“STRANGE ENCOUNTERS WITH THE BIZARRE MELONHEADS” and 5 More Truly Freaky Stories!

Find Weird Darkness wherever you listen to podcasts: https://weirddarkness.com/listen. #paranormal, #melonheads, #chronovisor, #shapeshifters, #phropheticdreams #truestories, #paranormalstories, #ghoststories, #horrorstories, #truecrime, #cryptids
Listen to ““STRANGE ENCOUNTERS WITH THE BIZARRE MELONHEADS” and 5 More Truly Freaky Stories!” on Spreaker.

IN THIS EPISODE: In parts of Africa it’s not the werewolf you need to look out for, but the were-hyena… and it’s almost always the local blacksmith that is the man behind the monster. (Lesser Known Morphing Monsters: The Shape-Shifter Hyena) *** Does the Vatican have a device that allows them to see in the past and the future? Some believe they do. And if it were to ever fall into the wrong hands, it could then create the “scariest dictatorship the world has ever seen.” (The Vatican’s Chronovisor) *** Some fathers will do whatever it takes to protect the virtue of their daughters. One man’s solution came at the end of an ax blade. (The Linville Murderer) *** A man believes the creature in his nightmares may be trying to speak with him. (Spirit Communicating Through My Dreams) *** A young girl is surprised to find the Easter Bunny visit her in the middle of the night. But many years later she learns it wasn’t either of her parents. (Easter Bunny Creeper) *** The stories range from the being inbred cretins running amok, to government created mutants, to escaped hydrocephalic patients from an insane asylum. What are the strange creatures people are seeing in the deep woods of Ohio? (Strange Encounters With The Bizarre Melonheads)
SOURCES AND ESSENTIAL WEB LINKS…
“Lesser Known Morphing Monsters: The Shape-Shifter Hyena” by Nick Redfern: http://bit.ly/2lNmfOq
“The Vatican’s Chronovisor” by Amando Flavio: http://bit.ly/2mh4Vl3
“The Linville Murderer” by Robert Wilhelm: http://bit.ly/2klRUWQ
“Spirit Communicating Through My Dreams” by Ari Lancaster: http://bit.ly/2mh4QxL
“The Easter Bunny Creeper” posted anonymously at WeirdDarkness.com: http://bit.ly/2lN3Wcb
“Strange Encounters With The Bizarre Melonheads” by Brent Swancer: http://bit.ly/2keM2hS
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PARTIAL TRANSCRIPT…..

Among all of the mysterious beasts, creatures, and monsters said to lurk in the wild places of our world there are occasionally those that go beyond the merely strange to plant themselves firmly into the territory of the almost absurd. Surely to be counted among the denizens of the domain of the patently outrageous are a type of nocturnal, large-headed beings that reportedly stalk rural roads in the northeast of the United States. These creatures are said to look more or less human, but with a sickly pallor and enormous, almost comically oversized craniums, often also mentioned as possessing sharp, shark-like teeth, that sit atop their slight, emaciated frames, and they wander about the forests surprising motorists, startling hikers, and sometimes downright terrifying people with their nightmarish visage. They’ve come to be known as the Melonheads.

I’m Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness.

SHOW OPEN=====

Welcome, Weirdos – I’m Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you’ll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and unexplained.

Coming up in this episode…

In parts of Africa it’s not the werewolf you need to look out for, but the were-hyena… and it’s almost always the local blacksmith that is the man behind the monster.

Does the Vatican have a device that allows them to see in the past and the future? Some believe they do. And if it were to ever fall into the wrong hands, it could then create the “scariest dictatorship the world has ever seen.”

Some fathers will do whatever it takes to protect the virtue of their daughters. One man’s solution came at the end of an ax blade.

A man believes the creature in his nightmares may be trying to speak with him.

A young girl is surprised to find the Easter Bunny visit her in the middle of the night. But many years later she learns it wasn’t either of her parents.

