Library of the Odd, the Obscure, and the Occult
In this week’s instalment of “Author(ized) Accounts of the Paranormal and Unexplained,” Terry Friedman, author of Bone Pendant Girls, will tell us the about the dark energy she’s sensed while visiting historical places…
Continue reading “Author Terry Friedman: Knock. Knock. Nobody’s There?”
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”
The oldest bookstore in America, the Moravian Book Shop in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, has been continuously running for over 270 years. There are some solid arguments that it’s actually the longest running bookstore in all of the world (Sullivan, 2016). Of course, a place like this would pick up a few ghosts over the centuries. There are at least two spirits haunting this bookstore—if you believe the stories, of course.
Today’s blog post is a little shorter, because I’ve been doing NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and I’m writing an entire book in just thirty days. I don’t have many words to spare! I picked this story to dissect because there isn’t much evidence supporting or refuting the claims of the people who’ve seen strange things in this bookshop. But it still makes for a fascinating story…
Continue reading “The Newer Haunting of the Oldest Bookstore”
An ironic ghost haunts the basement of Attic Books, an antiquarian and used bookstore in London, Ontario. I’ve decided to start BibliOccult with this story, because not only have I been to this bookstore, but I may have encountered its spirit. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Built in the mid-to-late 1800s, the stunning red brick building on 240 Dundas Street was initially only one storey, with the first and second storeys being added during renovations in 1880. The gargoyle, which adds a Gothic look to the building, was only added in 1996 (1).
The building has housed many businesses over the last century and a half. The first inhabitant of note is Abraham Spry. He worked as a tailor in the building in 1875 (1). However, he only stayed there a year before moving on, transferring his business to another building on Dundas Street. It’s my understanding that he didn’t stay there long enough to grow attached to the building. He didn’t stay there long enough to die.
BibliOccult 