some shards and pieces of pottery at the site, it’s estimated that she died sometime between 350 and 400 AD.

There is no way to know who she was—whether she was Roman, a Briton, or someone from the empire's fringes. But every day the workers in London’s financial district rush and hustle past one of the city’s earliest inhabitants, memorialized by some of the city’s latest.

Sitting unnoticed on the streets of Wilmington, Delaware is a bland, two-story office building called the Corporation Trust Center, a name that is quite unfitting considering that what happens behind its glass doors are some of the least trustworthy corporate activities on the planet.

1209 North Orange Street is the legal address of a whopping 285,000 American businesses, as of 2012, making the little Corporation Trust Center the largest corporate facility in the world by number of firms. As the registered home of Google, Apple, Walmart, American Airlines, J.P. Morgan Chase, and Coca-Cola, the center is home to more businesses than there are people in Wilmington.

What draws companies to the Corporation Trust Center is not its drab, yellow brick exterior, but rather the Delaware General Corporation Law (DGCL), often referred to as the single most important corporate jurisdiction since the beginning of the 20th century. The DGCL allows corporations based in other states to file their taxes in Delaware, which has a unusually low corporate tax rate, saving companies billions in taxes.

The DGCL is so lucrative for businesses that over 300 of the Fortune 500 companies are incorporated in Delaware. It's so corporate friendly, in fact, that every year, 15% of all public corporations in the United States use the exact same building as their tax haven. These hundreds of thousands of tax-avoiding businesses include firms under the names of the two 2016 presidential candidates. Hillary Clinton—who has spoken adamantly in favor of cracking down on corporate tax havens—has received $16 million in public speaking fees and book royalties and an established firm called ZFS Holdings LLC at the Orange Street address. Republican nominee Donald Trump's Trump International Management Corp. and multiple companies associated with Trump's Manhattan condos dodge taxes through the exact same address.

It was 1999, and the middle of the week in the sparsely populated desert state of Western Australia, when a man known only as Peter made a phone call to Australian UFO Registry. He was alarmed—after all, he was seeing “tonnes of white threads” floating down from the sky, covering paddocks, trees and power lines as far as he could see.

But what was it?

Peter didn’t know. When he collected some of the material, he noted that it wasn’t “cotton, nor sticky, nor web.” It was an instance of what is known as “angel hair”.

In the 1960s, the United States Air Force funded an investigation into UFO phenomena in response to public pressure. The resulting Condon Report, published in 1968, examined angel hair under the auspices of “Materials allegedly deposited by UFOs,” and defined it as “a fibrous material which falls in large quantities, but is unstable and disintegrates and vanishes soon after falling.” The report concluded that, in several of the cases examined, “the composition or origin of the ‘angels hair’ is uncertain.”

The mystery didn’t last long in Peter’s particular case, however. A few days after his call, a local entomologist reported to the area newspaper, the Esperance Express, that his car was covered with hundreds of baby spiders. He explained that the white thread, or angel hair, was the result of spiders flying through the air.

This phenomenon is known as ballooning. And is “very common” among small spiders, Macquarie University’s Professor Marie Herberstein says, “as a way to disperse from where they hatched from the cocoon.” 

“The animal lifts its abdomen and extrudes a piece of silk (still connected to the spinneret),” she explains, “and eventually the wind catches the silk and lifts the spidering off carrying it away. Sometimes the spidering can cocoon over kilometres.” It’s particularly common in Australia, where several native species of spiders are known to balloon.

Case closed on angel hair? Not so fast, say ufologists and conspiracy experts, many of whom contend that the threads have extra-terrestrial associations. Cases of the falling thread are neither historically nor geographically isolated. In 1561, when there were reports of a “celestial phenomenon” in Nuremberg, angel hair was one aspect of the occurrence. And UFO reports often accompany instances of the falling thread.

UFO researcher and pilot Brian Boldman conducted a major review of angel hair in 2001, citing the existence of 225 cases of angel hair between 679 AD and 2001. Boldman’s contention is that while some cases of angel hair may be due to spiders, others are potentially extra-terrestrial events. He bases this argument on the fact that, according to his research, “Fifty-seven percent of angel-hair cases involve UFO reports, a significant number, which strongly links the two phenomena.”

While Boldman doesn’t explain how angel hair may relate to the UFOs, other ufologists have attempted to explain their relationship. These paranormal experts argue that angel hair is ionized air sleeting off an electromagnetic field created by a UFO.  

It’s worth noting however that not all ufologists agree. Alejandro Rojas, the Director of Operations at the UFO investigation site Open Minds, says that “I have not seen a case that I feel strongly demonstrates angel hair as something unknown.” He cites spiders as a common cause. 

Tasmania floods: Ballooning spiders fleeing soaked ground find refuge in treetopshttps://t.co/NtRzlagABCpic.twitter.com/biL86WZWMf

— ABC News (@abcnews) June 8, 2016

The problem with conclusively arguing where all angel hair comes from—or what it is—is that the substance tends to disappear soon after forming. This means that in some cases everyone from scientists to conspiracy theorists have to take the word of those who witness it. Of course, scientists can prove that spiders are the root of many a case, but conspiracy theorists point to the fact that the substance isn’t always the same.

In 1950s France, angel hair was described as “great flakes,” while in 21st century Australia, angel hair was encountered as a silky blanket. Adding to the abundance of theories around the hair is that many historical incidents were only briefly reported, making them ripe for modern speculation. It is worth noting, however, that the “vanishing” quality of angel hair is consistent with the spider explanation. As Professor Herberstein explains, “the silk does not dissolve, but just breaks into smaller pieces until we no longer recognize it as pieces of silk.”

Nonetheless, the lack of clear testing of many of the cases has meant conspiracy theories have flourished. For some, angel hair is proof of chem-trails. This claim is bolstered by  test results of the hair, which have sometimes shown traces of metals. As one commenter, ‘Wayne’ writes on the website Geoengineering Watch, “The next time you see these in your yard get a sample and go have it tested. The test results will show metallic and not a spider web trail which is made from a completely different material … The truth is scarier than fiction.”

