Candy Man: The Truth Behind Poisoned Halloween Candy

 

If you grew up in the last half-century or so, the tradition of checking your Halloween candy after coming home from Trick or Treating was a commonplace event of your childhood.

There could be a razor blade stuck in your Taffy Apple or a loose wrapper on your peanut butter cup that may mean poison.

Like most things though, especially those connected to a holiday like Halloween, truth is often stranger (and sometimes scarier) than fiction.

The first question is: Has a child ever died from candy connected to the holiday of Halloween?

Yes.

That fact stated the truth behind the fear of a murderer targeting children through poisoned holiday sweets is a bit more complex and interesting...

Get paid To Predict the Future With The Simpsons!

 

You know of all the great psychics and seers: Nostrodomus, Kassandra, Criswell, Browne, and of course, Homer Simpson. 

If you've had any interest in weird news in the last ten years or so, you would have by now probably bumped into the many times the long-running Fox cartoon sitcom The Simpsons has at least somewhat accurately predicted the future.

From Lisa complaining about 'President Trump' leaving her administration a budget crisis when she became POTUS to the NSA spying on the calls of American citizens, to Lady Gaga's 2017 Super Bowl halftime show, to almost incredibly predicting the actual mass of the Higgs boson or God Particle, the Simpsons have had a number of very interesting insights over the years. 

And now a gambling website wants to profit from it along with one lucky soul would who will be paid to watch it...plus get free doughnuts while they do it, sounds like a job right up Homer's alley. 

Ghostly Pics: Tulip Staircase Ghosts

 

There are countless ghost stories that come from England, which should not come as a surprise as the area is as rich in historical architecture as it is in ghost stories.

The proof is needed however for any story that borders on the unbelievable, like ghosts or other paranormal activity. Using that criteria the Tulip Staircase photograph may count among the very best evidence of ghosts and life after death.

Ghostly Pics: Hampton Court Ghost

 

This infamous ghost image took the internet by storm in 2003. It was originally published in the Chicago Sun-Times on December 21st of that year and was said to be a still of CCTV footage from the Hampton Court Palace, located on the Thames River in London, England.

Although the Hampton Court is ripe with tales of ghostly apparitions and strange occurrences, the picture of the robed figure was immediately a topic for debate for both believers and skeptics alike.

Was it an excellent ghost photograph or a clever hoax?

Ghostly Pics: The Sunnyvale Toys-R-Us Ghost Photo

 

For most of us, toy stores conjure up childhood images of fun, freedom, and imagination.

However, a Toys R Us location in Sunnyvale California has become more well known as a place of terror than pleasure.

It is said that a ghost resides in the shop, a ghost searching for a lost love.

A ghost that during an investigation by psychic Sylvia Browne just happened to have his picture taken and became one of the most well-known paranormal photographs in the world.

Ghostly Pics: The Backseat Car Ghost

 

Graveyards are one of those places that you just might expect to capture a photograph of a ghost or spirit. After all, it is the final resting place of our physical forms and has an obvious connection with death and whatever might lay beyond it.

So it might not come as a shock to anyone that one of the most famous ghost photos in the world came from a cemetery.

Even more impressive, the ghost seemed keen to get a ride to some destination in the physical world as the picture itself shows the spirit sitting in the back of a car!

Ghostly Pics: Wem Town Hall Ghost

 

There are many famous ghost photographs in the world, like the Amityville Ghost Boy or the lady sitting on a grave marker captured at Bachelor's Grove Cemetery in Illinois, but one of the most famous ghost pictures of all time is the one purportedly of the Wem Town Hall Ghost, which shows a little girl staring out from a building that is ablaze.

Taken by part-time \ amateur photographer and sewage farm worker Tony O'Rahilly in November 1995 as he was standing across the street from the blaze at the Wem Town Hall.

Later, after the picture had been developed Tony and others noticed the strange girl in old clothing standing among the flames.

Coincidence or one of the best pieces of evidence for life after death?

