Supernatural Friday: Feeling Like Testing a Curse?

Ever feel like testing to see if a curse will work? Check out the following ghost story.

Curse of the Three Sisters in Northern Virginia

Another tale of the Algonquian tribes is about a curse by three Algonquin women that apparently seems to still work today. This curse concerns three large granite rocks that rise out of the water between Virginia’s shoreline and Washington D.C. The story takes place a hundred years before Jamestown had been settled by the white man.

Though the land was rich with farmland and game and everyone did well, peace did not reign here. To the north were the Iroquois and Susquehannocks and they would raid the Algonquin tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy in the Virginia area, the battles fierce and bloody.

After a long siege, one Powhatan chief felt it was safe enough for his warriors and him to hunt for food. He forbidden though, three of his young sons to go with them, feeling they were not old enough to defend themselves if trouble came.

The young men decided to show their father how well they could go out and bring enough fresh fish to feed the women, children, and old men in the village. They did this after the hunting party left.

Now the greatest abundance of fish lived in the waters near the northern shore where the Susquehannocks warriors might still be. Using a canoe, they pushed it into the river and struck out. Not long after, a Susquehannock scouting party captured them and they were brought before the village, tortured, and killed. Of the villagers, three young daughters of the village shaman who were in loved with the young men watched with horror and growing anger.

They devised among themselves that they would cross the river to the village of the Susquehannocks to demand the warriors that killed the men they loved. They would take them back to their village to beguile them with their beauty and their fathers’ medicine. But afterwards, they would kill them by a long, agonizing death.

The sisters lashed several logs into a raft and pushed it from shore. But the current from the river proved too strong and fast and soon, they found themselves racing downstream. Still angry over the senseless deaths of the men they loved, the sisters cursed the river and said if they couldn’t cross it, no one would ever be able to do so.

The raft broke up and they sank to their deaths. The curse became true as one flash from a lightning struck the spot where they went down. That night the storm continued and the river’s waters went crazy. The following morning all grew calm as the sun rose into the sky. But three boulders had rose out of the spot where the sisters drowned, boulders that hadn’t been there before.

From that time on, the rocks take their toll on those who dare to try and cross the river there. A growing list of those victims who died is added to a growing list by local law enforcements—many fishermen, swimmers, and boaters. Old-timers claim that you can hear moaning over the Potomac during a storm, warning of another impending drowning.

In 1972, when they tried to construct a bridge to span the river, it became interrupted by one of the worse storms ever. Whitecaps surged on the water and lightening struck the spot where the bridge supports were starting to be built. The water surged and swept away the construction framework. Funny thing, the bridge was to be called “Three Sisters Bridge.”

Next time you feel you want to test an Native curse work, try swimming in the Potomac where three sisters had died.

Supernatural Friday: Feeling Like Testing a Curse?

Ever feel like testing to see if a curse will work? Check out the following ghost story.

Curse of the Three Sisters in Northern Virginia

Another tale of the Algonquian tribes is about a curse by three Algonquin women that apparently seems to still work today. This curse concerns three large granite rocks that rise out of the water between Virginia’s shoreline and Washington D.C. The story takes place a hundred years before Jamestown had been settled by the white man.

Though the land was rich with farmland and game and everyone did well, peace did not reign here. To the north were the Iroquois and Susquehannocks and they would raid the Algonquin tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy in the Virginia area, the battles fierce and bloody.

After a long siege, one Powhatan chief felt it was safe enough for his warriors and him to hunt for food. He forbidden though, three of his young sons to go with them, feeling they were not old enough to defend themselves if trouble came.

The young men decided to show their father how well they could go out and bring enough fresh fish to feed the women, children, and old men in the village. They did this after the hunting party left.

Now the greatest abundance of fish lived in the waters near the northern shore where the Susquehannocks warriors might still be. Using a canoe, they pushed it into the river and struck out. Not long after, a Susquehannock scouting party captured them and they were brought before the village, tortured, and killed. Of the villagers, three young daughters of the village shaman who were in loved with the young men watched with horror and growing anger.

They devised among themselves that they would cross the river to the village of the Susquehannocks to demand the warriors that killed the men they loved. They would take them back to their village to beguile them with their beauty and their fathers’ medicine. But afterwards, they would kill them by a long, agonizing death.

The sisters lashed several logs into a raft and pushed it from shore. But the current from the river proved too strong and fast and soon, they found themselves racing downstream. Still angry over the senseless deaths of the men they loved, the sisters cursed the river and said if they couldn’t cross it, no one would ever be able to do so.