Not everyone is quite so dramatic, with many acknowledging most incidents may in fact be “just” flying spiders. Secret government plot, airborne spiders, or visiting aliens? One thing’s for sure—angel hair is more than a little freaky.

Grab your Pilgrim hat and buckle your shoes—the story of the remains of Myles Standish is a saga that spans nearly three centuries.  

Myles Standish was a passenger on the Mayflower when it sailed to Plymouth in 1620, but at 36 years old, with his auburn locks and hair-trigger temper, he was no Pilgrim. He was hired by the more pious passengers to be their military commander, a position he held until retirement to the new town of Duxbury, ten miles up the coast.

Standish lived out the rest of his life here, and in 1656 was buried—somewhere—and he quietly slipped away from most people’s minds for the next 200 years. It took a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow to make the once-fiery redhead hot again, with “The Courtship of Miles Standish.” When the poem was published in 1858, the love triangle of Standish, John Alden and Priscilla Mullins helped to reignite a public passion for the early colonial days.

In the late 19^th century, the town of Duxbury wanted to find their favorite son, but by then the old burial ground had been nearly abandoned, alternately overgrown by brambles and trampled by wandering cows. It was known that Standish and the Aldens were buried there (Priscilla had made her choice in the poem, and it wasn’t poor Myles), but with no good records to say where exactly, it took some digging. Literally.

A spot marked with two sharply pointed stones was eyed as a likely candidate, and in 1889 out came the shovels. Two bodies were found, but their identities were inconclusive. Two years later a second attempt discovered three bodies: an older man between two young women. Local historians knew that the Standish will had instructed for a burial between his daughter and daughter-in-law, so the arrangement of the bodies was taken as proof: here lies the body of Myles Standish. In 1893 a memorial was constructed to mark the spot.

All seemed quiet and settled—until 1931. After the 1891 exhumation, Standish had been placed in a plain pine box for re-interment, a grave error in the eyes of the town selectmen and Standish family ancestors. They dug again, and this time placed the remains in a sealed copper coffin within a solid concrete vault.

Four burials, four cannons, a Longfellow poem… and one epic graveyard tale.

Hannibal, Missouri, a town of 18,000 on the banks of the Mississippi River, has one claim to fame—it’s Mark Twain’s birthplace—and claim that fame it does. On the drive from St. Louis, billboards advertising the Mark Twain cave—the cave that was featured in five of Twain’s books, including The Adventures of Tom Sawyer—begin appearing at least 50 miles outside town. When you enter Hannibal, the town is thick with Twain sites and Twain references — the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum, the Mark Twain Hotel, the Mark Twain Memorial Lighthouse, and even the Mark Twain Dinette.

But perhaps the strangest embodiment of this literary destination is a contest called the Tom and Becky program. 

Hannibal’s quaint main street is lined with historic buildings repainted in bright, joyful colors. The storefronts are filled with antique shops, gift shops, and ice cream parlors (with a generous sprinkling of “shoppes” and “ye oldes” in their titles, of course). On any given Saturday morning, you might see a 12 year-old boy and a 12 year-old girl strolling together down the street. He’s got a straw hat and a fishing pole in hand; she’s got white gloves and a slate board that says “I Love You” on it. They glance in shop windows, they gaze out at the river, they smile and wave, they stop in to Java Jive (the first coffee shop west of the Mississippi River!) for a refreshing beverage.

A bleary-eyed visitor might do a double take.

“We call them goodwill ambassadors,” said Melissa Cummins, coordinator of the Tom and Becky program and marketing and community relations manager for the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum. Every year since 1956, Hannibal has named one seventh-grade boy and girl the official “Tom” and “Becky.” The Tom and Becky application process is long and demanding: it lasts from February to July and is comprised of a speech, a written test, personal interviews, costume preparation, and a two-day observation period by judges. Applicants are judged on their ability to tell Tom and Becky’s stories best, and on how well they’d do as public faces of Hannibal.

The program is billed as an opportunity for young people to develop public speaking skills and represent their community. Semifinalists are eligible to apply for a small college scholarship in their senior year of high school. Participants say it’s hard work, but it’s also fun and rewarding. Mason Latta, 14, one of this year’s Tom semifinalists, said that he’s been shy all his life, but being a Tom has turned that around. His arms, and then his legs, used to start shaking before any public speaking. “Now I’m able to talk to anybody,” he said.

Today, five boys and five girls are chosen as semifinalists. They share a demanding schedule of travel and public appearances, but one official couple is still chosen. The winners find out about their victory at the same time as the rest of the town: on stage in Hannibal’s Central Park on July 4th. “Last year’s official Becky opens an envelope containing the name of this year’s official Tom,” Cummins explained. “Then she weaves among the semifinalists with a fishing pole and plants a kiss on the official Tom’s cheek.” The same ritual is repeated for the new official Becky: the envelope, the weaving, the kiss. 

At moments like these, it feels as though, among other purposes, the Tom and Becky contest might have been intentionally designed to publicly embarrass tweens. One of the most important tasks of any Tom and Becky is to be ready to perform the engagement scene from Tom Sawyer on command. After some banter about rats and chewing gum, the two kiss and Tom says, “Now it’s all done, Becky. And always after this, you know, you ain’t ever to love anybody but me, and you ain’t ever to marry anybody but me, ever never and forever. Will you?”

“No, I’ll never love anybody but you, Tom, and I’ll never marry anybody but you—and you ain’t to ever marry anybody but me, either,” answers Becky.

Aside from the strangeness of choosing this particular scene as the most representative of the two characters, watching it feels like bearing private witness to any middle school theatre kid’s nightmare: it’s like the one scene in the play they dread, but it’s performed in isolation and in perpetuity, any time anyone ever asks them to.

