 Ads heard during the podcast that are not in my voice are placed by third-party agencies outside of my control and should not imply an endorsement by Weird Darkness or myself. Stories and content in Weird Darkness can be disturbing for some listeners and is intended for mature audiences only. Parental discretion is strongly advised. Picture it. Your sound asleep. Deep in slumber when it happens. You wake up. Completely paralyzed. A menacing presence hanging over you. Crushing weight on your chest. Perhaps you see a creature in your room. A dark mass on your bed. Or as some describe it, an old hag sitting on your chest. Sleep paralysis demons they say have entered your home. Horrified you try and scream but you can't. This evil entity is holding you down. The only way out of this is through and you have to lie there in complete horror until this being decides to go away. I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Welcome, Weirdos. 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. It was the single most destructive fire in American history. On October 8, 1871, a large portion of the Midwest burned to the ground. But this wasn't the Great Chicago Fire. You could say their story is a long and fishy tale. Mermaids have been in folklore and myths throughout history and with stories of them being found worldwide. But first, it feels like a demon trapping you inside your own body. For some, it's a faceless entity trying to suffocate them. For others, it's a creepy old witch with long, dirty claws. Others believe it's alien abduction and some even see the face of dead relatives during these attacks. However, it happens, whatever is seen or felt, whatever the truth of the phenomenon may be, sleep paralysis is always terrifying. 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, to visit sponsors you hear about during the show, sign up for my newsletter and or contests. 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. Sleep paralysis is a fairly common occurrence that afflicts many people. It is most commonly explained as a feeling of being paralyzed while lying in bed, during which time auditory and visual hallucinations might also occur. Some people see human-like figures or even creatures and hear voices or other strange unsettling sounds. Far more intense than your average nightmare, sleep paralysis experiences can deeply terrify and disturb sufferers. Samuel Johnson coined the original definition of sleep paralysis in his book A Dictionary of the English Language as Nightmare, a term that evolved into our modern definition. In Old English, the name for these sleep paralysis demons was Mare from a pharaoh-germatic word Maren and Old Norse Mare, hence the Mare part of the word Nightmare. Different cultures have different explanations for sleep paralysis demons. Canadian-innovate folklore has sleep paralysis demons that are attributed to the spells of shamans. In Japanese folklore, a vengeful spirit that suffocates enemies in their sleep. Fijian folklore. In Fiji, the experience is interpreted as kana-tavoro or being eaten by a demon. In many cases, the demon can be the spirit of a recently dead relative who has come back to some unfinished business. Eastern Chinese folklore. It's thought that a mouse can steal human breath at night. Human breath strengthens the mouse, allowing it longevity and the ability to become human at night. The mouse sits near a person's face or under their nostrils, stealing their air. Mongolian culture. Nightmares in general and sleep paralysis are referred to by the phrase car-de-roc, which means to be pressed by the black or when the dark presses. Brazilian folklore. The demon has a name in Brazilian folklore, Pisa de Eta, which is Portuguese for she who steps. She's a crone with long fingernails who lurks on rooftops at night and then walks on the chests of people who sleep belly up on a full stomach. The United States. During the Salem witch trials, several people reported night-time attacks by various alleged witches, including Bridget Bishop, that may have been caused by sleep paralysis. In many parts of the southern United States, the phenomenon is known as a hag or old hag, and the event is said to tell of an approaching tragedy or accident, a bad omen, if you will. Across cultures and centuries, the strange sensation of sleep paralysis has been described. Even back in 1664, a Dutch physician published a case of a woman with sleep paralysis. He stated that the devil lay upon her and held her down. Countless other cultures have stories of these happenings. Are these demons real? For some, yes, the paralysis is real. It's called sleep paralysis, and the phenomenon of seeing something while experiencing sleep paralysis is also real. It's called a hypnagogic or hypnopompic hallucination. These hallucinations occur when you wake up during the dream phase of sleep. During this period, your brain turns off the signals to the rest of your body to keep it from moving or acting out your dreams. Vivid dream-like experiences referred to as hypnagogic or hypnopompic hallucinations can seem real and are often frightening. They may be mistaken for nightmares, which can occur while falling asleep, hypnagogic, or while waking up, hypnopompic. During these hallucinations, you may see scary people or creatures near you or even lie in your bed, and they are often accompanied by sleep paralysis. These hallucinations can happen if you are partially conscious during the REM cycle of sleep. In that state, you're looking at the real world but also dreaming, the perfect recipe for seeing things that aren't there. It's estimated that anywhere from 1.7 to 40% of people experience sleep paralysis, but not everyone experiences the demons that come along with it. While there are ways to avoid sleep paralysis, it cannot always be avoided. It's said that keeping a regular sleep schedule, not eating right before bed, and not sleeping on your back are a few ways to avoid a visit from a hag, demon, or hallucination. While science can explain the phenomenon, many people, yours truly included, believe that the paralysis is caused by another worldly entity, an evil spirit out to cause fear and harm. Now, let's hear from some of those who have lived through the nightmare of sleep paralysis. From Redditor Hobshanker. I've had quite a few, from just feelings of a presence to a full-blown figure. Sometimes there are voices, sometimes it is dead silent, but the masked man was in another league of bone chilling. It started with me waking up to a