But first… the stories range from them being inbred cretins running amok, to government created mutants, to escaped hydrocephalic patients from an insane asylum. What are the strange creatures people are seeing in the deep woods of Ohio? We begin there.

If you’re new here, welcome to the show! While you’re listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com for merchandise, my newsletter, enter contests, to connect with me on social media, plus, you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you’re struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com.

Now.. bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness!

STORY: MELONHEADS=====

Such tales of something very bizarre lurking in the woods come to us from the wilds of the state of Ohio, where we have stories of an incredibly strange tribe of pale, bulbous headed, freakish looking cannibals that have long been said to stalk rural areas in and around Kirtland and Chardon, Ohio, and have come to be known as the Melonheads. These creatures are said to look more or less human, but with a sickly pallor and enormous, almost comically oversized craniums, often also mentioned as possessing sharp, shark-like teeth, that sit atop their slight, emaciated frames, and they wander about the forests surprising motorists, startling hikers, and sometimes downright terrifying people with their nightmarish visage. The supposed origins of this odd tale are murky to say the least, and there are many versions of how the Melonheads, also commonly written as “Melon Heads,” came to be, but the most popular is perhaps of a group of orphaned children that came to be the subjects of a dark and twisted scientific experiment gone awry.

According to this version of the story, a mad scientist by the name of Dr. Crow came into the possession of these abandoned children by unspecified means, and proceeded to take them out to a secluded facility in the middle of the rural woods near Kirtland, Ohio, in order to perform demented medical experiments on them. Depending on the version of this particular story, the children’s heads then became deformed and misshapen due to either the effects of the mysterious experiments or the fact that they already had a condition known as hydrocephalus, which causes a buildup of fluid in the brain. These deformed children went mad from whatever was being done to them, and escaped into the woods, again depending on the version either from sneaking out or with the help of Dr. Crow’s wife, who had become sympathetic with their plight. One permutation of this tale is that Dr. Crow’s wife died and in their sorrowful tantrum the children knocked over a lamp to burn the cabin down in a fiery inferno. In this story, the Melonheads are either the descendants of these freakish mutants or are the ghosts of the children eternally wandering the wilderness.

Another version of the Melonheads’ origin is a more straightforward story of a top-secret government project which was doing experiments out in the wilds of Lake County for who knows what nefarious purpose. In this scenario, the subjects underwent some sort of drastic experiments on their brains, which caused them to become ballooned and deformed. These subjects over time craved some sort of contact with the outside world, and are said to have escaped to make their way to civilization. Unfortunately, they soon realized that civilization did not want anything to do with them and their hideous visages, and so the forlorn freaks trudged back out into the wilderness to live forever in seclusion. The government, not wanting to create a widespread panic, did what any sinister government does in a good conspiracy theory and covered it up. Still other stories say they are the inbred descendants of a renegade band of witches who escaped into the forests to get away from persecution in colonial days.

Whatever they are, stories of these bizarre entities with their freakishly oversized heads prowling the woods of Ohio have persisted for years, and indeed the legend has spread beyond borders to both Michigan and Connecticut, which each have their own versions of the story ranging from that they are inbred cretins running amok, to government created mutants, to escaped hydrocephalic patients from an insane asylum. In most traditions, these strange entities are said to still live out in the wilderness, often haunting remote, rural roads, and have kept their numbers steady over the years through continued inbreeding, which has made them even more insane and alien looking.

Depending on the version of the tale these Melonheads are either shy and glimpsed only briefly, or that they are ravenous, vicious little monsters that will attack anyone who gets too near, and they are for the most part said to be best avoided. No matter what they are or where they reside, the Melonheads are very often purportedly not at all pleasant to be around. They are supposedly quite aggressive, feral creatures said to come out at night under the cover of darkness to roam the wilds hunting and getting into mischief, and it is said they are responsible for the mutilated bodies of animals sometimes allegedly found in the deep backwoods. They are also said to terrorize or even kill and eat people who wander into their territory from time to time, even each other on occasion, with those who have disappeared in Melonhead country sometimes said to have fallen victim to the vile creatures.