The raft broke up and they sank to their deaths. The curse became true as one flash from a lightning struck the spot where they went down. That night the storm continued and the river’s waters went crazy. The following morning all grew calm as the sun rose into the sky. But three boulders had rose out of the spot where the sisters drowned, boulders that hadn’t been there before.

From that time on, the rocks take their toll on those who dare to try and cross the river there. A growing list of those victims who died is added to a growing list by local law enforcements—many fishermen, swimmers, and boaters. Old-timers claim that you can hear moaning over the Potomac during a storm, warning of another impending drowning.

In 1972, when they tried to construct a bridge to span the river, it became interrupted by one of the worse storms ever. Whitecaps surged on the water and lightening struck the spot where the bridge supports were starting to be built. The water surged and swept away the construction framework. Funny thing, the bridge was to be called “Three Sisters Bridge.”

Next time you feel you want to test an Native curse work, try swimming in the Potomac where three sisters had died.

Supernatural Friday: Don't Buy a Cursed Box from an Antique Store

 With Paranormal Petersburg, Virginia, and the Tri-Cities Area having buildings full of antiques in Old Towne Petersburg, I thought cursed boxes might fit Supernatural Friday's bill today. Curse boxes are locked, wooden containers with sigils on the exterior. They are designed to contain the magic, evil spirits, or cursed objects to prevent them from causing harm. Cursed objects are created by magic, and can kill their owners. The idea for the curse box may have come from the legend of Pandora's Box, a box that holds all the evil and all the diseases in the world, until - once opened - it releases all this evil upon the world, leaving only Hope behind.

In the fictional world of television, in one show, Supernatural, Dean and Sam Winchesters' father, John Winchester, had curse boxes made for him by Bobby Singer. He kept these at his secret storage space in New York. One of his curse boxes were stolen by thieves working for Bela, who worked for those who paid to get their hands on supernatural objects, and when they opened it, they found a cursed rabbit's foot inside.

One now well-known cursed box, thanks to an episode of Paranormal Witness this year and a movie, The Possession, that came out in September, dybbuk box, or dibbuk box. Itis a wine cabinet which is said to be haunted by a dybbuk. In Jewish folklore, a dybbuk is a restless, usually malicious, spirit believed to be able to haunt and even possess the living. The cabinet has the Shema carved into the side of it. Its dimensions are 12.5" × 7.5" × 16.25”. Shema are the first two words of a section of the Torah, and are the title of a prayer that serves as a centerpiece of the morning and evening Jewish prayer services.

The term "Dibbuk Box" was first used by Kevin Mannis to describe the box in the item information for an eBay auction to describe it as the subject of an original story (not the story for the film) describing supposedly true events which he considered to be related to the box. Mannis, a writer and creative professional by trade, owned a small antiques and furniture refinishing business in Portland, Oregon at the time. According to Mannis' story, he purportedly bought the box at an estate sale in 2003. It had belonged to a German Holocaust survivor named Havela, who had escaped to Spain and purchased it there before her immigration to the United States. Havela's granddaughter told Mannis that the box had been bought in Spain after the Holocaust. Upon hearing that the box was a family heirloom, Mannis offered to give the box back to the family but the granddaughter insisted that he take it. "We don't want it." She said. She told him the box had been kept in her grandmother's sewing room and was never opened because a dybbuk was said to live inside it. On opening the box, Mannis found that it contained two 1920s pennies, a lock of blonde hair bound with cord, a lock of black/brown hair bound with cord, a small statue engraved with the Hebrew word "Shalom", a small, golden wine goblet, one dried rose bud, and a single candle holder with four octopus-shaped legs; all items supposedly used in Jewish folklore to exorcise demons. Numerous owners of the box have reported that strange phenomena accompany it. In his story, Mannis claimed he experienced a series of horrific nightmares shared with other people while they were in possession of the box or when they stayed at his home while he had it. His mother suffered a stroke on the same day he gave her the box as a birthday present — October 28. Every owner of the box has reported that smells of cat urine or jasmine flowers and nightmares involving an old hag accompany the box. Iosif Neitzke, a Missouri student at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri and the last person to auction the box on eBay, claimed that the box caused lights to burn out in his house and his hair to fall out Jason Haxton, Director of the Museum of Osteopathic Medicine in Kirksville, Missouri, had been following Neitzke's blogs regarding the box and when he was ready to be rid of the box Neitzke sold it to Haxton. Haxton wrote The Dibbuk Box, and claimed that he subsequently developed strange health problems, including hives, coughing up blood, and "head-to-toe welts" Haxton consulted with Rabbis (Jewish religious leaders) to try to figure out a way to seal the dybbuk in the box again. Apparently successful, he took the freshly resealed box and hid it at a secret location, which he will not reveal.