deep-throated chuckling. Having been one of my later experiences of sleep paralysis, I knew immediately that that's what it was. I resigned myself to another sleepless, creepy night when the door opened. A man stepped through in a mask as red as blood. The mask itself was demonic in nature, with big underfangs like abores, with unnatural outlandish twists and turns in the cheeks and a deep-set wrinkled brow. But the worst part were the eyes. His violet serpentine eyes bulged out of the mask. They looked like they were about to pop. He was wearing a rich-colored brown robe with a hood pulled up covering the rest of his head, drawing all attention to the mask and those dreadful eyes. He pulled a squirming burlap sack behind him and he stopped when he got to the foot of my bed. He stared at me for a long moment and then reached in the bag. One by one he pulled everyone I had ever loved, cared about or considered a friend. Each time he pulled them out he positioned them so I was looking directly into their eyes. And he took his hand, a gnarled, bony thing with skin drawn so tight it looked as if it had none at all, and drew his long, sharp nails across their throats, spilling torrents of blood at my feet. I had to watch the life drain out of the eyes of everyone I had ever truly known, and deep in those eyes I could see terror mixing with pity in each and every one of them. And only after his bag was empty did he let it drop and he began walking around my bed. He stopped as he towered over me, leaning down he reached to me and gently stroked my face with his bloodstained nail. With his other hand he reached and pulled off his mask. I cannot honestly put into words what I saw beneath that mask. It was an ever-changing face of horror. It twisted and squirmed and never remained still for long and each facial reconstruction was more terrifying than the last. As I looked into his violent, serpentine eyes he spoke to me. I still remember the words well enough to quote them verbatim, but as they were profoundly disturbing and personal in nature I do not care to repeat them to anyone. But the last thing he said was, enjoy the time you have left because soon your life will be mine and your soul as well. And as he said this, his face finally settled onto a single form. It was my own face. From Redditor GodweenSatan This happened when I was 6, 20 years ago, and I still remember it vividly because I haven't gone more than a couple months without replaying it back in my head. I remember waking up from a creepy dream and lying in bed for a minute. Then my mom opened the door and I could see her silhouette. Was she there to comfort me possibly? She didn't say anything. She then eerily waddled, hobbled into my room and started looking a little more creepy. She looked a little like a creature from where the wild things are. I could see only the dark outline of her body and head, but her hair appeared messy and her head looking larger than normal. I was on the top bunk. My baby sister was asleep below. My mom stood at my bed. Her head was about level with my own. She stood there for a minute at the side of my bunk bed and I could begin to sense that things were weird. She then reached out and started tickling me a little. I wasn't freaked out quite yet. Then I began to feel uncomfortable, but the tickling intensified. She began grunting quietly, almost as if she was murmuring something. Finally, I was trying to tell her to stop, but of course words were impossible to form. The tickling intensified until she was scratching and jabbing and digging at my torso. By then, the grunting had eventually grown into a deep growling and howling. I couldn't move or make any noise. Why wouldn't my little sister wake up and help me? Scariest thing that's ever happened to me. From Redditor Jellybean's Skittle. I suffered a terrible accident involving being kicked in the face by a horse, which resulted in my jaw being broken. Two plates and a wired jaw later, I was pretty hangry and exhausted. I'd suffered from sleep paralysis before, but nothing to the extent after this accident. It occurred every night, sometimes multiple times, for months on end. We have a mirrored wardrobe next to our bed, my side, of course, and I keep the bedroom door open. Quite often, I would be just falling off to sleep when I would feel the dread wash over me, followed by the feeling of someone being in the room. I would then feel like something was pulling me off my bed by my arm toward the mirror, then the nightmares progressed to being dragged off the bed by my back, all whilst feeling choked, unable to scream or move, unable to get my husband's attention who lay next to me. Extremely unnerving and upsetting, to the point I would fear sleep. My husband told me that I had been sleepwalking and I had no recollection of this. He'd found me in the hallway a few times, really upsetting. After a post on Reddit, it was suggested that we cover the mirror. It did help curb the amount of experiences for a while until I returned to work where the nightmares lessened. Recently, the sleep paralysis has returned, but interestingly, some of my daily headaches and migraines. I'm able to sometimes let out a sound whilst trying to scream while my husband then is able to wake me out of it. My most recent experience has been of a black figure, think person covered head to toe in skin-tight black lycra, who's trying to drag me from the bed by my face, incredibly frightening. In this state, it feels like it's almost in slow motion and I'm trying to crawl my fingers across the bed to my husband to wake him, but it's impossible. I find it interesting that most of us who experience this tell of the same figure. From Redditor, I'm not crab. I've only had one experience and it was terrifying. I woke up in the middle of the night and had the usual symptoms. However, I was sleeping facing the door, which was open. You know, lady in full black appeared and stared at me for what felt like an hour. Finally, before I regained motion, the woman screamed and lunged at me, and I woke up. From a former Redditor, I almost always have them when I sleep on my back during the night, so the most terrifying time was when I slept on my chest during the daylight hours on my couch in the living room. I thought that it was a coward that it only came in the dark of the night, but it came back to prove me wrong. Every single incident was at night except this one. My wife and I were arguing on the way home from church, and she took the kids to her mother's for