Stories and reports of eyewitness account of encountering these outlandish beings are numerous. One popular tale is that of a group of teenagers who were traveling through prime Melonhead territory in Wickliffe, Ohio in 1964, when they passed by one of the bizarre creatures standing by the side of the road just staring at them. When they slowed the car down to get a better look the creature scurried off into the wilderness and the teens decided to give chase. They made their way through the brush and trees until they allegedly came to a clearing in which sat an old-fashioned house with an older couple sitting leisurely on the porch with several of the Melonheads milling about them in a surreal scene none of the teens could quite believe.

One of the teens asked the man what was going on, and he wove a bizarre tale indeed. He apparently told the teens that he had once been a nuclear scientist during World War II, and that the radiation he had constantly been exposed to had caused his children to be born deformed with their bulbous heads. He claimed that the government had paid him to keep quiet about it and relocated him their into the remote area along with his wife and the mutated children, where they would be kept away from normal society. The man made them promise not to tell of the location of the house and sent them on their way.

Of course, teens being teens they supposedly immediately told all of their friends about how they had run into the legendary Melonheads, and a group of them went out to find them. As they drove along the lonely road towards the house they then apparently were stopped by a large group of police officers, which was surprising as they were in the middle of nowhere. The cops asked what they were doing out there and when the subject of Melonheads came up the police adamantly insisted that this was just an urban legend and that they had best head back. When the teens refused they were then allegedly taken to the police station and their parents came to pick them up. The teens would later claim that they had been doing nothing wrong and that they had just been driving minding their own business, making them suspect that a cover-up was going on.

Bizarre reports like this have come in sporadically all the way up to more modern times. In an account published in Weird U.S.: Your Travel Guide to America’s Local Legends and Best Kept Secrets, in 2001 a witness known only as “Tony” claims that he had been out traveling the dark roads of Melonhead territory in Chardon, Ohio, actively trying to find any truth to the legends. Up until then he had driven back and forth along these remote roads and found nothing except the still dark and quiet trees of the forest, but as he was about to leave he claims that he looked out the window to have seen one of the creatures running alongside the car going around 40 to 50 mph. Interestingly, rather than being a short, dwarfed being as the legends say, he described this one as standing perhaps 5’7”, although with the same spindly limbs and outsized heads as in the lore. The creature apparently kept pace with the vehicle for a time before veering off back into the woods. He would say of the incident thus:

It didn’t look anything like I’ve heard in the stories. He looked about the same height as me (5’7″), was wearing brown pants which were very ripped up and where the seams would be, it was held together by what looked like corn husk. It wore a white shirt with brown and red stains all over it (hoping that the red stains weren’t blood). Its head was a very light-brown tint. It had two holes in the sides of its head which think were ears. Its head was swelled up and its eyes where very big looking. Just as we turned a curve it jumped into the woods. That is my story of the Melonheads.

In yet another relatively recent account a woman named Kelly Topp-Bedrosian claims that she had a run-in with the Melonheads as she was poking around the abandoned Felt Mansion, in Laketown Township in Allegan County, Michigan. While exploring the ruins of the old estate with some friends, she says that she happened to spy a man standing some distance away, and that she soon realized that there was something rather off about him. His head seemed to be larger than it should be, and then he began walking towards them. She would say of the rest of the encounter:

Not knowing who this man could be, my friend yelled, ‘Hello!’ to try and be friendly, but all we got was a loud grunt and the man continued to walk towards us, but now at a faster pace. At this point the same idea hit all of us and we all started sprinting towards our car. We scrambled in and peeled out of the parking lot at full speed not slowing down until we were several miles from the mansion.

Another account, this time from the Creepy Cleveland archives, was posted in 2009 by a witness who calls himself Jay B. He claims that as a child he used to live by the woods on Wisner Road, Ohio, near a place called the Lundgren barn. It was here that he would have his unusual encounter, which he would describe thus:

It was an early Autumn night around 10:00pm when I heard my dog bark and I ran outside to see what was going on. When I went outside to see what the commotion was all about I found my dog lying there bleeding. I looked towards the woods and saw what I believed to be a small figure with very pale skin and a large head. When the creature saw me it ran into the woods. I went out the next morning and followed the tracks but they stopped near a creek.