If adolescent engagements and public kissing give you the heebie-jeebies, there’s also the annual Tomboy Sawyer contest. Sponsored by the Business Women of Missouri, Hannibal Club, it offers an alternative competition for girls aged 10-12 who don’t feel they fit into the Becky Thatcher image. Young girls compete in events like minnow catching, watermelon seed spitting, bubble gum blowing, and slingshot target shooting. 

But what values do Tom and Becky represent? Why are the youth of Hannibal encouraged to emulate these two characters from Mark Twain’s oeuvre? Tom Sawyer is mainly distinguished by his selfishness and immaturity and his ability to manipulate those around him. Becky Thatcher is proper and well-behaved, defined mostly in relation to Tom’s interest in her and always in need of rescuing. Huck and Jim, arguably Twain’s best characters, have stronger depth and moral fiber but exist on the margins of society—making them seem like less desirable choices, perhaps, for a program whose purpose is to build and promote Hannibal’s community. Cummins claimed that Tom and Becky are Twain’s most iconic characters, and are most reflective of Samuel Clemens himself.

Like Twain’s own work and legacy, this past is tied to issues of race, but there’s never been a black Tom or Becky, Cummins said. Although all seventh graders living in Hannibal, which is nearly 90 percent white, are personally invited by mail to apply, Cummins admitted that it’s difficult to attract non-white applicants—but she isn’t sure why.

“We took a deep look at the initial posters advertising the contest to make sure the language sounds welcoming to everyone,” she said. As a parent of two former Beckys, she believes firmly in the program’s value, emphasizing the playfulness and fun that the Tom and Becky program offers. “Kids grow up so fast these days,” said Cummins, “This is a chance for them to step back and see what childhood would have been like then.”

(Photo: Public Domain)

Although Atlas Obscura is an established authority on haunted houses, spooky graveyards, and abandoned asylums, we also have a long-running fondness for Halloween’s rounder and friendlier mainstay, the humble jack-o'-lantern. Over the years, we've come across some of the world’s most surprising pumpkins, “pumpkins,” pumpkin-throwing war machines, and pumpkin-adjacent horrors. In celebration of Traveler Beer Company's new Jack-O Traveler Pumpkin Shandy, here’s our take on the season’s favorite squash: 

1. The Yankee Siege Catapult

NEW HAMPSHIRE

(User Photo: Greg Boggis)

This pumpkin-hurling contraption sitting in a New Hampshire field was built by an entrepreneurial farmer looking to attract more customers to his vegetable stand. Inspired by the medieval trebuchet, he built an attention-grabbing siege machine of his own. Although now retired, in its glory days, the Yankee Siege catapult could toss its orange ammunition over a half mile–some strong punkin’ chunkin’ indeed.

2. Pumpkin Spring Pool

ARIZONA

(Photo: Alan English CC-ND 2.0)

This “pumpkin” is actually a limestone formation, shaped by mineral deposits that lend its distinctive color and form. Although the pool’s green water is picturesque, the rock is essentially a cauldron full of poison. The water is a noxious mix of lead, copper, and an unusually high quantity of arsenic.  

3. Clark’s Elioak Farm

MARYLAND

(Photo: Fred Schroeder CC-ND 2.0)

In 2005, the Clark family of Maryland offered their farm as a new home to the nursery rhyme and fairy tale structures from retired area amusement park The Enchanted Forest. The Enchanted Forest had been a classic roadside attraction, opening in 1955, just a month after the opening of Disneyland in California. Thanks to the Clarks, it lives on. Today, visitors can wander the grounds and come across giant mushrooms, Mother Goose, and, of course, Cinderella’s mouse-drawn pumpkin coach.

4. The Most Expensive Pumpkin Seed

ENGLAND

(Photo: Daniel Schwen CC: 3.0)

In April, a British seed company spent nearly $2,000 on a pumpkin seed. At time of sale, the seed measured nearly two inches and was believed to have a good shot at breaking the record for world’s largest pumpkin (if cultivated with proper care). The promising pre-pumpkin was delivered to a Royal Horticulture Society specialist, where it is being encouraged to reach its full potential.

5. The Original (Worst) Jack-O-Lantern

YOUR NIGHTMARES

(Photo: IrishFireside CC BY-2.0)

Hundreds of years ago, inhabitants of the British Isles etched faces onto turnips and other root vegetables to ward off evil spirits. These gnarled, genuinely frightening crafts were the original jack-o'-lanterns. Upon emigrating to the United States, Irish immigrants discovered the pumpkin, which was quickly adopted as the favored face-carving canvas. We should all feel very lucky. 

Vernon Lamme didn't quite seem the type to be an archaeologist. With his prominent chin and substantial waist, he was neither a swashbuckling, world-traveling Indiana Jones nor a meticulous, dust-covered scholar. He sometimes like to play the part of the adventurer—in pictures from the 1940s, when he was excavating burial sites at the aquatic theme park Marineland, he's wearing a pith helmet—but his territory was Florida.

He stuck to it, and it paid off: in 1935, the governor appointed him State Archaeologist, the first in Florida and one of the first anywhere in the country.

But if the position paid off, it was because Lamme made sure of it.

"He was known among archaeologists as being a shady, charlatan type character. He was a real showman. I look upon him like a P.T. Barnum," says Jeffrey M. Mitchem, an archaeologist who's researched and written about Lamme's life and career. "But maybe not as smart as that."

Today, most states have an official State Archaeologist, or someone serving in a similar role. The position began as more of an honorary role, but after Congress passed the Historical Preservation Act in 1964, new state historic preservation offices started hiring archaeologists to review development projects and help protect valuable archaeological sites.

"Just like we protect the birds and bees with environmental laws, we protect cultural resources," says Nicholas Bellatoni, Emeritus State Archaeologist in Connecticut and past president of the National Association of State Archaeologists. If state archaeologists identify archaeological sites that are potentially significant, they might recommend a development be paused while a survey is conducted. This doesn't always go over well. "Any state archaeologist is used to controversy," says Bellatoni.

But not the type of controversy that Lamme incited. In his first stint as state archaeologist, he lasted just six months—and his scandals included getting hoards of teenagers drunk.