the day so we could both calm down. I chose to take a nap, laying on my chest with my head turned to the left, away from the sunlight from my living room windows. I woke around 2pm, unable to move, only this time I felt that my right leg was slightly elevated. Each of my experiences beforehand were different and that I was being held down and choked by a dark silhouette. I would try to yell, but nothing would come out. I would panic and begin to pray, and then it would let me go and leave. This time, though, it dragged me off the couch and was yanking me violently with my face down in broad daylight where I could not see it. I truly thought this thing was finally going to kill me. I am a 33-year-old man in good health who is not scared easily, but in that moment I thought I would never see my children again. I prayed that God would protect me, and He did. A veil of darkness lifted from the room from where I was on the floor. I could see the sunlight from the window shift forward several inches. There was a handprint on my ankle from where it grabbed me and dragged me. It had five fingers like the hands of a man. I had a large terrier mix at the time and he was clawing at the back door and growling like I had never heard him do before. I let him in the house and he was snarling and bearing his teeth, running from room to room chasing something that I could not see, but had heavy footsteps on my wooden floor. I watched my dog chase after this thing to the corner of my yard and it wasn't until he came back that I realized my dog almost clawed halfway through a two-inch-dick wooden door trying to get in to protect me. I blessed my home with oil that same day and I haven't had trouble since. That was in 2012. My dog passed a year later of old age, but I got my girls a Rhodesian Ridgeback named Jax and he sleeps in their room every night. I'd rather he be there with them if this thing ever returns. From Redditor Blackfeather. My first experience was in junior high and has continued to sporadically occur throughout my life. I'm 25 now. The worst experience I've ever had happened after I graduated high school and moved into my grandfather's old house after he passed. I had a couple of roommates who were out and decided to take an afternoon nap. I knew as soon as I shut my eyes what was going to happen, but I never could have imagined how intense it would be. The music I had playing in the background began to morph until it was nothing but the sound of unknown voices screaming and crying in pain. I had fallen asleep on my side, facing a pair of doors leading into my walk-in closet which slowly began to creak open and give me a glimpse of complete darkness surrounding a pair of ruby eyes staring gleefully at me. As the doors continued to open inch by inch, the piercing cries intensified and I was able to pick out the word hell being repeatedly screamed. I managed to jerk myself out of it just before the doors opened halfway and I wasted no time bolting out of bed to the safety of my front yard. Feeling the sun on my skin and seeing the neighbors' kids playing in the street had never felt so good. From a former Redditor. It happened once in my sister's room. I was lying on my back and noticed a dark figure jumping from wall to wall. Alone it wasn't the most terrifying experience. I have sleep paralysis often, so I didn't even bother telling anyone else. The next week I was sitting at the table with my sister and she told me she had a weird dream, her first time with sleep paralysis and she described the exact figure in detail. From Redditor Okuro 9. Similarly, during one of the darkest times of my life, I awoke in my room to a feeling of great pressure and a sense of evil. It sounds cliched and difficult to describe, but a real thick, heavy energy in the air which instinctively told me there was some kind of malevolent presence in close proximity to me. It was the middle of the afternoon, so there was enough light to really get a good look. I was in the state described above, mind awake, eyes open, but body asleep slash paralyzed. After staring in anticipation and horror for what seemed like a few minutes at the entrance to my room, it came. I see a figure slowly struggling to walk through the doorway, a very old woman, sunken eyes, long grey hair, skinny to the point that the skin looked barely attached to bone and naked, her ribs were sunken in. A sense of complete dread overwhelmed me as I saw this woman make her way awkwardly towards me. There was definitely a sexual component to it. It took every ounce of strength and willpower to shake myself awake as this thing made its way half on top of me, very much like the way that dementors were depicted sucking out the life of people in Harry Potter years later. It was like I had to push a yell to come out of my mouth. It began as a struggled whimper and with great effort I managed to let out a roar. The waking up consisted of me being given back control of my body and the woman vanished, but it was a seamless transition. Everything else remained the same. The feeling of dread remained for a short while before withdrawing. I was unnerved at the time, wondering if I'd simply lost the eyes to see this thing in my awake state and had a cold shower in an attempt to get rid of the putrid feeling that I was left with. I've since done a lot of research into this and the out-of-body experience, and I'm convinced that in our dark moments, there are entities that are attracted to this state. I was shocked when I discovered the Night Hag or Nightmare was not so uncommon. Whether they exist or not is another question where multiple answers can be given. My advice if these things are plaguing you is to not underestimate the power of ritual. From Redditor, Resistance I shared this experience before. It happened two months ago. I've had sleep paralysis since I was roughly 11 or 12, 5th grade, 22 now. I've never had a dream. I remember my first nightmare and can't remember a night I haven't had one. That being said, I'm used to them, so only sleep paralysis can still ruin my night. In the dream I had before waking up and experiencing the paralysis, I'm seeing myself in third person, waking up on a floor and investigating an abandoned and trashed, stark white painted room as big as an apartment. There are some unnecessary details, and then I grew fatigued and fell back down onto the floor. In third person, my dream self was ravenously hungry, deciding I needed to break apart and eat gritty old battery acid out of a battery off the