It is worth noting that Wisner Road in Kirkland, Ohio, is a notorious hotspot for Melonhead sightings. Indeed, certain roads have become known as being magnets for Melonhead activity, where sightings are especially frequent and mutilated animals can supposedly be sometimes found strewn about the vicinity. Another of these roads, which is probably the most famous of the “Melonhead Roads” of all is a road called Velvet Street, which runs through Trumbull and Monroe, Connecticut and is more well-known for its sinister nickname “Dracula Drive.” There have been scores of alleged Melonhead encounters along this road, and one of the more dramatic was one written of in Joseph Citro’s book Weird New England.

The account comes from the 1980s, when a group of girls named Megan, Sue, Kim, Deb, Jen and Karen were out on a joyride one Friday night. The group decided to take a ride down Dracula Drive for kicks, knowing full well about all of the dark folklore of Melonheads that orbited it. As they turned onto the secluded road none of them thought they would actually see one of the beasts, and they even parked their car to get out and explore. It would apparently be decision they would soon regret.

As they walked down the road giggling and trying to spook each other with scary stories they allegedly heard the door of their car open, after which it started up and then actually came driving towards them, the mysterious thief obscured by the dark and the blinding headlights. The car barreled towards them, forcing them to jump off into the tree line, and when they looked around they would finally see the car thieves within as the vehicle passed. They were described as child-sized humanoids dressed in ragged clothes and with humongous heads and wide eyes that glowed with an orange light. The creatures could be heard giggling maniacally as the car sped past and off into the night, never to be seen again.

Surely the bizarre notion of tribes of pale, vicious cannibals with oversized heads lurking in dark forests killing animals and humans seems like it must be pure urban legend and absurdity, and it likely is, yet this has not stopped people from continuing to report sightings of them from time to time, and indeed there are many who swear they are real. Urban legend or something else, the Melonheads are certainly one of the weirder mystery monsters out there.

BREAK===

When Weird Darkness returns… In parts of Africa it’s not the werewolf you need to look out for, but the were-hyena… and it’s almost always the local blacksmith that is the man behind the monster.

Plus… A young girl is surprised to find the Easter Bunny visit her in the middle of the night. But many years later she learns it wasn’t either of her parents.

But first… Does the Vatican have a device that allows them to see in the past and the future? Some believe they do. And if it were to ever fall into the wrong hands, it could then create the “scariest dictatorship the world has ever seen.” We’ll learn about the Vatican’s Chronovisor up next.

STORY: VATICAN CHRONOVISOR=====

Conspiracy theories will continue to live with humanity, probably until the end of mankind on earth. Of course, not every theory stands the chance of being true, but remember the old saying that in every rumor, there is a little bit of truth.

At the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church, the Vatican has been embroiled in many conspiracy theories. One of these theories is that the Vatican has a secret device called the Chronovisor, which it uses to look into past and future events.

In the late 19th century, the English author H. G. Wells published his science fiction novel The Time Machine. Although the work was fiction, it attracted interest in both the scientific and pseudo-science community. The novel became popular to the extent that some physicists believed traveling through time is possible.

Although time travel still remains a controversy among the scientific community today, some scientists have proven the mission possible. In 2015, a group of scientists from the University of Queensland, Australia simulated how time-travelling photons might behave; suggesting that, at the quantum level, the grandfather paradox – which makes time travel impossible – could be resolved. The study used photons – single particles of light – to simulate quantum particles travelling back through time. By studying their behavior, the scientists revealed possible strange aspects of modern physics, concluding that time travel is possible.

Having established this fact within the modern-day scientific community, the Vatican’s Chronovisor rumor appears to have the element of truth. In May 1972, an Italian newspaper published an article titled “A machine that photographs the past has finally been invented.” The article alleged that the machine capable of this extraordinary task is called the Chronovisor, and was invented by Vatican insiders.

