Museums house artifacts of historical, artistic and cultural significance, providing visitors a unique opportunity to catch glimpses into the past. The Cleveland Museum of Art, however, allows you to catch a literal glimpse into the past. It stands to reason that a museum filled with treasured items would be haunted. But the Cleveland Museum of Art has taken this to an extreme. It is allegedly home to several spirits, and has been dubbed one of the US’s most haunted museums.
This week’s topic isn’t a library or a bookstore or directly related to books, but museums share many of the same values as libraries—primarily the preservation and sharing of information. This information doesn’t have to come in the form of books. Art, artifacts, memorabilia—all these items provide invaluable insights into the past, present, and even the future.
Now that I’ve justified talking about a museum, I can dive into the nitty gritty of the haunting. Or should I say, hauntings.
If you stand in front of an artwork that was beautifully painted by an Impressionist, you might feel captivated, at a loss for words, and have an overwhelming desire to escape into that world of pastel shades and blurred reality. But what if it were possible that the subjects of these paintings could come to life? No, I’m not describing The Night at the Museum, but what many visitors and employees claimed to have experienced while roaming the halls of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
Continue reading “A Gallery of Ghosts: The Cleveland Museum of Art’s Various Hauntings”
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