floor. Dream self poured it into my mouth while laying there, and then the dream changed to first person. I tasted it. I felt the texture. I felt it burn through flesh and could feel bone. I woke up to the paralysis and the feeling, burning gritty sensation of choking on battery acid. Choked out my dog's name, but she didn't budge, and then gave up trying to fight off the sleep paralysis. I more easily went back to sleep and woke up out of the dream. When awake, I looked at the clock and realized all of that happened in 45 minutes. I've had ranging experiences, continuations of feelings from dreams such as what's stated above, hands gripping my limbs, one time a sad hug slash embrace, being pulled out of bed, upon being able to move, saying half of my body off the bed with my blanket folded on covering me, pressure pushing me into my bed, voices, screams. I've seen a woman sitting in my room turn around and scream at me, various lights and shadows, the works. I still won't get used to how exhausting the nightmares and sleep paralysis are, or how disgustingly vivid and different things are every time, but it is normal for me. I'm otherwise used to it all now. More true stories of sleep paralysis coming up. Plus, you could say their story is a long and fishy tale. Mermaids have been in folklore and myths throughout history, and with stories of them being found worldwide. To go along with this episode on sleep paralysis, I have a new creepy yet humorous design in the Weird Darkness story that you might like. It's a ghostly face with the words, I drink coffee because I owe my sleep paralysis demon money. The design is discounted for the next two days and will only be available for one week, disappearing from the store on January 16, 2024. You can get the design on any product in the store, mugs, shirts, hoodies, laptop cases, stickers, tote bags and everything else. Again, you can get discount pricing for the next two days and the design disappears completely from the store on January 16. So grab it now while it's available. I drink coffee because I owe my sleep paralysis demon money. Find it at WeirdDarkness.com slash store and then click on All Designs. That's WeirdDarkness.com slash store and then click on All Designs. From Redditor Bunny Chow. I used to get them quite a bit. I guess school was stressing me out. Graduated high school now. But most of mine were auditory sensory. I've never seen anything, thankfully. I think the worst one that I experienced was when I was in bed, laying on my side, facing the wall with my back to the rest of the room. I have a queen bed, so there was quite a bit of room left. This was towards the end of my sleep, so like I wake up and I felt this terror wash over me and an indentation next to me like something got onto the bed. I had a squeaky bed too, so I heard that. I was absolutely terrified at this point, just clenching my eyes shut and this thing is like hovering its face right by mine and I could feel it breathing on me. It only lasted a few minutes, but felt like forever at the time. One of the worst things I've ever experienced. The brain is amazing, everything else is creepy, garbled voices and the feeling of something on you. I got to the point where if I felt I would just wiggle my toes and fingers, I could get out of it. From Redditor, NovaStarLord. I got sleep paralysis too, and it's different most of the time, but there is one recurring experience that happens to me, though it usually starts when I feel like my father or someone from my family is in the room with me and when I realize they're not supposed to be there and that something is wrong, it's the moment that I see this man with white skin and watery red eyes yell and jump on me and attack me and it goes away when I start regaining the moment and try to fight back. There are times I feel a body in bed with me and I think it's my dad or my mom and then I just think, how weird or absurd that is and then realize, why would they be there? Oh crap, it's not them. That thing attacks me. Last week I was sleeping soundly and I thought my dad was there until I realized, wait, that makes no sense for him to be there. I'm having sleep paralysis and then that man appears and starts hissing at me and shaking my arms and honestly at this point I'm more angry and annoyed than scared so I angrily try to fight back, but I can't really move and when I feel like I start regaining the moment, he lunges back into the floor and cries, leave me alone. It's funny but I met this guy while having those weird out of mind body experiences and not sleep paralysis. That said, my other experiences with sleep paralysis are usually me not being able to move with no hallucinations, but when I do and the peel man is not in them sometimes, I see shadow people or I feel things walking on my bed and on top of me. This one time it was an invisible dog growling at me or the whole room moving with my bed tilting back and forth. It's weird. The weirdest thing that happens to me sometimes and I don't know if it's sleep paralysis but I feel like I get up from bed and I'm going on my normal everyday life but then I realize I'm still on my bed and I'm having a hard time trying to get up for real because that experience keeps repeating itself. This usually lasts for an hour. It's like sleeping awake. From Redditor, Snapspro. When I met my significant other, he mentioned to me that he would often wake up and see black shadows standing next to his bed or walking in his room. At this point, I had never experienced sleep paralysis. I didn't know much about it but ever since he told me, I've had roughly 20-30 occurrences. Ranging from simply waking up and not being able to move or breathe, waking up on my left side facing the wall and feeling someone pull on my right shoulder, having the feeling someone's pulling me out of bed by my ankles or wrists. Feelings of people in my room but beyond the range of what I can see because I can't turn my head. And the scariest one to date, I was sleeping with my significant other at my friend's house. We usually sleep on the floor but this time we got a bed. I wake up and I can't move. I'm on my back. It's morning out so it's not dark. I can hear this very deep voice talking very loudly and what I can imagine to be Latin. I don't know any Latin but I've looked it up and it seemed like that was the language that was being spoken slash yelled. The voice continues to get louder and louder until I pass out or fall asleep. The worst part about this is that this exact same