Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Creepy Magazine's "The Tell-Tale Heart"

I try to space out my posts involving Edgar, but there's a reason why he and his work hold such a special place in my heart.

Behold- "The Tell-Tale Heart," as animated from Warren Magazine's "Creepy" Magazine, and narrated by the original source material. Something about Poe's tale has always mesmerized me. I first read the text as a child, and there is a creepiness conveyed with the brilliance of words that only Edgar Allan could create.

This video brings back a host of magazines and comics I remember from childhood- and does quite an interesting job at breathing new life into those memories.

Sunday, June 27, 2010

The Picnic in the Cemetery



A few Sundays back, my partner and I tried to attend an event I read about in our local paper, and desperately wanted to attend. An over 100 year old cemetery near a small rural town was having a fundraiser, and said fundraiser was going to be a Memorial Day Picnic-- in said cemetery.

Unbeknown to me, picnicking in a cemetery was apparently very popular in Victorian times. Research on this topic is few and far between, but as this article by Margaret Spencer suggests, the custom began in Victorian times, when architects moved away from the more cozy, dismal churchyards of yesterday and began designing lush, flowing rural parks as graveyards. When loved ones would come to tend to the monuments of the departed, they would come prepared for a full day of grave-tending; complete with gardening tools, flowers and other greenery-- and food to last them for the excursion.

I know many people who would balk at the idea of a cemetery picnic, and find something disturbed or unnatural about it. But I love the idea. Never do I enter a graveyard and is the experience lost on me. Of walking among the stones of those gone, and seeing what they have left behind to memory; what lasts, and what ultimately cannot.

Toward the end of our hour long drive, we managed to get lost and pass the cemetery several times. By the time we found the Evergreen Lawn Cemetery in Akron, New York, the fundraiser was over as they had sold out of all food. I gave them a small donation, and one of the Boy Scouts who had been serving the food offered us two sodas.

I walked around for a bit, taking pictures of anything that struck my eye or what I thought had the potential to. I find few things as calming, as perspective-giving as a walk through the gravestones. We ended up stopping at other cemeteries along our way home, which I will save for posts on other days.

Here is the Flickr album I created for my attempt at attending the picnic in the cemetery.



The tents in the background were where the picnic took place.

Saturday, June 26, 2010

"Humpty Dumpty by Edgar Allan Poe"

And now, for some fun involving my dear friend Edgar.



YouTube User: paperhand

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Happy Father's Day from the Ghost...

... with a little help from good old Stephen King.


YouTube User: mastergamer35

Friday, June 18, 2010

"Emily"

Just as I was beginning to get discouraged from my YouTube searching... I found this. And it made all the difference.

Here's "Emily - Creepy Animation About a Creepy Girl." Enjoy!


Wednesday, June 2, 2010

"Amityville Horror" house back on the market


Looking to buy a new home? You may be in luck.

The "Amityville Horror House" has gone on sale in New York state.
Brought to fame by the 1975 crime in which Ronald DeFeo Jr. murdered members of his family, and the family which later moved in and the novel and numerous film adaptations they inspired, the house will set you back a mere $1.15 million. The five-bedroom Dutch Colonial went on the market Monday.

Whether or not you believe (or have even followed) the saga of controversy over the experiences of the Lutz family when they lived in the home after the murders, the story of the Amityville haunting remains one of the most enduring accounts of a haunting in modern American folklore.

The book, which catapulted the story to fame, began after George and Kathy Lutz, the alleged victims of the haunting, were introduced by a book editor to Jay Anson, the book's author. Since it's publication, the story of the Lutzes has received harsh criticism, including a debunking of several claims of damage made by a couple who bought the house in 1977 on the television show "That's Incredible." Local Native American leaders have also denied claims made in the book that the local Shinnecock tribe once abandoned the mentally ill and dying on the land which would late become the house.

However, even in the face of these criticisms, though it was proven there was no snow on the date in which the Lutzes claimed to find cloven foot prints outside their home, the legend lives on. Most recently, The History Channel broadcast "Amityville- The Haunting and Amityville- Horror or Hoax?" in October 2000. In the documentary, George Lutz is quoted six years before his death as saying, "I believe this has stayed alive for 25 years because it's a true story. It doesn't mean that everything that has been said about it is true. It's certainly not a hoax. It's real easy to call something a hoax. I wish it was. It's not."

And now, for a little vintage paranormal TV, going back to 1979 "In Search... of The Amityville Horror."



YouTube User: FriendshipTown

Photo: Daily Mail