Skeptic Chris French, head of the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit at Goldsmiths' College, told an interviewer he believed that the box's owners were "already primed to be looking out for bad stuff.  In other words, if one is primed to believe they’ve cursed. Bad stuff that happens is what you perceive to be the cause. 
When I went to eBay and put in the word, dybbuk box, four came up, including this one.http://www.ebay.com/itm/DYBBUK-BOX-Has-Hebrew-Writings-Carved-into-the-Back-Of-BOX-/251168167143?pt=Cabinets_Cupboards_1&hash=item3a7aca14e7

Another cursed box is used in the film, Silent Hill. I can’t tell you for sure if used in the video game, only a gamer that has played it can.

Of course, the most famous cursed “box” is Pandora’s. The original Greek word was 'pithos', which is a large jar, sometimes as large as a small person (Diogenes of Sinope was said to have once slept in one), mostly used for storage of wine, oil, grain or other provisions, or, ritually, as a container for a human body for burying. In the case of Pandora, this jar may have been made of clay for use as storage as in the usual sense, or of bronze metal as an unbreakable prison.
The mistranslation of pithos is usually attributed to the 16th century humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam who translated Hesiod's tale of Pandora into Latin. Erasmus renderedpithos as the Greek pyxis, meaning "box". The phrase "Pandora's box" has endured ever since.

I will end this article with the Greek myth, “Pandora’s Box.”

Once up a time, a long time ago, Zeus ordered Hephaestus (Aphrodite's husband) to make him a daughter. It was the first woman made out of clay. Hephaestus made a beautiful woman and named her Pandora. 

Zeus sent his new daughter, Pandora, down to earth so that she could marry Epimetheus, who was a gentle but lonely man. 

Zeus was not being kind. He was getting even. Epimetheus and Prometheus were brothers. Zeus was mad at one of the brothers, Prometheus, for giving people fire without asking Zeus first.  

Zeus gave Pandora a little box with a big heavy lock on it. He made her promise never to open the box. He gave the key to Pandora’s husband and told him to never open the box. Zeus was sure that Epimetheus' curiosity would get the better of him, and that either Epimetheus or his brother would open the box. 

Pandora was very curious. She wanted to see what was inside the box, but Epimetheus said no. Better not. "You know your father," Epimetheus sighed, referring to Zeus. "He’s a tricky one."

One day, when Epimetheus lay sleeping, Pandora stole the key and opened the box.

Out flew every kind of disease and sickness, hate and envy, and all the bad things that people had never experienced before. Pandora slammed the lid closed, but it was too late. All the bad things were already out of the box. They flew away, out into the world.

Epimetheus woke up at the sound of her sobbing. “I opened the box and all these ugly things flew out,” she cried. “I tried to catch them, but they all got out.” Pandora opened the box to show him how empty it was. But the box was not quite empty. One tiny bug flew quickly out before Pandora could slam the lid shut again.

“Hello, Pandora,” said the bug, hovering just out of reach. “My name is Hope.” With a nod of thanks for being set free, Hope flew out into the world, a world that now held Envy, Crime, Hate, and Disease – and Hope.

Supernatural Friday: Talking About Worms--the Monstrous Kind

I am not talking about the kind you put your fishing hook, or the kind that you might find in your cat or dog. No, these worms are terrifying and monstrous. The old English form of the word worm (or wyrm) refers to a humongous snake or dragon. Like the Lambton Worm from the northeastern part of England.

Lambton Wrym: This gigantic worm terrorized the above mentioned region in medieval times. The story goes, that John Lambton, heir of the Lambton estate in County Durham, decided to go fishing one Sunday morning. He had been warned by a mysterious old man that no good could come of skipping church. But the young man ignored the advice and went fishing anyway. He had no success in catching anything out of the Wear River, then he pulls in a strange fish. The eel-like creature had the head of a salamander and nine holes on each side of its skull. Lambton said he’d caught "the devil." On the advice of the old man, he decides not to return it to the river. Instead, he throws it down a well.

When Lambton became a man, he went off to fight in the Crusades. All this time though, the creature thrived underground and had grown to an immense size inside the well, poisoning the water and when it emerged, it started to terrorize the land by eating livestock, along with the occasional village child. It approached Lambton Manor, where John's father manages to placate it on a daily basis by filling a stone trough outside the building with fresh milk for it to drink. In between assaults on the surrounding countryside, the creature relaxes by wrapping itself around the base of a hill.