thing has happened twice. Same voice, same room. I could sleep anywhere in the house but in that room. I'm also very nervous to tell my friend, the homeowner and his wife, for fear of freaking them out. I started using an app called SleepCycle which is supposed to wake you up when you're out of REM. I think it's helped. I also believe that sleep paralysis happens to me when I'm really tired and I wake up and go back to sleep too quickly. From Redditor, Vashti Strafe. Two years ago I would have sleep paralysis so often that I was terrified to even try to sleep. The first hallucination I remember having while undergoing sleep paralysis was it felt like something was dragging its claws down my left arm. I followed a sleep on my back on the couch in the living room and I remember opening my eyes a few hours later but I couldn't move a muscle and it felt as if it was suffocating. I could feel those claws dragging down my arm but I couldn't scream. No sound would come out. I felt terrified and felt as if something was watching me. I had a dreadful feeling that I would die and no one would help me. After I had control of my body again, I sat straight up and began to cry and had to call one of my friends to talk to her to maybe keep my mind off of the horrible situation. From Redditor, ZeroJJC. I've been getting them off and on since high school. I used to scare the crap out of me until I looked it up and learned about it. Now when it happens I try to stay calm, which is easy if I'm aware that I'm having it and not still partially in a dream. Then I still try to move my hand or arm and keep trying off and on until it eventually breaks free. One night I woke up in it and I didn't feel like fighting so I tried to go back to sleep. However, I had a horrible feeling. I can't explain it other than it felt like as I started to fall back into sleep that I was slipping away or possibly dying so I quickly began fighting it again. Since then I've just always fought it until I snap out, then I'll sit up, have a sip of water, roll over and go back to sleep. From Redditor, loves the only way. I've had it multiple times. I mainly find it happening after a night of partying or maybe the first full sleep after. I always know it's going to start by the strange buzzing sound and pressure on my head. I've heard voices, felt presences and been convinced there were aliens standing around me. But one of the most realistic ones was a hallucination of me falling off my bed and having a seizure, half crawling and screaming for help, but no noise would come out. Eventually I was able to shake myself out of it, but sometimes if I don't get myself time between shaking myself out and trying to sleep again, I'll fall right back into it. 3. From Redditor, sell BSMC felps I used to get these a lot and for some reason they still happen when I sleep at my parents' house, but luckily I haven't had one in my house in my own bed. I even used to get them at my ex-boyfriend's house. I always feel an evil presence, either floating over me or standing next to me. Always black and cloaked. The feeling they give me is the worst feeling I've ever felt, like impending doom. Even if it happens when I'm on my stomach, it's like I could feel the shadow above my back and I know exactly what it looks like. I honestly thought for a long time I was just messed up and had evil following me around and I wasn't sure why. That was the scariest part. Luckily surfing through vice I saw that they'd written an article about it and I realized I wasn't alone. It's always the worst when I feel in the clear and then as soon as I get back to sleep I'm right back in that place with the evil. From Redditor, Stevie and Paylor. During my teenage years and up until about 21, 22 years old, I would get sleep paralysis often. I'm 25 now and I almost never get it anymore. I only had one time I had a hallucination and to this day it's the scariest thing that's happened to me. At my old house I had a big room with one side of the wall being a sliding glass door that led to an outside patio. There'd be times when at night you could hear animals and strange sounds from the woods and stream by our house. Anyway, one night I remember I was tired from playing my Gamecube and I laid down and got ready for bed. I remember not being able to move, although I was completely awake. I remember white bluish light coming from around my bed and lighting up the room. When I was able to move my eyeballs I for a moment saw four white alien figures at the corners of my bed. I felt as though the room was moving and I was being abducted. As the aliens started coming closer to my paralyzed body I fought through the paralysis and immediately got up. My body was in cold sweats and I turned on all the lights in my room. For a while I was trying to fight off the notion that what actually happened to me was real. From Redditor, Scary Sleepy. My sister passed in February and my ex pushed me too far so we broke up. I ended up staying with my mom for a month until she found a place and left. It's been so hard to get a good sleep since we lost my sister so I was extremely exhausted by this point. My mom's basement room was a little creepy and I was thinking a lot about schizophrenia at the time for some reason, kind of wondering what it was like to visualize terrifying monsters. I'd imagine kind of like the old creepy woman from Insidious almost. As I started falling asleep I saw a different woman come at me swinging briefly before she was gone and I just felt the pressure. When I realized I couldn't move I thought something was wrong. I could barely breathe and I thought I was having a stroke. Calling out to my mom and my stepdad obviously didn't work. It felt like I blackened out and then just snapped out of it. It really scared the crap out of me but I tried to get back to sleep after realizing it was a weird half-dream thing. It happened again in a lesser form with no hallucination except I fell right asleep after. The next night it happened again except this time it was a little demon thing that jumped onto my bed and crawled over my leg and moved its way up to my chest and just held me down. It was definitely one of the strangest things I've experienced. From Redditor, TinyGigan. I have sleep paralysis fairly regularly, especially if I'm sleeping alone and or in a different place than usual. Happily if there's real movement in the room like the cat milling about to my wife making noise it'll bring me right out of it. I've had it enough over the years that it