Supernatural Friday: Haunted Objects

Can spirits be attached to objects? Objects like jewelry, furniture, statues, and others? If you ever seen The Haunted Collector on the SyFy Channel, John Zaffis makes claim that is true. He even has a paranormal museum, with items founded to have paranormal activity connected to them and after taken from the places, the activity has stopped, or lessened. Honestly, I feel one should do a blessing and cleansed, and keep the object. Taking someone's family heirloom or something is not something I would do.

I do believe that ghosts can leave the places they haunted and go to other places; some even are attached to objects they owned in life.  It does depend on how badly one is haunted by the phantom or phantoms, to attempt a cleansing or bring in a psychic or priest to do a blessing. If anyone needs to have a blessing or cleansing, here one place to find out: Cleansing

Like I said, most hauntings are associated with houses, castles and other things that go bump in the night, but hauntings can include objects, like the Hope Diamond, tchotchkes (Yiddish tshatshke trinket-the term has a connotation of worthlessness or disposability as well as tackiness) found in antique shops, even items on eBay. Hauntings have gone so mainstream that eBay has a “Guide to Buying Haunted Items.” 

One such famous cursed item is the "Hope Diamond." According to the legend, a curse befell the large, blue diamond,  when it was plucked (i.e. stolen) from an idol in India - a curse that foretold bad luck and death not only for the owner of the diamond but for all who touched it.  Several centuries ago, a man named Tavernier made a trip to India. While there, he stole a large blue diamond from the forehead (or eye) of a statue of the Hindu goddess Sita. For this transgression, according to the legend, Tavernier was torn apart by wild dogs on a trip to Russia (after he had sold the diamond). This was the first horrible death attributed to the curse.

Whether or not you believe in the curse, the Hope diamond has intrigued people for centuries. Its perfect quality, its large size, and its rare color make it strikingly unique and beautiful. Add to this a varied history which includes being owned by King Louis XIV, stolen during the French Revolution, sold to earn money for gambling, worn to raise money for charity, and then finally donated to the Smithsonian Institution.

“Haunted” Items (this author does not say yay or nay if these objects are truly haunted or not):

There is a painting titled “Hands Resist Him.” It was done by Bill Stoneham in 1972. Years later, a family found the painting in a dumpster and thought they’d found some free artwork. After taking it home,  their 4-year-old daughter claimed the children in the painting were fighting. An experiment was done, by the family as they recorded the painting over several nights. Supposedly, the figures moved within the painting in the video. They made a claim too, that the owner of the gallery where the painting was first displayed and a Los Angeles Times critic who reviewed the show died within one year of the art show. Of course, was it due to the painting? The family sold it on eBay along with the story for $1,025. Obviously, someone believed it was haunted or cursed.

 “The Crying Boy” was painted by Bruno Amadio, and is not just one painting, but a mass-produced print with numerous alternative versions, all with young boys or girls crying. These were distributed in the 1950s. The stories about these particular paintings began in the 1980s after a fireman in England claimed he kept coming across the paintings in burned houses. Funny thing, the paintings were remarkably untouched. The newspaper, The Sun gave readers a chance to bring in the paintings and destroy them in a bonfire. Psychics said the painting was haunted by the spirit of the boy or girl it depicts. If someone wanted the curse lifted, the owner must hang a boy and girl crying together, or pass the painting onto another person. 

I just watched about this doll on William Shatner's  paranormal TV show on SyFy, The doll was called Robert. It had been owned by painter Eugene Otto, and allegedly cursed. Otto got the doll as a gift in 1906 from a servant who was supposedly skilled in black magic. Neighbors reported seeing the doll moving from window to window. Otto screamed at night. He said that the doll turned over furniture. When he died in 1974, the doll fell into the hands of a 10-year-old girl who began to scream at night, and that the doll tried to kill her. Robert is now in the Fort East Martello Museum and Gardens in Key West, Fla., where guests can take a picture with him. But if they make fun of him, visitors have made claims of bad things happening to them. They send letters to the doll, asking him to forgive them, so their curse will be lifted. The doll is the inspiration for the movie “Child’s Play.” 

Located in Newport, R.I., Belcourt Castle was completed after three years of construction and opened in 1895. Nowadays, there are ghost tours conducted there. Visitors claim to feel chills when they are near two chairs in particular in the gothic ballroom. Some sit in the chairs, feel resistance, and evicted, ending up on the floor.

The wedding dress of Anna Baker at Baker Mansion is supposedly haunted. In the mid-1800s, Anna became engaged to a man her father did not approve of. Her father sent him away. The wedding never took place, the dress sat unused, and Anna died an old maid. Since then, visitors of the mansion in Altoona, Pa. (bought by a historical society) have seen the dress flutter in its glass case. Does the spirit of Anna still want to wear it, or wanted to be buried in it?

The Roosevelt Hollywood Hotel is famous as the address of the first Academy Awards in 1929. Marilyn Monroe also stayed as a resident for two years. Now, it is now a swank party place for Hollywood’s hip crowd. While there have been “sightings” on the ninth floor, Cabana Suite 213 and Blossom Ballroom, it is the mirror that used to hang in Monroe’s room—now in storage--that concerns being on this list. It is said, that when you gaze into the mirror, you might see more than your own reflection. A busty blond is what has been seen. Is it Marilyn Monroe?

Ah, here is another paranormal active doll for your pleasure—Annabelle. Annabelle was a Raggedy Ann doll given to a girl named Donna in the 1970s. Messages started appearing on parchment paper in a child’s handwriting, and yet, there was no parchment paper stored in the house. The family contacted a medium and learned that a young girl named Annabelle Higgins died and that she “possessed” the doll because she felt comfortable with the family. If the doll is friendly, the family preferred enemies. The father Lou had nightmares about the doll trying to kill him. He even gotten clawed in the chest from something unseen. The family felt they had been deceived through the medium by "the Father of Lies." That there was anyone named Annabelle in the doll, but something evil.  They had an exorcism performed and got rid of the doll. It now resides in an occult museum.

Who hasn't heard of the "curse" of James Dean's car "Little Bastard?" It has become part of America's cultural mythology. Warren Beath, a James Dean archivist and author, believes the source of the myth is Hollywood's George Barris, the self-described "King of the Kustomizers." This man said he was the first to purchase the wrecked Little Bastard. Barris promoted the "curse" after he placed the wreck on public display in 1956. Over the years, Barris described a series of accidents that mysteriously occurred from 1956 to 1960 involving the Little Bastard, resulting in serious injuries to spectators and even a truck driver's death. Porsche historian Lee Raskin states many claims regarding the "curse" of the Little Bastard appear to have been based on Barris' 1974 book, Cars of the Stars.

 

Myrtles Plantation is known as “one of America’s most haunted homes.” The plantation is supposedly the home of 12 ghosts, and reputedly built over an Indian burial ground. To make it a trifecta of terror, people were also murdered there. But it’s the mirror that contains the spirits of Sara Woodruff and her children that gets the haunted object award. After their deaths, per custom, the mirrors were covered, but someone forgot to cover this one. Supposedly, they are trapped forever in it. Visitors have reported seeing hand prints in the mirror.

Bunk beds that aired on an episode of “Unsolved Mysteries,” In 1987, Allen and Deborah Tallman who come from the town of Horicon, Wisconsin bought a bunk bed from a second-hand shop. Suddenly there are noises, a snow blower moving for no reason, and unexplained illness. The parents began to believe their children’s bunk beds were haunted. They buried the beds in a landfill.