[Discussion Post] What ghost stories did YOU grow up with?
100 percent of the liquid rewards for this post will go towards rewarding engaging and relevant comments. . .
Hello everyone!
As many of you probably know, my father (@remlaps) and I have been slowly making our way through the 1960's tv show The Twilight Zone. The other day, we saw an episode that played with the idea of ghosts. It was one of those stories where the events where bordering between explainable and "super natural" (I know that it is fictional). One thing that that helped me to realize is that ghost stories are something quite different from culture to culture. So, I decided to make this week's discussion:
What ghost stories did YOU grow up with?
I am really interested to see the different stories that you all respond with. Please feel free to discuss any scary story that you are familiar with! It doesn't necessarily have to feature ghosts.
I will begin the discussion by talking about one that I am familiar with that has been passed down for generations in my area (specifically since the 1800s).
Mad Anthony Wayne and his Lost Bones
Anthony Wayne was a general in the revolutionary war. He earned the nickname "Mad Anthony" through his risky moves against the British as a general. He was born in South Eastern Pa (in an area now named "Wayne" after him), and he died in North Western Pa (close to lake Erie I believe).
The general had requested on his death bed to be buried where he had died, but his family wanted his bones transported to his birth place.
Thirteen years after the general died, his son Isaac Wayne came to collect his father's remains. The problem came when they dug up the remains. The general's body was well preserved due to the conditions of the area that he was buried. Isaac Wayne had not planned to transport the whole body, and only had the storage for his father's bones. He paid Dr. James Wallace to separate the general's bones and body. The doctor boiled the remains in a large cauldron, and the bones were given to Isaac Wayne. The remaining parts of the body, the tools the doctor had used, and the general's uniform were reburied in Erie.
Legend has it that on the road back to South Eastern Pa, the box holding Wayne's remains fell out and spilled its contents numerous times. Some of the general's bones were scattered along the road from Erie to Wayne. To this day, it is believed that Mad Anthony rises from his grave in Erie every New Years Day (his birthday) to ride the road all the way to his grave in Wayne. As he rides, he looks for his lost bones.
Here is the source I used to refresh my memory
I look forward to what stories you may share!
Discuss away!
| Sponsor | Message |
|---|---|
| @steemingcurators | Looking for a Steem Exclusive community? Check out the Steeming Curators Community and voting trail! |
| @glory7 | Check steemworld.org for any Steem related features! |
| @knitrias | Knitrias Project Community: Growth and Education Group. |
| @cmp2020 | Do you enjoy Harry Potter? Join the Wizarding World Community for all things Harry Potter |
| @remlaps | Please consider joining the Popular Stem and Classical Music communities! |
Thank you also to @steemitblog and @steemcurator01 for their support!
How do I become a sponsor?
In order to better reward the discussion aspect of Steem, I am asking anyone interested to sponsor these discussion posts.
If you want to be listed, with a brief 15 word message, as one of the sponsors of these discussion posts , you should:
- Have a stake of at least 1000sp
- Commit to upvoting each of these weekly discussion posts with 100 percent to help increase the distribution that goes to participants in the discussion.
- Comment on this post expressing interest. Make sure to include the 15 word message you want displayed next to your name, and if you want a group name or nickname displayed instead of your username.
The Initiative
Right now, it is important to develop the discussion aspect of Steem. In order to do this, the experimental account, @penny4thoughts was created by @remlaps.
If the account (@penny4thoughts) is set as a beneficiary, it will evenly distribute the liquid portion of the post's rewards to the authors of comments that the post author upvotes with 100 percent voting power. For this post, and all future [Discussion Posts] in the category 'penny4thoughts', I will be setting @penny4thoughts as a beneficiary for 100 percent of the posts' rewards, and I will monitor the discussion and upvote valuable contributions.
Additional Information About My Use of Bidbot(s)
In addition to rewards from sponsors' upvotes, I am also committing to using bidbots to try to increase the amount of liquid rewards of these discussion posts so that there is more stake for rewarding engaging discussions. I know that the use of bidbots has been looked down upon, but I think an exception can be made when trying to enhance the community through rewarding positive discussion.
I listened to a lot of real encounters ghost stories from my grandparents and relatives as they can see these spirits. I think I can see them too but I still can't differentiate if it's my imagination or they are really there. But I can feel their presence as I'm sensitive to other's energy. One funny story is, when I told my mother I saw one old woman without a shirt only in her sarong with her traditional white headscarf made from weaved rattan that our tribe women usually wear on their head, and describe her looks to my mom, she said that sound like our great grandmother who had long passed away. Back then when I was a child,(I think from memory when I was 4-5years old) our family had a stay at my grandfathers' orchard huts for a night and I want to pass a motion but scared to go to the toilet far at the back and just resort to squat on the flooring wood that has little space in between them so my urine can drain out through that space and to the ground below as the hut was constructed with high stilts around it and there's space down there that grown adult can walk through without hitting their head at the house floor above their head. As I urinated, I look down from the space between the flooring that almost as wide as half of my adult palm and saw this old woman looking straight at me from below. I didn't feel scared at that time but wondering what the old lady doing down there as it's already dark and she supposes to be with us inside the hut. She stared at me until I finished my business as if she accompanied me. But I never recall she is with us that time too as I never saw her with our family or knew we have other visitors with us. I never see her after that. I told my mom about her when I went back to my hometown last year. She said she saw her too sometimes when she was a kid after this old lady had passed away.
the old lady/my great grandmother looking like this old lady in the photo but more skinny
to give you a visual look at how my grandfather huts orchard looks like, it was more simple and smaller than this on the photo.
la tua storia e' molto misteriosa, @cryptokannon
buona giornata!!