The article further revealed that the device enables its user to observe future as well as past events, and that the machine the Vatican possessed is one of the greatest guarded secrets humanity has ever had. This article was the first to shed light on the Chronovisor publicly. But as for those familiar with activities that go on inside the Vatican, the article wasn’t surprising.

According to details of the article, many scientists contributed to the building of the Chronovisor in the 1950s under strict supervision of the Vatican. Father Pellegrino Maria Ernetti, an Italian physicist who later became a priest, is said to have led the project. He received technical and important information from Nobel laureate Enrico Fermi and the famous rocket scientist, Wernher von Braun.

The article described the machine as a small object that is equipped with a number of antennas, composing entirely of precious alloys, cathode tubes, some dials, and levers. The device is capable of capturing specific locations, important events in the past and those that are yet to come.

In 1997, the German author Peter Krassa revealed more details of the Chronovisor in his book ‘Father Ernetti’s Chronovisor: The Creation and Disappearance of the World’s First Time Machine’. Krassa had a personal encounter with Father Ernetti before his [Ernetti] death in 1994.

The priest told Krassa that he had in fact invented the machine. Father Ernetti confirmed that he used his machine to witness the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, and other major historical events, including the founding of Rome in 753 B.C. He also claimed to have attended a performance of a previously unknown play by the Roman playwright Quintus Ennius by the help of the machine.

According to Krassa, Ernetti said he used the machine to witness the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, as well as witnessing Napoleon, the Roman philosopher Cicero and other great and momentous historical and biblical episodes.

However, when asked about the whereabouts of this amazing device, Father Ernetti refused to answer, saying he was not allowed to talk about the location or whether the device was still being used or not.

Apart from what Krassa published, others who were close to father Ernetti speculated that father Ernetti himself decided to dismantle the machine due to fear of the machine falling into the wrong hands.

Father Ernetti is reported to have said if the Chronovisor fell into the wrong hands, it could then create the “scariest dictatorship the world has ever seen.”

Another source also quoted Father Ernetti as saying “Pope Pius XII forbade us to do disclose any details about this device because the machine was very dangerous. It can restrain the freedom of man…”

The Vatican later denied links with the machine, warning that “anyone using, an instrument of such characteristics would be excommunicated.” This warning prompted many conspiracy theorists to believe the church is hiding the Chronovisor from the rest of the world.

Whether this is true or not, the Chronovisor rumor still hangs around the neck of the Vatican, refusing to disappear. Do you believe the Vatican has no knowledge of the machine, or do you believe the rumor?

STORY: MORPHING MONSTERS=====

The United Kingdom is home to the eerie, body-morphing creature known as the Phantom Black Dog. On rare occasions people have describe the mysterious, red-eyed dogs taking on multiple forms, including large cats and even bear-like animals. And walking upright, no less. The United States has its very own supernatural equivalent of the Phantom Black Dog. It’s the morphing and mysterious coyote. Far less well known is a somewhat similar creature that lurks and roams within the continent of Africa. It is known as the were-hyena. It’s a beast that some believe is actually a human who becomes a hyena. Others, meanwhile, teach that it is a hyena which has the ability to take on human form. Before we get to the matter of the supernatural hyena, though, let us first take a look at its regular, normal equivalent.

Widespread across East Africa and South Africa, the hyena is a formidable and highly dangerous animal, one which will not think twice about attacking, killing, and even eating, people if it comes down to it. Muscular and athletic, the hyena can reach a height of around three feet and can live for up to twenty-five years. Now, we’ll examine the far stranger side of the hyena; the one which is dominated by the undeniably strange matter of morphing from one form to another.