Various villagers and knights try to slay the monster, but discovered that slicing off sections of the worm is ineffective as the creature seems to be able to reattach lost parts without much permanent damage (or more likely grew the part back like a lizard?). The worm also would catch some of the foolhardy in its coils and slowly squeezed that person to death (like a boa constrictor or python?).

Young John came home from the Crusades to find his father's land in ruin from the worm. He vows to destroy the creature and seeks the aid of a local witch. The witch tells him that he is responsible for the worm's existence by his actions as a boy. The witch’s' advice is to go to the local blacksmith and have his armor covered with razor-sharp spear points. Then he must find the worm as it lay wrapped around a great rock down by the river to fight it. She warns Lambton that if he is successful in his quest, he will be required to kill the first living thing he sees after his victory, or the Lambton family will be cursed for nine generations with no heir dying peacefully in his bed.

Brave Sir John takes her suggestions to heart and they prove to be the keys he needs to defeat the beast. When the animal gets a hold of him in its coils, it cannot squeeze him to death as the spear points on his armor drive into the creature's body. Because he is fighting the worm at the edge of the Wear River, any parts cut off fall off into the water and are swept downstream, so the beast cannot heal itself by reattaching/ The monster is killed.  It has been arranged that at his bugle signal, one of his hunting hounds will be released. It will run to him and John will slay it to save his family from the curse. Unfortunately, John's father forgets about the signal and runs out himself to greet his son after the victory. John does not have the heart to kill his father and the family is cursed for nine generations.

Also, did nine generations of Lambtons die violent deaths? Some of them may have. Given that the Lambtons were involved in such actions as the English Civil War, however, a premature end to their lives doesn't seem all that unlikely. The curse may also have been self-fulfilling: It is said that by the ninth generation one Lambton slept with a horse whip by his bedside to defend himself in fear that his servants might take actions to make the curse come true.

There’s a song about the myth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEb8r_M6ln0 one might like to listen to.  

The Mongolian Death Worm: This cryptid has gained status in the past 90 years. It is alleged to exist in the Gobi Desert, Mongolia. The creature is believed to exist by traditional inhabitants of the area. An expedition in the 1920s was sent out to try and discover and capture one of these beasts. The expedition met with failure.

It is described as a red worm ranging from two to five feet in length, with a thick body. It can kill at a distance, spewing acid, poison, or causing an electric shock. Biologists who have studied the area cannot find an indigenous animal to equate the myth with this creature..

The Minhocão: This means "big earthworm" in Portuguese. This giant subterranean worm-like cryptid inhabits the earth beneath South American forests. Though enormous earth worms, there are reports of them also being aquatic. There is a type of tentacle like appendage that protrudes from the head and it has been reported to prey on large mammals, namely cattle, capturing them from below the water where the bovines came to drink. Its body length can vary in size, from seventy-five to a hundred and fifty feet, and it also is known for the enormous tunnels it leaves behind. These tunnels suggest a diameter of up to ten feet. Buildings collapsing into the earth have been blamed on the tunnels left by this creature. These tunnels can sometimes flood and created subterranean water bodies. The Minhocao is featured in the game "Final Fantasy" as a "sand worm."

Unlike their mythological cousins, there are giant earthworms that actually exist and are not dragon or snakes.  They live in Australia, Japan and South America. The giant Gippsland earth worm is found only in the Bass River valley of South Gippsland in Victoria, Australia. These huge worms regularly reach sizes of 10 feet. The longest specimen on record was measured at 14 feet long. These rare earthworms are so large that it is possible to hear the gurgling sound of their movement through the earth when they are disturbed.

In New Zealand, there is another large worm known as the North Auckland worm that reaches a length of 4.5 feet. These worms have the added surprising, some might even say creepy, feature of glowing in the dark. By some accounts, the light the worms emit is said to be bright enough to read by.

Tales of enormous earthworms surface from time to time in various areas of Japan. One such account is Hyogo prefecture, on Honshu Island, which has many historical accounts of worms at five feet long. One tale comes from the year 1712, in what was then known as Tamba province (now part of Hyogo). A huge landslide occurred in a village, after which two giant earthworms were found in the debris. One of these worms measured five feet in length. The other was larger, at ten feet long. Another landslide that occurred in the same general vicinity allegedly unearthed a long worm around fifteen feet. A more modern report from Mikata-gun, which is located in the mountains of Hyogo prefecture, dates from 1996 when a farmer uncovered an earthworm 3.3 feet long and 0.8 inches thick while planting a tree on his rural property. It was the first time the surprised farmer had ever encountered such a large worm in all his years in the area. 