Lord Combermere’s Ghost Photo

 In 1891 an amateur photographer named Sybell Corbet decided that as the entire household of the Combermere Abbey was attending the funeral of the late Lord Combermere four miles away, it would be a good time to take interior photos of the abbey while it was quiet.

This included the Combermere Abbey Library, where she set up her camera hoping to get good results using the natural light coming into the room. The Abbey had been around since 1133 after being founded by monks and some of the interiors are simply stunning making them an easy muse for a photographer.

However, Corbet got a bit more than she bargained for when besides the interior of the library she also captured what appeared to be a ghostly figure in one of the room's chairs. Could this be the ghost of Lord Combermere himself, visiting his home once last time while his funeral was taking place a short distance away?

Ghostly Pics: S.S. Watertown Ghosts

 

In December of 1924, James Courtney and Michael Meehan were killed by gas fumes aboard the ship S.S. Watertown. The two men, who were part of the ship's crew, had been overcome by the fumes while they were cleaning a cargo tank on board the vessel.

The S.S. Watertown was in the middle of a journey between New York City and the Panama Canal at the time of the two deaths and the men were given a burial at sea off the Mexican coast.

However, the next day at dusk, and for several days thereafter, the crew claimed to see the faces of the two dead men in the waves in the water near the ship. When the ship came to port in New Orleans, the ship's Captain, Keith Tracy bought a camera, hoping to capture the apparitions.

After setting off from New Orleans the faces appeared again, and Tracy took six photos of the ghosts before locking the camera and its film in a safe till the voyage's end.

It was these events that spawned one of the most famous ghost photos ever, and one of the most popular pictures proving that there was indeed life after death.

However, new research conducted in 2010 may make you change your mind about one of the most famous ghostly pics of all time...

Ghostly Pics: The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall Ghost

 

This is another relatively infamous ghost photo that was taken at Raynham Hall in Norfolk in 1936. It was taken by two photographers for Country Life magazine, which made its name highlighting the pleasures of living in the country and used photographs of various stately homes as evidence of this.

 According to the story, the two journalists were doing just such a photo shoot when they saw the ghost descending the stairs and quickly took this photograph.

Ghostly Pics: The Newby Spectre

 

The photograph of the Newby Church Spectre is often cited as one of the 'best ghost photos ever' and with good reason. It has particular resonance with me because it is one of the first photographs that ever really scared the hell out of me as a child.

Ghostly Pics: Tombstone Cemetery Ghost

 Some places are just perfect for a ghost story or the perfect location for an excellent ghost photograph. Well, nothing quite says 'haunted' like the trappings of the American Old West, with its tales of ghost towns abandoned after the money went dry in those areas and the body count created by the outlaw atmosphere that prevailed there.

One infamous and easily debated evidence of ghosts in an old west setting was the one taken at Boothill Cemetery in 1996 when Ike Clanton posed for a picture on the old burial site.

However, they did not count on the mysterious figure in the background, dressed in clothing similar to those worn in the Old West and holding a knife.

Ghost Dog At The Tower of London?

 The Tower of London has a history of ghosts and hauntings, so it is not surprising that a current resident of the historical landmark is reporting she has had a run-in with a spirit, in this case, possibly a phantom dog...


Tik-Tok user Megan Clawson, also known as Meganambxr on the video-sharing site, says that although she has been asked many times if the Tower was haunted and indeed Megan thought she had felt a cold spot or two and had heard 'the odd footstep,' but never had anything really scary or weird happen to her.

Until the night the ghost dog came to visit, as she recalled in a video this month.

Megan, who has a dog herself (which was away on the night in question at Megan's Mother's house) was in bed when she heard her pet's squeaky toy squeaking in the middle of the night even though her dog was as said in another dwelling about one-hundred-and-fifty miles away:

"...I was struggling to get to sleep, which is quite strange for me anyway.
Because as soon as my head hits that pillow I am out like a light.
So I was just listening to the clicking of my plug-in radiator...because I live in the wall of a castle so it's bloody freezing.
I hear this squeak... so I have this dog toy in my room with a little squeaker on the end.
And every hour or so I would just hear one... one squeak.
And [then] it would stop."