As far as the morphing beast of Africa is concerned, it is East Africa and North Africa where the creature is predominantly said to dwell. One of the most visible of the various bodies of African were-hyenas is that which is known as the Bultungin. It voraciously and savagely hunts in the vicinity of Lake Chad, which borders upon northern Nigeria. In 1883, Gerald Massey wrote of this particular controversy in The Natural Genesis: “In the Kanuri language of Bornu (Africa), the name of the hyena is Bultu, and from this is formed the verb bultungin, which signifies ‘I transform myself into a hyena.’ There is a town named Kabultinoa, the inhabitants of which are said to possess this faculty of transformation.”

Massey was of the opinion that this belief could be explained away in wholly down to earth fashion, and as a result of “the donning of the hyena skin in their religious masquerade.” But, is that all there is to it: rites and rituals and nothing else at all? Not according to the locals, it’s not. Far from it. Throughout Morocco, the Lake Chad area, and Tanzania, there is an intriguing belief that each and every blacksmith has the ability to take on the form of a hyena – chiefly as a result of the same blacksmiths also being experts in the fields of magic and sorcery.

Whereas the werewolf traditionally surfaces when the moon is full, the blacksmith-turned-were-hyena is limited to activity during daylight hours. Interestingly, in Tanzania there is a longstanding belief that witches travel on the backs of supernatural spotted hyenas, late at night, and in much the same fashion that the traditional European witch takes to the skies on the traditional broomstick.

Moving on, we have the were-hyena of the Republic of Mali, in West Africa. The republic is home to a secret society known as the Kore. Jurgen W. Frembgen says – in “The Magicality of the Hyena: Beliefs and Practices in West and South Asia” – that members of the society, “‘become’ hyenas by using zoomorphic helmet masks and playing dramatic roles, both of which refer to the dirty habits, trickiness, and nastiness of the animal mentioned above; they may also be used to invoke fear among the participants.”

Real shape-shifting hyenas, or tales born out of graphic, violent rites and rituals? The question remains wide open and is very much dependent on belief-systems.

STORY: EASTER CREEPER=====

When I was younger, I used to live by the woods and could see a cemetery from my back porch. One Easter I remember waking up and seeing the Easter bunny and what really gets me is I remember smelling the wet hay. When I woke up I didn’t tell anyone, but there was an extra Easter egg in my house that my parents didn’t hide.

Years later when I was in high school, I asked my parents if they ever dressed up like the Easter bunny and came into our room, they said they would never go through so much trouble. Then my younger sister, who I shared a bunk bed with when this happened, said she remembers when the Easter bunny came into our room and made a remark about the hay smell. I was terrified that we both remembered seeing a person dressed as a bunny in our room. To make it even stranger, I told the friends I sat with at lunch what happened. One of the girls was my neighbor across the street. She told me one Easter a long time ago, she looked out her window during the night and saw the Easter bunny standing in her driveway. I had chills. To this day I am terrified of people in rabbit costumes.

BREAK=====

Coming up… Some fathers will do whatever it takes to protect the virtue of their daughters. One man’s solution came at the end of an ax blade.

And… A man believes the creature in his nightmares may be trying to speak with him.

These stories, when Weird Darkness returns!

STORY: LINVILLE MURDERER=====

Thursday, December 13, 1877, began as an ordinary day for Alfred Jones, a 72-year-old farmer in Linville, Ohio. He walked to Brownsville and returned home about 11:00, had lunch, sat down to relax and dozed off. He awoke when he heard the sound of squeaking shoes coming from the back porch—he had heard that sound before and thought it meant his daughter was up to no good.

Jones went out the back porch and caught a glimpse of someone disappearing down the ravine behind the house. He followed after and met his daughter, Susanna, coming back up the hill carrying three large flat stones she planned to use as stepping stones in a marshy area near the house.

41-year-old Susana had never married. After her mother died twenty-one years earlier, she stayed to keep house for her father. She had recently joined the Lutheran Church against her father’s wishes and he suspected that she was inappropriately intimate with several of their married neighbors.

Jones helped his daughters carry the stones up the hill, then suddenly turned and said, “You had a man over there!”

“Father, you accuse me wrong,” she replied.