doesn't bother me too much except when I'm also having a nightmare over it at the same time. The worst one ever happened while staying at the guest room at my in-laws. They have a slightly creepy house to begin with, it's been added onto over the years and has weird indoor windows, settles constantly, etc. My wife and I weren't married yet at the time so I had to sleep alone. Catholic in-laws. Long and short is that I found myself having a bout of sleep paralysis in a room I'm rarely in. For some reason that makes it worse and I slowly become aware of an arm draped across my chest. Not seeing it so much as just feeling that it's there. Oh, I think to myself that's just shelly. Then I remember that she doesn't sleep with me at her parents' house. My mind immediately switched gears to, well, it must be a dead, drowned woman because gruesome nightmares are the absolute best. That particular experience set the bar for bad sleep paralysis events for me. From Redditor, Pre-Apps. Night terrors, around four to six years old, walking around the house screaming in my sleep. Dad tried to wake me up and I wouldn't. He knelt in front of me at eye level, shaking me for a good five minutes apparently before I finally woke. Told him to get off of me and give me some space for a minute while I collected myself. Always needed a wee for some reason. About 18-24, at least once a week, I had sleep paralysis with the hallucinations. First one I recall was a gypsy-looking old wrinkly woman, green, silky, see-through head scarf with little coins attached sat on the edge of my bed staring at me. Nothing more, just staring. That one happened a few times. Another was a little blonde-haired lad sat in my computer chair also just staring. Dark figures walking toward me down the hallway. Someone cloaked in shadow peering around my door. A man sat on my bed stroking my dog, smiling, probably the last one was someone with a mask walking away from me down the hall, getting to the top of the stairs, looking up at me and waving and then going downstairs. I say probably last because it felt like he was waving goodbye and I've had next to none since then. I got so used to it that it didn't bother me anymore. Still, wake up hallucinating now and then, but not paralyzed. Startles my girlfriend when I'm grabbing the imaginary spiders off of her and throwing them across the room. From Redditor, Takeda 1007. I used to get them a lot as a kid. I remember it starting around junior high and eventually stopping in high school. The first time it happened I had no idea what was going on with my body. Funny enough, just before they started I was at a summer day camp and played Bloody Mary in a supposedly haunted restroom at the park with a few friends. The sleep paralysis started after that so I was convinced whatever was haunting that bathroom followed me home. I don't remember hallucinating anything but I do remember that feeling of not being able to breathe or move, immense pressure on my chest and not being able to call out for help. I think I would eventually just pass out and wake up later feeling really scared about what had happened. I never told anyone but a few friends who just laughed it off. Eventually I realized if I didn't sleep on my back I would be okay. I still try not to sleep on my back. Now every once in a while I have dreams where like if I have to be active, bite someone off, etc. I physically feel like I am moving through water or jelly. Not sure if it's related but it's a similar feeling without the trouble breathing and chest pressure. From the former Redditor. One time I was laying on my back at night and when I woke up I couldn't move and there were about 12 short figures and brown robes standing around me. I've seen them in a dream before and when I looked them up it seemed that there was a phenomenon all over the world to be seen. I've never seen them in person before, movie, etc. They were just standing there staring at me though. From Redditor. Radioactive coffee. Suffered from sleep paralysis a lot in the past. Always knew what they were and new people were prone to hallucination when on them. When I had another one and suddenly thought, oh no, what if I hallucinate something terrifying and instantly I started hallucinating that there was a massive source of light outside the windows coming in, even though it was night accompanied by a deafening deafening sound. Weird stuff, man, weird stuff. From Redditor. Inmate95123. I have two to three of these episodes a month on average. Thank God I don't have the hallucinations. I've only had hallucinations twice and once it sounded like my entire room was shaking as if it was full of plastic trash bags. Next I felt a pressing on my feet that quickly ran up my legs to my chest. As soon as it happened I suddenly sat straight up in bed and gasped just as you would imagine somebody would do in a horror movie. It was the only time in my life I've ever made a gasping noise. Most of the time I'm just froze, can't move, can't speak. I feel overwhelmed with claustrophobia and I fight to move or break free with no avail at times. Growing up in the Bible belt I thought it was some sort of demonic experience for years and kept it to myself until I talked to a friend I knew from church who was also a psychologist. She quickly said, I think you might be having some sort of seizure or similar sleep disturbance. I can't believe I never thought of considering that. After that I got online and quickly found an explanation for all my random nighttime and sleep-oriented experiences. Yes, I'll hold off buying that bottle of holy water from a former Redditor. Luckily, haven't had them in a long time, but when I was younger I got them virtually every time I took a nap during the day. Sometimes it felt like I was being squeezed and people were standing over me. Scary. I'm assuming this is why some people think they're abducted by aliens and stuff like that. From a former Redditor. This used to happen to me a lot when I was younger, especially when I was in middle school. I just randomly would wake up from my naps and found myself in that state. I was able to wiggle my toes and move my eyes around, but the rest of my body was unable to move and I couldn't talk no matter how hard I tried. I just calmed down, waited a few seconds, then everything went back to normal. I told two of my friends about it, one of them who was spiritual, said that ghosts were pinning down my body while my other friend said your mind was still operating but your body wasn't or your