Lamme was born in Kansas, in 1892, and when he was 20, his family moved to Florida, to stake a homesteading claim on Merritt Island, a long strip of land off the state's eastern coast, next to what's now Cape Canaveral. It was a rough set up: most of the houses were simple shacks, with hand pumps in the back, and there were no roads, schools, tools, or unemployment checks, he wrote later. There was, occasionally, "excellent wine made from grapefruit juice."

In his 20s, Lamme started working in newspapers, first as a local correspondent, and then moving to Naples to start the Transcript. In 1931, the senator from Key West promised to find him a job, and he began working for the state government as a "verifier in the Enrolling Room," where he made sure bills passed by the state senate were in the right form when they went to the governor for a signature. But he also continued submitting stories to newspapers in Key West and Fort Myers.

By 1935, he had become legislative secretary to the same senator who had originally lured him to the capital. It was from this position that he launched himself as state archaeologist. He wrote the bill that created the position and, after it passed, convinced the governor to appoint him to the office, though he had no training and little experience as an archaeologist.

In the southeastern states at the time, though, that wouldn't have been so unusual. There was little professional archaeological work being done in Florida, and enthusiastic amateurs could finagle their way into digs or make their own contributions. In the mid-1930s, though, the state was about to experience a small boom in archaeological work, funded by the federal government.

As part of the New Deal, the Civil Works Administration was launching large archaeology projects, under the supervision of the Smithsonian, in "states with mild climates and large numbers of unemployed workers," as Edwin Lyon puts it in A New Deal for Southeastern Archaeology. Whatever artifacts were found would be split between the state and federal governments. As the newly appointed State Archaeologist, Lamme would be in charge of the state's side.

"Because he was called the state archaeologist, he was supposedly involved in all these projects," says Mitchem. "Some of the other people involved in these projects, who were competent, trained people couldn’t stand him."

The problems began quickly, as Mitchem discovered while researching Lamme's life. The digs that Lamme was overseeing kept shoddy records, so that archaeologists looking at the reports he wrote can find little to elucidate what was actually found. At the site of one educational project, Lamme "bought moon-shine whiskey and lemons and succeeded in getting the crowd drunk," reported one of his enemies, J. Clarence Simpson, an employee of the Florida Geological Survey and an actual archaeologist.

Some of Lamme's young employees had "never drank whiskey before in their lives," Simpson wrote. "I feel sure that every resident of the town will recall very clearly the shameful incidents which followed." Lamme also took the government trucks provided for the work and rented them out for $8 a day, a fee which he presumably pocketed. More seriously, some of the best artifacts from the dig disappeared.

"Lamme was good friends with a major collector in Miami," says Mitchem. "Apparently he was letting this guy take some of the cream of the crop stuff that they were finding."

After six months, these transgressions lost Lamme his new position. He was suspended as State Archaeologist.

Surprisingly, this was not the end of Lamme's archaeological career. He convinced a new governor to reinstate him as state archaeologist in 1937, only to resign a few months later to begin a different government job, as a citrus fruit inspector. In 1939, he started working with Marine Studios, a SeaWorld-like park that focused on dolphins.

At the Marineland site, he started excavating mounds built by Native Americans and in 1940, in connection with this work, he got himself reappointed as State Archaeologist yet again. That same year, he was also elected Alderman for Marineland, Florida, where the park was located.

At Marineland, Lamme's love of a good story, his interest in archaeology, and his need to make a buck finally came together. "Ever the showman, he convinced the owners of Marine Studios to make him and the excavations part of the attraction itself," writes Mitchem. "This indeed proved popular." Visitors to Marineland could pay 25 extra cents to view the mounds, the excavated burial sites, and eventually the Seminole family Lamme convinced to live on site. He himself gave lectures.

After America entered World War II, though, Lamme found a better government job, as, ironically, a fraud investigator, and after the war, he went back to writing. He never stopped thinking about archaeology, though: In his book, Florida Lore Not Found in the History Books!, written later in his life, he's still trying to advance a pet theory, that Florida was once occupied by the Maya people.

"As State Archaeologist of Florida, I had the opportunity to tramp over every deer trail and cowpath in the every county of the state – and the more Indian mounds I studied the more firm was my belief that the Mayas once roamed these trails," he wrote.

Evidence? There's little. But that never concerned Lamme: he made the world what he wanted it to be.

When thinking of the origins of Vampire literature in the Western world, chances are you think of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. This chef-d'oeuvre has defined the genre ever since it was published more than a hundred years ago.

But years before Stoker was obsessively researching for his book, another vampire story was written in Ireland. Carmilla, a novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu, could be called the original vampire novel of modern Europe.  

Written in 1871, the novella is a first person account from Laura, a young English woman who falls prey to a beautiful vampire. In some detail, Laura tells us of a curious incident that brings Carmilla, a stranger, into her home.

At first, she is scared of the newcomer, who looks exactly like a specter she had seen in a nightmare when she was a child. But these feelings quickly subside and are replaced by an ardent relationship that blossoms with intensity.

In the meantime, panic arises as maidens from nearby towns are afflicted by a mysterious illness that causes their deaths. Eventually, Laura herself becomes ill, and has recurring nightmares of a giant cat that attacks her at night.

As a strange twist of fate, a general who has lost his niece to the illness comes to visit Laura's father. He is now aware of the reality of vampires, and is on the hunt for Millarca—as he knew Carmilla. When the two unexpectedly come face to face, a fight ensues and Carmilla, now exposed, flees.  

After the incident, Laura is taken back and guarded by several people. Meanwhile, her father, the general, and a vampire hunter find Carmilla’s hidden tomb, drive a stake into her heart, decapitate her, and burn her remains. Laura recovers her health, but never fully, and continues to be haunted by the memory of Carmilla for the remainder of her short life.  