Enraged, Jones picked up a hatchet lying nearby and began assaulting Susana with it. She warded off the blows and managed to run about 50 yards before he caught up to her. After a brief struggle, Jones overpowered Susana, raining blows with the hatchet until she lay dead in a pool of blood.

He hid the bloody hatchet under the house and put his blood-stained coat and shirt in an ash barrel. Inside the house, he cleaned up and put on his best clothes, then walked twelve miles into town where he surrendered to Sheriff Scofield.

At first, the Sheriff and his men laughed at the old man confessing to murder, thinking he must be drunk. Jones denied that he was drunk, saying, “I’m a Virginian, and it’s Virginia grit when a man has broken the law to give himself up and suffer the penalty.” The sheriff took Jones into custody then went out to his farm to see for himself. He found Susana dead on the ground and he and his men located the hatchet and bloody clothes.

Alfred Jones was indicted for first-degree murder but it was assumed that he was insane. Neighbors had known Susana Jones as an industrious, amiable and intelligent woman who took good care of her father. There was not the slightest ground for her father’s suspicion of adultery. But Jones remained convinced that his daughter had done wrong and used the Bible to justify killing her. He said he had read the scriptures three times and they declared whoever committed adultery should be put to death. It was his duty to kill her. While acknowledging the enormity of his crime, Jones showed no remorse. He asked the sheriff if he would be compelled to pay for his board and lodging while in prison and thought it best if he were hanged as soon as possible. The Stark County Democrat said, “Alfred Jones, the Linville murderer, if not a lunatic is an idiot.”

At his trial the following April, Jones was treated as sane but was not sentenced to death. He was convicted of second-degree murder and spent the remainder of his life in the penitentiary.

STORY: SPIRIT DREAMS===

I’ve been having some nightmares lately involving a man standing at the bottom of my bed. I can’t see his face but can make out his outline. He doesn’t move. He just stands at the bottom of my bed. I presume he is staring at me?

When I wake up in the morning I can vividly remember the dream. It has been happening for several weeks. I have also started to notice that little things have been happening around the house. I live alone, and I woke up last Thursday to find that the fridge door was wide open. I also found my wallet had been moved, and I’ve been noticing tapping and creaking sounds at night. I never noticed these things before and I do feel they’re connected to my dream.

The house I live in isn’t old. It’s a new building. I don’t know anything about the history of the area. Is it possible for a spirit to want to get in touch with me via my dreams?

SHOW CLOSE, CREDITS, A LITTLE LIGHT, AND A FINAL THOUGHT==========

Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please share it with someone you know who loves the paranormal or strange stories, true crime, monsters, or unsolved mysteries like you do! And please leave a rating and review of the show in the podcast app you listen from! You can email me anytime with your questions or comments at darren@weirddarkness.com. WeirdDarkness.com is also where you can find all of my social media, listen to audiobooks I’ve narrated, shop the Weird Darkness store, sign up for monthly contests, find other podcasts that I host, and find the Hope in the Darkness page if you or someone you know is struggling with depression or dark thoughts. Also on the website, if you have a true paranormal or creepy tale to tell, you can click on TELL YOUR STORY. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com.

All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true (unless stated otherwise) and you can find source links or links to the authors in the show notes.

“Lesser Known Morphing Monsters: The Shape-Shifter Hyena” by Nick Redfern

“The Vatican’s Chronovisor” by Amando Flavio

“The Linville Murderer” by Robert Wilhelm

“Spirit Communicating Through My Dreams” by Ari Lancaster

“The Easter Bunny Creeper” posted anonymously at WeirdDarkness.com

“Strange Encounters With The Bizarre Melonheads” by Brent Swancer

WeirdDarkness™ – is a production and trademark of Marlar House Productions. Copyright, Weird Darkness, 2022.

Now that we’re coming out of the dark, I’ll leave you with a little light… “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.” – 1 Peter 4:8

And a final thought… “I just read, ‘Behind every successful person is a pack of haters.’ So if you could all please start hating me now, I’d greatly appreciate it.”

I’m Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.