body wasn't in sync with my mind or something. Mermaids are multicultural, mythical figures, reflecting the continuing human fascination with the sea and stories echoing thousands of years into the past. Mermaids are found in cultures across the globe. In Australia, special water spirits appear in the rock and bark art of First Nations people in Arnhem Land. Across the continent of Africa, mermaid-like water deities such as Yamaya and Mamie Wattah reflect the powerful connection between human communities and their environment. Among the most well-known mermaid narratives is Hans Christian Andersen's fairy tale, the Little Mermaid, which most of us know as a Disney character. By the time of its publication in 1837, the Little Mermaid was already a relative latecomer to the genre. Indeed, Hans Christian Andersen himself was raised with much earlier stories involving mermaids. His childhood bedtime reading included the works of Shakespeare and the Tales of the Arabian Nights. Shakespeare's mermaids from A Midsummer Night's Dream are noted for their song. Oberon observes beautiful mermaid melodies that could calm the sea and draw down the stars. Since once I sat upon a promontory and heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back, uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath that the rude sea grew civil at her song, and certain stars shot madly from their spheres to hear the sea maid's music. Andersen's other bedtime book, The Arabian Nights, is a collection of Indian and Persian stories assembled over many centuries. Among these are narratives about merfolk, some of whom live in wonderful undersea palaces. In one story, a human fisherman visits his merman friend under the sea. There he finds communities of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim merfolk before their friendship ends over religious differences. Images of human fish hybrid creatures can be found from the 3rd millennium BC in ancient Mesopotamia, a geographical area relating roughly to modern-day Iraq. The Apkula, or the seven divine sages of Mesopotamian myth, can take the shape of human fish hybrids. This is particularly interesting due to their connection to the ancient wisdom traditions predating the great flood. In Mesopotamian literature, as in the Bible, a great flood event destroys most of humanity. As human fish hybrids, the Apkalu were well equipped to survive the flood and carry forward their wisdom traditions. According to Mesopotamian literature, the useful information given to humanity by the Apkalu included knowledge of medicine and building cities. The connection of mermaids to wisdom and medicine extends to other ancient traditions. In Southern Africa, mermaids play a complex role in age's old healing rituals. The ancient Near Eastern connection between mermaids and flood traditions can be seen in the illustrated Nuremberg Bible of 1483, where merfolk are depicted swimming around the ark with their mer dog. Across the world and across traditions, mermaids have been accompanied by many different creatures. Their close connection to the sea extends to animals who share their home. As in the Nuremberg Bible, mermaids and sea dogs are said to swim together in Inuit mythology from North America. In folklore from the Ornke Islands in Scotland, merfolk are instead accompanied by seals and are described milking whales. In a Midsummer Night's Dream, mermaids are accompanied by dolphins. In myths from East Asia and South America, they are friendly with turtles. Similarities with the Danish fairy tale can be found in a famous story from South Korean folklore dating to the 13th century AD. In the story, the mermaid princess Hwang Aok, also known as Topaz, marries a prince and becomes more human. The princess is homesick for her underwater life, so her turtle companion helps her to use the moon to turn back into a mermaid and regain her well-being. Turtles and whales appear with mermaids as helpers to the Mesoamerican storm deity Tezcatilapoca. The myth is an atological tale about the creation of music in the world. Another theme shared by many mermaid myths is that of music. Powerful and persuasive song is a feature of numerous folkloric tales containing mermaids, including varieties of the little mermaid tale and Shakespeare. In his fairy tale, Anderson's mermaid uses her special abilities with music to win a contest in the royal court. In a disturbing scene, the voiceless mermaid participates in a song and dance contest against decoratively-attired enslaved women all competing for the prince's attention. In 1989, the animated Disney film Soundtrack won both a Grammy Award and two Oscars. In Shakespeare, mermaids are sometimes conflated with the sirens of Greek myth by the poet. The two mythical figures were commonly viewed as interchangeable from the medieval times. Sirens in ancient epics such as Homer's Odyssey were known for their ability to lure people to their death with their sweet-sounding songs, and their promise to share secret wisdom with their listeners. Sirens, like merfolk, are known as hybrid creatures with powerful voices but are usually depicted with bird-like rather than fish-like qualities. The power of merfolk to seduce with their charms may reflect the ability of the sea to capture the hearts of seafarers and keep them away from their homes on land by accident or design. The dynamic nature of mermaid mythology contributes to their continuing popularity in the 21st century. Mermaids build bridges between land and water at times in Southeast Asian and South American myths, quite literally, between human and animal, and between wilderness and civilization, giving a human face to the mysteries of the deep. It was the single most destructive fire in American history on October 8, 1871, a large portion of the Midwest burned to the ground. But this wasn't the great Chicago fire, the story of the great Pestigo fire when Weird Darkness returns. Anywhere and anything can be haunted and many people from all walks of life experience strange things in surprising locations. As you will discover, the prettiest of places, the most innocent of places, and the most unexpected places can still be filled with supernatural forces and pure demonic malevolence. Haunted places, churches, hospitals, forests, the workplace, and more. Horrifying true tales of ghosts, demons, poltergeists, and the paranormal. Come and be chilled by people's creepy experiences with the supernatural in ordinary everyday places. Warning, listening to this audiobook may