Most scholars agree that Carmilla heavily influenced Dracula, as elements of the first appear in the latter, though modified or amplified. The aesthetic of the female vampire, for example, is very much the same in both stories. They have rosy cheeks, big eyes, full lips, and almost irresistible sensuality. There is also the vampire hunter who comes to the rescue and imparts his knowledge of the obscure on the confused victims. Even the narrative frame of Stoker’s masterpiece is quite similar to Le Fanu’s; first person accounts from the victims. 

But what makes Carmilla so endearing are not its similarities to other works of the genre, but its distinct differences. Most notably, the fact that the story is centered around two female characters, whose complicated relationship is colored by thinly veiled lesbian undertones.

The novella was written during the Victorian Era, a period known for its strict moral laws and sexual repression, so no wonder vampire novels rose into prominence. The premise of these novels is that even the most pure of hearts cannot resist the supernatural seduction. This idea was extremely attractive for the Victorian upper class, especially women, whose desires have always been rigidly restricted.

However, powerlessness does not mean redemption or absolution, as these powers are understood to be evil and tied to devilish forces. In almost every vampire story, the women who are preyed upon meet their deaths, unless the men in their lives come to their rescue. As such, the vampire trope simultaneously provided an outlet for repressed sexual desires and a moral lesson on the danger of succumbing to such desires.

In this sense Laura is the perfect victim of vampire literature. She is at once repulsed and drawn to the vampire, both wishes to succumb to and withdraw from her feelings for the strange and beautiful creature. And the fact that the beautiful creature is an irresistibly lovely woman only makes her feelings more confusing.

“I experienced a strange tumultuous excitement that was pleasurable, ever and anon, mingled with a vague sense of fear and disgust. [...] I was conscious of a love growing into adoration, and also of abhorrence.”

Laura isn’t alone in her feelings. While we are given to understand that most of her victims are of no importance to her, Carmilla is genuinely enamored of a few of them. She seems to have fallen for her victim.

“With gloating eyes she drew me to her, and her hot lips traveled along my cheek in kisses; and she would whisper, almost in sobs, ‘You are mine, you shall be mine, you and I are one for ever.’”

In these moments of frenzied rapture, she implies that for them to become one, Laura must die. To drink Laura’s blood was to become one with her forever. As it stands, Carmilla is the antithesis of the heteronormative and male-centered world to which vampires were constricted to after Dracula. It has inspired several remakes as well as a plethora of lesbian vampire tales, including a Canadian web series of the same name.

Given the historical context, it is not surprising that the novella did not gain much attention when it was initially written. Now that it’s been 145 years, it is time for Carmilla to rise from the grave.

For Daniel Erenberg, it’s gas masks. For John Kozik, it’s old Ouija boards. These are just some of specialties of the 18 collectors that are profiled in the new book Morbid Curiosities:Collections of the Uncommon and the Bizarre. The title is apt: these are collections of items that would make many people recoil.

However, for the collectors, whether they are drawn to taxidermy or early medical photography, the relics are as appealing as gemstones or priceless stamps. “I know the origin and pathology of all of my pieces,I know the story behind them" says collector Nicole Angemi about her collection of human and animal specimens, "I don’t just collect body parts; this is my career, my livelihood, and, of course, my passion.”

Many of the collections featured in Morbid Curiosities have not been previously made public. With detailed photographs and portraits, the book is a glimpse into whole worlds of strange and rare collections. Here is a selection of images from the book.

Between Seguin and San Antonio off Interstate 10 there is a little body of water with an unusual name, "Woman Hollering Creek." Legend has it the name came from the ghostly screeches of a forlorn woman that could be heard there late at night.

The story probably came from the the Latin American myth of La Llorona ("The Weeping Woman"). Her husband is said to have left her for another woman and in a fit of rage she drowned all of her children. Upon realizing her actions, the woman drowned herself. When she reached the Gates of Heaven, she was told she could not enter until she found all of her children. Now she is cursed to walk along the riverside for all of eternity, wailing in anguish for her babies. Further legend has it that if you get too close to the water, the hollering woman may grab you and drag you in, hoping that you are her child. 

Alternatively, some people think that it's just a creek where an upset woman used to go and holler when she was pissed at her husband. If you're down by Woman Hollering Creek and you hear a lady's spine-tingling cry, don't worry, it's probably just the wind... right?

The United States is filled with controversies, but none quite as quirky and bizarre as the debate over who holds the world record for the largest ball of twine. Both Darwin, Minnesota and Cawker City, Kansas claim to have the largest in terms of length and width, but there is one twine ball title that goes undisputed: the world's heaviest ball of twine, which can be found hidden in the middle of northern Wisconsin.

At an estimated weight of 21,280 pounds, the World's Heaviest Ball of Twine was constructed by James Frank Kotera, nicknamed "JFK." Over the past 37 years, JFK has spent tens of thousands of hours wrapping twine into a ball in an isolated house in Lake Nebagamon, Wisconsin.

Since 1979, JFK has spent three days a week working at a nearby dump and the other four days at home wrapping garbage bags full of twine in gigantic circles. In addition to the world's heaviest twine ball, JFK has also constructed "Junior", a ball made of string that weighs 47 pounds in honor of Kotera's birth year, 1947. Kotera was born on February 2nd, which inspired the self-given nickname of "Groundhog."

The few people that visit the ball of twine will be treated to a casual conversation with JFK, who will insist that he never gets tired of wrapping the twine and plans to never stop until he dies. According to JFK, he used to be a drunkard, but that all changed in 1979, when he had a conversation with God who encouraged him to stop drinking and turn to twine. Ever since this conversation, JFK's painstaking effort has given him the grounds to claim that, in terms of weight, he truly has the world's biggest balls.

Jessica Fleming was 12 years old when she met the goose who would change her life.

She was living with her parents and grandparents in a former naval ammunitions depot in the small city of Hastings, Nebraska, and she never quite knew what would be going on there when she returned from school. "I got home after a brutal day of junior high," she says. "I looked out the window, and I could see my grandpa holding a leash. So I walked out to see what he was up to, because he was always up to something."