For many ghost stories are fictitious, and why question those who consider it that way? Few people are formed under the criteria of the supernatural, understanding that beyond the earthly and material, there is a spiritual world, therefore everything that is special or related to another dimension, they take it in a jocular way. However, my lived reality is different, since I was a child I was educated, believing in a spiritual world, which reigned over the earthly including, this coupled with the fact that I grew up in a fairly rural and desolate population, where the story of ghost stories was common among the village elder. And who would deny such assertions, being people with high credibility before society, in addition to them, a group of people who with testimonies, supported those accounts of having evidenced appearances of that nature. So it grew between ghost stories that were not only people who had lived in those places and died, but as I expressed it earlier, those who saw them attest that they were dealing with those specific beings. My own father told me that he witnessed seeing an old man who was rich and appeared wrapped in fire in order to guard some morocotas (gold coins) that he himself had buried in the patio of his house ... so much effect caused the fact that to this date no one has asked to inhabit that house for fear of that appearance. Therefore, although I have not had the experience of evidencing the presence of a ghost, I have lived among them through the experience of others and I am firmly convinced that they exist and have a parallel world. I keep admitting that I am terrified just thinking that one day I may run into one of them.
I grow up listening the horror stories by my brother-in-law, whose family is much related with this kind of phenomenon. He was always talking about all the different ghosts he had watched. The worst came when he got his closed circuit camera some years ago. He has recordings of objects moving, lights (orbs), doors opening, the same camera being manipulated, all this in the middle of the night. Not fake. Supposedly he knows how to deal with those beings.
I definitely believe you... but I wouldn't see those recordings!
I would wish I didn't watch them!! :Z
You made a beautiful Haiku!! ;)
I definitely
Believe you... but I wouldn't
See those recordings!
- anasuleidy
I'm a bot. I detect haiku.
Although I was born on the island of Sicily, I did not really grow up with the Sicilian culture. I grew up in New Jersey, after my family migrated from our native home. We always heard the local legend of the Jersey Devil, but I never really bought into it much. The stories were indeed scary, especially the warnings to never go along in the forest alone. Being a nature lover, I did not want to live with this fear, so I would often go into the forest alone, during the day of course, and challenge this myth. Eventually, I moved well beyond the fear by visiting the forest in the absolute darkness, with no streetlights! Frightening, yes! But no Jersey Devil appeared!
You are really brave!! Urban legends can grow strong roots in our minds, but surely time teach us many things.
Good vibes, @FamigliaCurione!!
I agree! Having challenging myths to grow up with is important for a child's imagination. Unfortunately, the present generation live in an isolated world where superheroes always save the day.
I was also going to comment about the Jersey Devil. As a kid, I heard about it just about every year when we took our drive through the Pine Barrens on the way to family vacations on Long Beach Island. Since then, I have driven through the Pine Barrens many more times, but like you, I never had any Jersey Devil encounters.
A Jersey Boy!!! What are the odds! The Garden State is amazing for its nature!
I'm from Pennsylvania, but spent many childhood summers at the Jersey Shore. I agree about NJ's natural resources.
Pennsylvania is a beautiful State as well. My son lives in Philadelphia with his family. When I was a teenager, I used to love to grab the bus and take a trip into the city. Just as nature has its energy, so does the urban environment!
I'm about 25 miles west of Philly. I hope your son and his family are keeping safe with all of the disturbances in the city during the last few days.
I love this topic... I live in Venezuela, a country where there are tons of ghost stories, the most popular are "El silbon", the legend tells that he was a skinny man, tall who killed his parents, but his dying father cursed him for life and after that he died, from there he became a fright. "La llorona" is a woman who lost her children and walks the streets crying looking for her children, "La sayona" is a woman who appears to unfaithful men at dawn, she appears as a beautiful woman and when men they follow it turns into a corpse.
I think there is some truth in these stories that have been passed from generation to generation... I remember that my father listened to these stories in the morning on the radio and went out to ride my sister's bed, we hugged each other and clothed each other up to our heads.
Several truly haunting ghost stories! Pun intended :)
I definitely agree with you that these stories hold certain messages (if no other paranormal truth exists within them).
Your great-grandmother had two stories. It's been a while since I heard them, so I don't know how well I remember the details, but they went something like this:
One night, it would have been in the '50s or '60s, she woke up from a sound sleep to see her father standing at the foot of her bed. This surprised her, because he was being cared for in a nursing home that was a good distance away. (I thought I remembered that he was in Germany, but I don't see how that could be the case with our family's immigration history) She asked him how he got there, but he didn't answer. He left the room, and she went back to sleep. After she woke up in the morning, she received a call from the care facility informing her that her father had passed away during the night.
The second story was similar, but it had to do with a family in the neighborhood while they were away on vacation. Apparently, she saw the wife of the family when she was awakened from sleep and then the next day learned that the woman had died in a car accident during the family's travels. If I recall correctly, the whole family may have died in that accident, but I'm not sure.
In both cases, I think she believed that the apparitions had appeared as a way to say, "Good bye" and bring her some comfort in her grief.
As soon as they opened his tomb, the curse of the Pharaoh took effect.
"Death will spread its wings over those who disturb the rest of the pharaohs".
In a short period of time, more than a dozen people, archaeologists, scientists, teachers, and officials who were indirectly or directly associated with this project died.
My outlook towards ghosts is very deeply rooted in Christian beliefs. Which is funny because most Christians cannot explain the supernatural - and will avoid it like the plague. Especially now, it is very important to understand each individual aspect of the things that go bump in the night, so that, at the very least, you understand what they are, if you ever see them.
I have very rarely had supernatural encounters in my life. Once I saw the Oklahoma "Spook Light," out by Miami, Ok - where I lived for 2 years in my early 20's. This is what pushed me to begin to pay attention to the supernatural and begin to study it from a Biblical perspective - usually.