Giant worms have been reported from other parts of Japan as well. In Okayama, one woman said she had seen a worm ten feet long in a field that was being tilled. The worm had apparently been disturbed by the farming activity. Another farmer in the same area brought up a still thrashing piece of a worm that had been hacked off during farm work. The piece is estimated to have come from a worm up to 13 feet long. The rest of the worm could not be located.
Another of the largest known species is the South African giant worm that normally grow to around six feet long, but there is evidence that they maybe larger. In 1967, a South African worm was found by the side of a road in William’s Town, measuring at an incredible twenty-two feet in length, though its diameter was still only around 2 cm. This remains the longest earthworm ever confirmed.

So, the next time you start digging in your garden, take care. That earthworm you unearthed, may not be as small as you think. And it just might be hungry for human flesh!

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. 

Supernatural Friday: Curse of the Three Sisters

For Supernatural Friday this month until Thanksgiving,  I am going to talk about the Native American myths and legends. Today's is all about a ghostly legend told about the Potomac River in Northern Virginia, as told in my book,  Haunted Virginia: Legends, Myths and True Tales. 

What are your favorite Native American stories? Let us know, by leaving a comment.

 

Curse of the Three Sisters—Northern Virginia

Another tale of the Algonquian tribes is about a curse by three Algonquin women that apparently seems to still work today. This curse concerns three large granite rocks that rise out of the water between Virginia’s shoreline and Washington D.C. The story takes place a hundred years before Jamestown had been settled by the white man.

Though the land was rich with farmland and game and everyone did well, peace did not reign here. To the north were the Iroquois and Susquehannocks and they would raid the Algonquin tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy in the Virginia area, the battles fierce and bloody.

After a long siege, one Powhatan chief felt it was safe enough for his warriors and him to hunt for food. He forbidden though, three of his young sons to go with them, feeling they were not old enough to defend themselves if trouble came.

The young men decided to show their father how well they could go out and bring enough fresh fish to feed the women, children, and old men in the village. They did this after the hunting party left.

Now the greatest abundance of fish lived in the waters near the northern shore where the Susquehannocks warriors might still be. Using a canoe, they pushed it into the river and struck out. Not long after, a Susquehannock scouting party captured them and they were brought before the village, tortured, and killed. Of the villagers, three young daughters of the village shaman who were in loved with the young men watched with horror and growing anger.

They devised among themselves that they would cross the river to the village of the Susquehannocks to demand the warriors that killed the men they loved. They would take them back to their village to beguile them with their beauty and their fathers’ medicine. But afterwards, they would kill them by a long, agonizing death.

The sisters lashed several logs into a raft and pushed it from shore. But the current from the river proved too strong and fast and soon, they found themselves racing downstream. Still angry over the senseless deaths of the men they loved, the sisters cursed the river and said if they couldn’t cross it, no one would ever be able to do so.

The raft broke up and they sank to their deaths. The curse became true as one flash from a lightening struck the spot where they went down. That night the storm continued and the river’s waters went crazy. The following morning all grew calm as the sun rose into the sky. But three boulders had rose out of the spot where the sisters drowned, boulders that hadn’t been there before.

From that time on, the rocks take their toll on those who dare to try and cross the river there. A growing list of those victims who died is added to a growing list by local law enforcements—many fishermen, swimmers, and boaters. Old-timers claim that you can hear moaning over the Potomac during a storm, warning of another impending drowning.

In 1972, when they tried to construct a bridge to span the river, it became interrupted by one of the worse storms ever. Whitecaps surged on the water and lightening struck the spot where the bridge supports were starting to be built. The water surged and swept away the construction framework. Funny thing, the bridge was to be called “Three Sisters Bridge.”

Next time you feel you want to test an Indian curse work, try swimming in the Potomac where three sisters had died.

Like every state in the Union, Virginia has unique myths, legends, and yes, even true stories that sound much like legends, but aren't. Learn about the urban legend of the Bunnyman and what happens to mortals at his Bunnyman Bridge in Clifton at midnight on Halloween. Prepare to discover the myths surrounding Edgar Allan Poe and other famous Virginians. See why Natural Bridge is actually a haunted tourist attraction. And what makes the Great Dismal Swamp so creepy: Is it the ghosts or Bigfoot? Meet the Witch of Pungo in Virginia Beach and find out that Mothman and the Jersey Devil actually visited Virginia. Read Virginian stories of witches, demons, monsters, ghosts, pirates, strange animals, and soldiers from the Civil War. Come visit a most amazing, frightening, and even intriguing Virginia that you never knew existed.