Urban legends are stories which are passed by word of mouth (and more recently email and fax). The stories are untrue, although some have a kernel of truth to them or seem like they could be true. Each legend generally has myriad variations, and is told as having happened to a distant-but-not-too-distant acquaintance, the apocryphal "friend of a friend." Here we will take a look at some of the more famous ghostly urban legends.
La Llorona is the legend of a woman who has lost her children, and who can be heard, and sometimes seen, weeping in the night. La Llorona (the name means "She who weeps" in Spanish) is in most stories said to be Mexican, although sometimes she is a woman who lived in the American Southwest. As with most urban legends, there are many variations of La Llorona, but the central plot remains intact: The woman has lost her children, usually because she herself has killed them because she wants to marry a man who doesn't want any children. She is so anguished over the depressing circumstances that she kills herself as well, and is thus doomed forever to roam her native land, weeping and wringing her hands. Sometimes she is said to be searching for her children, and sometimes she is said to appear only as a warning to those who see her.
Here is a typical version of the La Llorona legend by Proserpina (proserp@duckmail.uoregon.edu):
"Sightings abound throughout the Southwest. Supposedly she drowned her children in the acequia (irrigation ditch,) and now she roams the ditches looking for her, or any, children. Usually the story is told with the intentions of keeping kiddies away from the ditches, so they won't drown."
The Encyclopedia of Ghosts and Spirits by Rosemary Guiley tells a more traditional Mexican version, which occurs in Mexico City around 1550. According to legend, an indian princess fell in love with a Mexican nobleman. The nobleman promised to marry her, but betrayed her and married someone else instead. The ultimate result of this bit o' treachery is that the princess murdered her children in a fit of rage, with a knife given to her by the nobleman. Afterwards, she wandered the streets crying for her children, and was eventually hanged for her sins. Since then her ghost has been searching for her children.
Another interesting feature of the La Llorona legend is that it appears to have merged with the Vanishing Hitchhiker legend. La Llorona is reported by some to hitch a ride on a road near to the place where she drowned her children.
There is a scene in the 1987 movie Three Men and a Baby in which some people claim to have seen the ghostly figure of a small boy who was killed in the house in which the scene was filmed. In some variations, the boy's parents are said to have sued the movie studio, or the owners of the "house," for letting their boy's name be released to the press. There are also tales of other ghostly objects being seen throughout the movie, most notably a rifle pointing at the head of the "ghost boy."
That is the legend. Here are the facts. The scene in question was not shot in a house, but on a soundstage in a Hollywood studio. The "ghost boy" is in fact a life-sized cardboard cutout of Ted Danson (who stars in the film), which had been left in the background, presumably accidentally, by a crew member. This cutout is seen in full view in another scene in the movie.
There is no ghost boy. No boy ever died on the set, and no one involved with the movie was ever sued by the mythical parents of said ghost boy. No one appears to know how the legend started. Some have suggested it was a promotional scheme perpetrated by the producers of the film to get people to buy/rent/go see it. Most likely the flub was simply noticed by one or more innocent movie goers, who told a friend, or perhaps a newspaper...
This is a popular legend that you may remember from your childhood. The Mary Worth story--also known by such names as Bloody Mary and Mary Margaret--is popular at sleepovers. As the story goes, a beautiful young girl named Mary Worth suffered some sort of terrible, disfiguring accident (or occasionally the wounds are inflicted purposely by a jealous party). From then on, other people shun her due to her ugly face. In some versions she becomes a witch.
Now for the scary part. Supposedly if you say Mary Worth's name three (or five, or ten... it varies) times while looking into the mirror, Mary Worth will appear and scratch your face off or kill you. She is exacting a hideous revenge on the undeformed people who made fun of her in life.
The great Clive Barker movie Candyman is based on this sort of legend.
This legend is probably familiar to most readers. It is a dark and stormy night. A person driving sees a forlorn figure at the side of the road and decides to give him or her a lift. Usually the hitchhiker is a young woman in some sort of trouble... her prom date dumped her, or her car broke down. The driver gets to her house only to discover that his passenger has disappeared without a trace from the back seat of his car. He knocks on the door to the house, maybe to make sure the girl is ok, and the door is answered by the girl's parent. Eventually it comes out that the girl died some years ago, and every year on the anniversary of her death (or her birthday), the girl hitches a ride back home with a stranger.
There are many variations of this legend. Sometimes the girl appears to make it home safely, but the driver finds something the girl left behind in his car, and goes back to return it, thus lear- ning the truth about the girl. Sometimes the driver lends the girl his jacket or sweater, and goes back the next day to retrieve it. Often, he finds his jacket hung over the grave of the dead girl.