Megan also noted that one of her neighbors told her that they had felt like a ghostly dog had curled up beside them on a couple occasions prior, pushing the idea even more among the many ghosts at the Tower of London, there is still room for man's best friend. 

-Thomas Spychalski 

(Via MyLondon)

Three Men and a Baby Ghost: (Paranormal Cardboard)

 

This is an urban legend I once fell hook, line, and sinker for.

I first heard of the 'ghost boy' who appeared in the film Three Men and a Baby when my dad told me about it after reading the story in a magazine. The story said that if you went to a certain part of the movie, a little boy could be seen in the background and that little boy had died in the apartment the film was shot in.

In short, the little boy in the background of the film...was a ghost.

Photo: Iceberg That Sank The Titanic

 

It will be more than one hundred years since the cruise ship Titanic sank in the Atlantic ocean in 1912. The event cost 1,514 people their lives after the ship collided with an iceberg.

Now the only known alleged picture of the iceberg that took down the Olympic Class ocean liner is to be auctioned off.

Ghostly Pics: Amityville Ghost Boy

 

The Amityville Horror haunting is still a very popular subject both inside and outside the circle of paranormal researchers and enthusiasts.

It is the story of the Lutz family, who went through a nightmarish twenty-eight days inside the house at 108 Ocean Ave in 1975 has become known worldwide. The house had previously been the residence of the DeFeo family about a year or so before the Lutz's moved in, that is until twenty-three-year-old Ronald DeFeo murdered both his parents in their beds as well as his four siblings: Dawn (eighteen years old), Marc (twelve) and John Matthew (Nine).

Since the Lutz's fled the 'Horror House', the story of what occurred to the family in less than a month's time in Long Island has been turned into a book, made into a movie, and spawned the name of a famous fictional horror movie franchise.

As we have noted on this blog before, the case also has many side trips and legends, some of which you have to read to believe. One of the most popular has to be the Amity 'Ghost Boy' photo, which has sparked debate in the Amityville and paranormal worlds for some time now.

It is also one creepy photo.

The 'Other' Amityville Ghost Photo

 If you read about or investigate the paranormal for a hobby, you probably have come across the story of The Amityville Horror, where a family in Amityville, New York spent twenty-eight horrific days in one of the most infamous haunted houses in the world.

The house, which is located at 108 Ocean Ave (formerly 112 Ocean Ave before the gawkers and tourists became too much to bear after the original film's release in the late seventies and the street number was changed), also was where Ronald Defeo murdered six of his family members while they slept in November 1974.

Later the Warrens would come in to investigate the house in 1976, leading to one of the most chilling and controversial 'real' ghost photographs of all time, The Amityville Ghost Boy.

There is another photograph connected to the ever-growing and confusing Amityville legend that has never really been brought to light.

It is said to have been taken in 1922 in the house that stood on the same property on which the Dutch Colonial the Defeos and Lutzes both lived in later stood.

And the figure within the captured image was claimed to be conjured during a seance no less...

Troy's House of Nine Ghosts

 

According to a recent report, Michele Bell of Troy, NY has been trying to sell her family home following her mother's death but has found no luck in selling the house that has been in Michele's family for generations. 

She had been living in that house for nearly a decade after coming in to help her sick mother in her final years but during that same time frame, apparent paranormal activity had begun to occur.  

Michele claims that she and many of the 'aides' who would come to help with her mother's care would see ghosts on the property, including in the house, with her grandfather and great-grandfather watching over their old home being the most benevolent while the 'creepy' basement was the territory of three male ghosts that were much more intrusive, including the claim that these men would also push multiple people over the years. 

The report went on to say that Michele Bell cleanses the house with sage on her regular visits and although there has been some recent interest in the haunted home, the ghosts don't seem to be hurting its value or marketability with some potential buyers implied to actually be seeking out a haunted house to purchase. 

-Thomas Spychalski 

(Via Fox News)