Jessica's grandpa, Gene Fleming, was an inveterate tinkerer. He had made his fortune in manufacturing, and it was he who had transformed the ammunition depot into apartments, complete with a rec room and chicken hutches. That day in 1988, he had been visiting his sister-in-law's farm when he saw something that got his heartstrings tugging and his wheels turning: a two-year-old goose who had been born with no feet, struggling to follow his fellow geese across a gravel road.

"Because I'm a Shriner," Gene later told People magazine, "my natural instinct was to help him." First, he tried making a fowl-sized skateboard, figuring the goose the could push along with one stump while balancing on the other, but no dice. The goose was patient, though, and Gene soon hit on a solution: a pair of patent leather baby shoes, size 0 and stuffed with foam rubber. By the time Jessica got home from school, the goose was running pell-mell around the yard, tugging at the other end of the leash. Soon, they were calling him Andy.

At the time, Jessica wasn't necessarily impressed. "I was at the age of being constantly embarrassed by my family," she says. She couldn't have predicted Andy's meteoric rise and devastating fall—that the Footless Goose would become first an international superstar, then the victim of a brutal murder, then the subject of a mysterious cover-up. She couldn't have known that 25 years later, she would be the Fleming who took up the mantle, fighting through a web of mystery and intrigue to bring Andy to justice.

Andy's Rise to Fame

Twelve-year-old Jessica may have been over Andy, but Gene's friend at the Chicago Tribune, Gary Johansson, saw the goose's potential. He wrote up a few lines, and almost overnight, Andy went 1980s-viral. "We had newspapers from all over the world contacting us and wanting to do stories," says Jessica. He got on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, where he shared billing with Isabella Rossellini and Martin Short. Reader's Digest did a profile, and Peoplesplurged on a photo spread. When Nike learned that Andy preferred their brand of baby shoes, they sent him a crate, making him almost certainly the first goose to get a major sponsorship deal.

Andy's hometown was quickly enamored, too. Gene gooseproofed the passenger seat of his bright orange Triumph TR7, and he and the star toured around, putting in appearances at libraries, schools, county fairs, and parades (they particularly liked speaking and honking at disability awareness events). Tourists flocked to see the Fleming homestead, and Gene even drummed up an Andy Fan Club, which issued official certificates signed by him and his wife, Nadine. "Hastings is known now for Kool-Aid," says Fleming. "But before they really promoted that cause, it was Andy the Goose. It put the town on the map."

Even beyond the shoes, Andy was a special goose. "He was very sweet-natured," says Jessica. "Just literally a nice bird." He seemed, she says, downright grateful to her grandfather—loyal to him despite the temptations of fame, and patient when he tried to switch out his Nikes for high-tops or to see if he could ride a bicycle. When Gene picked him up, Andy would nestle into the crook of his caretaker's arm, his shoes dangling like a kid's from a high chair. "He's a one-man goose," Gene told People.

A Brutal Crime 

But it couldn't last. On October 19, 1991, Gene and Nadine got the kind of phone call every goose owner dreads. "Is Andy OK?" asked an anxious voice on the other end. A couple of Hastings residents had been out metal detecting in a local park, and had found a dead goose sporting telltale sneakers. The Flemings rushed out to the hutch. There were fresh footprints in the dirt, much bigger than size 0. Andy and his mate Paulie were nowhere to be found.

Andy's killing was national news. A story about a community that rallies around a footless goose has almost everything—add a murder mystery, and you've got a truly all-American tale. Reporters pulled no punches, veering from grisly to maudlin in mere paragraphs. "He was found in a heap, decapitated and skinned, near the town baseball diamond," wrote People, before quoting a local first-grader with spina bifida: "He was my favorite goose because he had no feet. Why'd they do it?" The case even made the tabloids. "SICKO COMMITS FOWL DEED!" screamed Weekly World News, alongside stories about penile enhancement and a woman who was convinced her Dalmatian was Clark Gable reincarnated ("I can just tell it's Clark," she said).

When it came down to it, though, Andy was a local goose. Long after the glitzy reporters left town, long after the tide of sympathy cards trickled to a stop, the people of Hastings kept pushing for answers. The Chamber of Commerce set up a reward fund, and raised somewhere around $10,000 (the previous record for a reward was $100). Reporter Ron Grossman of the Chicago Tribunereturned to the town in June of 1993 to see how everyone was getting along. He quoted sheriff Gregg Magee saying "Andy's case is still open," and promising that his department followed up on every tip. "They were still feeling the shock of a murder," Grossman remembered in an email.

A New Twist?

Gene buried Andy quietly in his backyard, the site of their first romp together. "Not long after that, he started showing signs of Alzheimer's," says Jessica. "In retrospect, I think it was Andy who had kept him here with us for a lot longer." Gene agitated for a bronze memorial, but it never came to pass—although a local granite company did donate a carved headstone, which sits at the old Fleming homestead to this day. Gene passed away in 2000, at a nursing home in Grand Island, New York. "He definitely did not get closure," Jessica says.

A few years ago, though, Jessica Fleming, now Jessica Korgie, found herself thinking more and more about Andy. She began combing through her grandparents' piles of documentation—fan mail, crime scene photos, her grandmother's meticulously kept notebooks. She called around to key players. Intriguing inconsistencies began to emerge, particularly around the case's status as "unsolved." "Some people said that the [perpetrator] was found after so many years," she says.  

A recent call to former Chamber of Commerce president Don Reynolds confirmed this: "About two years [after the murder], someone from the sheriff's department called and said, well, we found out who did it, but we can't tell you, and we don't want to have any news release about it," he said over the phone yesterday. "We didn't know what to do. finally we donated the reward to our community foundation, which used it for kids' projects." The department, he said, had told him that Andy's killer was "somebody that was not responsible"—suggesting that they were perhaps mentally disabled, or otherwise not in control of their actions. (Sheriff Magee did not respond to a request for comment.)