It is interesting to note that this legend has made it into many regional folklores. In Hawaii, for example, the hitchhiker is often said to be the goddess Pele. It has already been mentioned that La Llorona has also been connected with the story. In the Chicago area, the vanishing hitchhiker takes the form of Resurrection Mary.
Occasionally a reader will tell the following story, usually attributing it to a local site. Once, there was a tragic accident on a set of traintracks:
A busload of children was crossing the tracks, and could not get out of the way in time to avoid the approaching train. Now, if your car stalls out on the tracks, it will be pushed over the tracks to safety before the train hits you. The ghosts of the children have saved you, and sometimes you can see their small handprints in the dust on your car.
The most well-known example of this urban legend are the haunted traintracks in San Antonio, Texas, but it occurs elsewhere as well.
A reader writes the following about the San Antonio traintracks:
From: "Griselda Holguin" (Gholguin@theholmesgroup.com)
To: obiwan@ghosts.org
Subject: San Antonio myth
Date: Wednesday, August 11, 2004 1:20 PM
I lived in San Antonio TX, from 1993-1997. Here we heard of an old story where a school bus was run over by a train. This occurred in the 1920's. It is said that a school bus filled with students was having trouble and the bus came to a stop on the railroad tracks. As the driver tried to start the bus up again the train had whistled announcing the passing in a few minutes. The bus was not able to start and the train came in at full speed killing everyone in the bus.
The story now is that if you are having car trouble and your car stops on the railroad tracks, the children's spirits come from out of the bushes and they will push your vehicle over the railroad tracks. Being curious my ex-husband and I, alike others, went to the railroad tracks and proceeded to turn off our car and place it in neutral. The tracks are uphill. Not even five seconds pass when you begin to feel the car moving forward. Now, this can be confused with some type of scientifical explanation. Here's the catch. The car will go over the tracks at a pretty good speed. If you place any dirt, flour, baby powder on the car, you can see the hand prints all over your car. I have done it, and even though it is a relief to know you will never have any problems at the tracks there is still an erie feeling when you see all those innocent handprints on your car. If you ever go to San Antonio try this I can assure you, it never fails.
[end quote from Griselda]
This legend is often merged with ghostlight legends.
For an explanation of how things can appear to move "uphill", see the "Miscellaneous" section of the FAQ.
FAQ EXTRA: Another story about the San Antonio traintracks in the Story Archives.
The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 movie based on a Bell Witch style mythos invented by the film's director/writers Dan Myrick and Ed Sanchez. To make their movie, which was shot in pseudo-documentary style, seem more real and thus scarier, Myrick and Sanchez created a legendary figure called the "Blair Witch." They even crafted an elaborate history to surround the Witch. They then gave this invented legend to some hired actors, set them loose in the woods with a minimal supply of food, and filmed the actors (who ad-libbed all their lines) as they reacted to scary surprises set up by the two directors. The result is a quite frightening, and quite fictional film.
As word of the movie and its mythos spread, however, many people began to believe that the Blair Witch was a real legend and that the film footage was an actual documentary shot by students doing a real project. This is not the case. The actors starring in The Blair Witch Project are alive and well. There is not and never has been a Blair Witch legend in or around Burkittsville, Maryland. A town called Blair has never existed in that spot.
This is an interesting urban legend because it unfolded before our very eyes. It was both frustrating and amusing to watch it happen. There is no doubt that the popularity of the Bell Witch legend (see FAQ 3.3) has contributed to the spread of the Blair Witch story. It is probable that the two mythologies will become intertwined in the future; indeed, some believers have already concluded that the Blair and Bell witches are "related."
A SPECIAL NOTE: I have been contacted by several people who live in and around the town of Burkittsville, Maryland. For pity's sake, PLEASE don't go milling aimlessly around the town, as there is nothing to see there! And if you really can't stop yourself from visiting, please refrain from vandalism, littering, and other unsavory activities. The people of Burkittsville would REALLY appreciate it!
In yet another case of the general public's apparent desire for fiction to become reality, a rumor that Stephen King's miniseries Rose Red was based on a true story spread around the time of its release. Although the story was "inspired" by Sarah Winchester of Winchester Mansion fame, King invented the plotline for Rose Red and all its characters (including the house) himself. The story of Rose Red is "completely fictional and has no basis in actual Seattle history." (Source: HistoryLink.org) The mini-series was shot at a place called Thornewood Castle, which was selected to match the building in King's script... not the other way around. (Source: Thornewood Castle Inn and Gardens) Although Thornewood Castle is rumored to be haunted, none of the story of Rose Red was based on or inspired by Thornewood itself.
Ghostly goodies!