We can't know for sure what Andy the Goose would have wanted, but it probably wasn't to cast undue scrutiny or blame onto a disabled person. Jessica, who is working on a documentary about Andy's life and death, agrees: "I'm not interested in the name of the person anymore," she says. "I wouldn't want retribution against the person or their family."

"I just want to know why."

Naturecultures is a weekly column that explores the changing relationships between humanity and wilder things. Have something you want covered (or uncovered)? Send tips to cara@atlasobscura.com.

The so-called Dixie region of Utah was settled by Mormons at the direction of Brigham Young, who thought the region would yield a profitable cotton crop. The town of Grafton was settled a few miles south of Zion National Park on the Virgin River in 1859 by five Mormon families, but they soon had to scale back cotton production in favor of food crops. Then in 1862, the Virgin River flooded and washed away the entire town, but the tenacious settlers reestablished Grafton about a mile upstream. 

In 1866, conflicts with the Black Hawk and other native peoples led Brigham Young to call on all settlements to combine into towns of at least 150 people. Grafton was abandoned, but farmers still came to tend their crops. Two years later, settlers returned and built the adobe schoolhouse, which still stands today. The population of the Grafton shrank as young people moved away in search of new farmland or other livelihoods until it was completely abandoned again in the 20th century. 

Today Grafton is a ghost town, and one that has enjoyed a few moments in the spotlight. Several movies were shot in this abandoned frontier settlement, including several scenes from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and the 1929 film In Old Arizona, the first talkie filmed outdoors. Descendants of the people who lived here still gather for an annual reunion to keep the spirit of this frontier village alive though only four buildings and the cemetery remain. The graveyard is a picturesque reminder of the hard lives of the Old West settlers below the grand sandstone spires and blue skies of southern Utah.

It's impossible to date this tree's exact age without falling it, but dendrologists estimate this olive tree is at least 2,000 years old. It might even be the oldest in the world, though it's in competition with the Stara Maslina in Montenegro.

Another indication of the Vouves tree's age is the fact that two cemeteries from the Geometric Period (900 BC - 700 BC) were discovered nearby. Despite its ancient age, the tree continues to produce olives, Vouves' heritage product. A museum was built right next to it to celebrate the tradition of olives in Greece and the rest of the Mediterranean.

There's evidence of olive cultivation in Greece as far back as the Neolithic period. There are references to olive oil in the writings of Herodotus and Pliny the Elder as well as the Hebrew record of the Exodus from Egypt. According to ancient Greek historians, the city of Athens was named as such as an offering to the goddess Athena, in the hopes that she would continue to bless them with a bountiful olive harvest. This history, coupled with the fact that practically every Greek dish uses olive oil as a base, indicates how inextricable olives are from Greek identity.

The 15-foot-wide tree was here when both Christ and Muhammad walked the Earth, when the Bubonic Plague devastated Europe, when Beethoven composed the 5th, and everything in between. It is arguably the most important tree in Greece, and it's got the connections to prove it: laurels for the 2008 Beijing Olympics were crafted with branches from the Vouves tree.

In the Paleozoic Era, roughly 400 million years ago, Michigan wasn't the chilly northern state we know it as now. It was somewhere near the equator and it was covered in a shallow, tropical sea, complete with ancient marine life.

Now, Petoskey State Park on the shore of Lake Michigan holds some of the only reminders that the Midwestern state was once an ocean. When Earth's tectonic plates shifted and created the North American Continent out of this watery ecosystem, some of the coral life residing there came along for the ride.

The state park is named for Petoskey Stones. These are small, unremarkable rocks, only identifiable by the faint spots covering their surface. When polished though, the perfectly hexagonal pattern grows visible, revealing what they really are. These are no ordinary pebbles; they're actually the skeletons of prehistoric coral. Each of the spots was once a coral polyp. The dark centers were mouths, and the "rays" surrounding them were tentacles. Time has scrubbed them down to a rounded rock, but combing the beach for these little fossils can offer even amateurs a connection to the very, very distant past.

The walls of Eastern State Penitentiary. (Photo: David/cropped/CC BY-SA 2.0)

My manager, Joe, emerged from the darkness, surrounded by fog. His towering frame was draped in distressed coveralls, his face transformed into a horrific, demonic skull. He offered me a clementine from his pocket.

Joe’s job was to watch over the monsters of Night Watch, the very last zone within Terror Behind the Walls—the haunted house inside Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia. My job was to be a monster, at least as far as thousands of visitors were concerned.

Upon its opening in 1829, Eastern State Penitentiary became one of America's most expensive facilities. The grounds included 450 cells on 11 acres of land, with plumbing and heating—luxuries that not even the White House had at the time. Then as now, the outside of the building is a striking display of cold, gothic architecture meant to be intimidating to those who enter the property.

Walls that tower over 30 feet high and eight feet wide guard the prison, while several watchtowers line the perimeter. The blueprint of the penitentiary is relatively simple – seven original cell blocks connecting to one central point, the Rotunda. From here, guards could have a clear view down each cellblock, with 30-foot barrel vaulted hallways with windows throughout. Eventually, mirrors would be added as a security tool for the guards so they could watch their backs from the Rotunda.

An aerial illustration of Eastern State Penitentary in 1859. (Photo: Library Company of Philadelphia/Public Domain)

After the construction of the penitentiary, over 300 prisons worldwide were based on its plans. Over the next 142 years, Eastern State Penitentiary housed approximately 75,000 male and female prisoners who had been convicted of a number of crimes, some of them never making it out alive. When it closed in 1971, it had 15 cellblocks with 980 cells. In 1994, the penitentiary became an official historic site.

Eastern State Penitentiary still stands today, but it’s now surrounded by a series of shops, cafes, and bars in what has become a trendy part of Philadelphia—but don’t let this fool you. City residents have long believed the penitentiary to be haunted, with the first reports dating back to 1940. Although most of the staff at Eastern State do not believe there are spirits, there are many people who claim to have had paranormal experiences, including the gang from Travel Channels’ Ghost Adventures and SyFy’s Ghost Hunters.

With such an unnerving reputation, Eastern State turned to hosting a haunted house to raise money for repairs in 1991. In its early days, the event included short performances and accounts of prison violence. In 1995, the event was rebranded as Terror Behind the Walls and became a full-on haunted attraction. The house specialty is the startle scare, typically a fast, simple scare intended to be powerful.

One of my favorite startle scares, and where I dropped my first body (a term in the haunt industry meaning to scare someone so severely that they lose control and drop to the ground), was the Spinning Barrel. To do it, I stood inside of a metal barrel that was equipped with a sliding pocket door on either side, giving me the opportunity to pop out and startle those who entered my area. I dropped dozens of bodies, teenagers and parents alike, and even had one girl scoot away on her butt, unable to walk.

The Penitentiary in 1998. (Photo: Library of Congress/HABS PA,51-PHILA,354--163)

While a run-of-the-mill haunted house is typically held at an amusement park or cornfield, Terror Behind the Walls is held inside a place where the residue of pain, torture, and repentance is still fresh. With alleged punishments like The Water Bath, a practice in which an inmate would be dunked in a bath of water then hung from an exterior wall to freeze overnight; and The Mad Chair, where prisoners would be tightly strapped for days, sometimes until circulation stopped, making amputation necessary; it’s no wonder many people believe the building still houses tortured souls. Reports range from hearing voices to seeing faces, shadows, and even full-body apparitions.

A few years after my first visit to Eastern State, I attended an open casting call for the haunted house and later auditioned in a group. After that, I was lucky enough to secure a spot for the 2012 season. The haunt is divided up into several zones, each with their own zone manager, and a theme that changes every few years.

The entire cast and crew, totaling over 200, attends orientation in the Rotunda—a few feet away from Al Capone’s cell and the very space prison guards stood— to get a rundown of the rules and learn more about how the haunt works. We learned that above all else, we were to respect the grounds and the history of the building, and instructed to never break character unless it was an emergency.

After being assigned our zones, we were trained on several types of scares and how to perform in a way that was both frightening and fun. We learned startle and “intimidation” scares, how to “scare forward” to keep the lines moving, and even some phrases in a different language that we used to communicate with colleagues to accommodate guests in wheelchairs or walkers without breaking the reality we’d so carefully created.

Inside Eastern State Penitentiary. (Photo: Adam Jones/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Halloween season at Eastern State officially begins when the gargoyles known as Frank and Carson are set up. Their installation signifies the opening of one of America’s top haunted houses, which runs for about six weeks with movie-quality set decor and elaborate special effects. Thousands of people attend Terror Behind the Walls each year and all of the profits go toward restoration of the prison so it can continue to serve as a museum.

Each zone has several rooms, its own specific set of costumes and makeup, as well as a call time. Once you arrive for your shift, you’re greeted by the Philadelphia Police, who are stationed outside each night, as well as the Street Team; this group is responsible for entertaining the people waiting in line. Finally, the Artistic Director and Zone Manager kick off the night with a call and response chant of “What time is it?” “Terror time!”

After entering through the very doorways the prisoners did more than a century ago, I got into my monster costume and went off to makeup, where professional cosmetologists apply SFX makeup and masks to all of the actors. I’d then hit my assigned space and wait to scare people, surrounded by fog and a soundtrack of ghostly dogs barking, a wailing prison siren signaling an escape, disembodied voices pleading for help, and guards making demands.

I was decked out in a denim jumpsuit complete with diseased bulbous lumps, blood stains, and sludge. Our makeup changed throughout the season, though I only wore latex once—after breaking out in a red, itchy rash we discovered I had a latex allergy. I primarily wore a combination of airbrush makeup and blood applied nightly, but I was envious of my rash-free colleagues who were able to wear disturbingly realistic prosthetics.

Shannon Brown in her make-up for her part in Terror Behind the Walls. (Photo: Courtesy Shannon Brown)

I started out as a scene actor in the haunt’s final room. Here, I played an employee who was witnessing a stunt gone wrong as my coworker was “electrocuted”. The biggest scare I achieved in this room was when a man wrapped his arm around my waist, thinking I was his wife. As we made eye contact, I could see the color drain from his face while he grabbed his son, called for his wife, and bolted for the door.

But in our claustrophobia room, an area where the guest has to squeeze through a room surrounded by walls closing in on them as actors swoop down from above, some even hanging from the ceiling—it was difficult for me to see through the thick fog and the laser lights well enough to accurately time my scares. I hit my stride when I was given my own room, where I could utilize hidden windows and creep through doors to startle those who passed me.

Through my time there, I never lost sight of the fact that I was working in a prison where people were incarcerated, kept away from their families and isolated from other inmates. I leaned against walls and sat upon floors where men and women were locked up, likely in areas where bloody fights broke out and murderous souls stewed; even the restroom made available to the cast was original to the prison.

During any given shift, you see hundreds of people. Cast members didn’t leave until the last person in line had finished the haunt, which some nights meant you clocked out well after midnight. After getting changed back into my human clothes, I’d hit the makeup stations with my fellow monsters to remove my makeup with a combination of men’s shaving cream and baby wipes.

Over the season, I dropped bodies, had people scream prayers and loudly sing Christmas carols to deter me from scaring them, and learned how to use a flint stick. The flint stick was my favorite tool to use, as a simple strike released a shower of sparks that while modest, terrified the guests. I used it most often when I was at the beginning of the zone with another actor, John.. I was the distraction before John would come sliding in, sending audience members screaming through to the next room.

Despite the inebriated guests, the cocky teenagers, and the protesters outside (who believe the haunt is disrespectful to those who spent time there), working as an actor at the Eastern State Penitentiary was thrilling and memorable. Dropping bodies became addictive, and working to preserve a historical site was rewarding.

My first—and hopefully last—time in prison evolved into one of my favorite jobs—and certainly the strangest. However, I will never forget being so close to misery and steps away from death row, all the while playing a monster within a reportedly haunted prison where I had the chance to scare Guillermo Del Toro and Philadelphia Eagles players.