increase nervousness. True tales of haunted places by G. Michael Vasey, narrated by Weird Darkness host Darren Marlar. You're a free sample on the audiobook's page at WeirdDarkness.com. On October 8, 1871, the single most destructive fire in American history devastated a portion of the Midwest. It was not the great Chicago fire which occurred on this same date, but a much less widely known conflagration a few hours to the north in Wisconsin. To those who experienced the terrifying events of the Pestigo fire, it must have seemed that the world was coming to an end. The smoke blocked out the sun, the rising moon turned red, and one witness later wrote that the woods and heaven were all on fire. The blaze pushed by Hurricane Force winds consumed more than a million acres of farms, forests, sawmills, and small towns in Wisconsin and upper Michigan. In the path of destruction, an estimated 1,500 people lost their lives, making this the greatest natural tragedy of its kind in North America. With the fire occurring on the same day as the great Chicago fire, it has been relegated to a lesser place in the annals of American disaster, and yet it left perhaps even a greater mark on the landscape of the country than this much more famous blaze. The summer of 1871 had been a dry season for the upper Midwest. Almost no rain had fallen between July and October, and the Pestigo and Menominee rivers were at their lowest levels in years. The forests of Wisconsin were ready to burn. Despite the ever-present threat of fire, those who lived in the region went about their everyday lives. Farmers worked their fields and kept their livestock healthy and fed. The dry weather even gave them the opportunity to clear more land and smoldering stumps of trees littered the newly cleared and parched landscape for much of the summer and into the early fall. Even with the drought-like conditions, the slash-and-burn method was still the best way to clear hundreds of acres of ground. This left scattered piles of flammable debris just steps away from homes, barns and fields that had been baked dry by the weather. Loggers in the region worked hard all summer too. The vast tracts of immense white pines and the numerous fast-moving rivers had lured lumber and railroad magnets like Chicago millionaire William Butler Ogden to Wisconsin and provided a way of life for the increasing number of immigrants arriving in the area. Communities like Bestigo and Marinette were supported by the lumber industry and logging camps dotted the landscape for miles around. William Ogden was the man responsible for much of the growth that had come to the region. He was greatly respected and admired, both in Bestigo and Chicago, where he had served as the city's first mayor. His venture in the Northwoods made him a millionaire many times over. He built and owned the prosperous Bestigo Company and built a company for his employees that included a company store, schools for the workers' children, and a rooming house for 200 of the unmarried men. Lumber was a booming business in the region, but this summer it had been problematic. The unusual low river levels had prevented the lumberjacks from floating logs down river to the mills. They were usually ordered to leave the cut timber and piles alongside the Bestigo and Menominee rivers, providing potential fuel for any fire that might break out. The logging practices of the area also produced a large amount of waste called slash made up of unusable tree branches. Tons of this material littered the logged over land north and west of Bestigo and Marinette. In their wake, lumberjacks had unknowingly left behind a deadly fuel to help the coming inferno. Where there was logging, there were sawmills. Thanks to the massive amount of trees cut down in the surrounding forests, there were eight sawmills in the towns of Bestigo and Marinette alone. They turned out millions of boards and thousands of finished goods every year. These mills so dominated the landscape that a fine layer of sawdust blanketed the towns. The dust was carelessly disposed of, shoveled into the streets, placed under wooden planks and pine board houses, or simply piled into enormous mounds near the mills. The sawdust was merely a byproduct of progress the locals knew and they learned to embrace the inconvenience of it with a sense of grim resignation. And while the sawdust represented prosperity, it added more fuel for the fire to come. The new work being done by rail gangs added to the volatile nature of the forests. Prior to the Civil War, the region had been slow to grow and during the war itself, nearly all the men left the woods and marched into battle. After 1865, though, Wisconsin's population nearly tripled and the lumber industry contributed greatly to those numbers. Bestigo soon became one of the three largest cities in the state, north of Green Bay. William Ogden, always with an eye for expansion, encouraged the railroads to move north. The railroads can move both men and machinery and link farm and industry together. It was faster, less expensive, and safer than shipping lumber by barge via Lake Michigan to Milwaukee and Chicago. The lake was notoriously dangerous during the winter months and gale force winds could easily sink a cumbersome lumber barge taking product down with it. Railroads seemed to be the answer to the problem and by September 1871, the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad was piercing the north woods, bringing rail and telegraph lines along with it. The rail gangs worked feverishly and by October, the line had advanced from Green Bay to a point just south of Pastigo. In their haste, they left smoldering logs and vegetation piled along the railroad right of way. The 19th century methods of land clearing, logging, and rail construction combined with the drought-like conditions created the perfect setting for a massive forest fire. The only thing missing was the right combination of meteorological conditions that would create such a destructive scenario. On October 8, 1871, the elusive weather conditions arrived, and the region would never be the same again. By late September, the area was experiencing small fires in the woods. The eyes of Pastigo residents were red from the ever-present smoke that choked the air. At night, they watched the flames from the fires stretch beyond the canopy of the forest and into the black sky. Some of the railroad crews were nervous enough about the situation, both the small fires and the lack of drinking water that they went on strike. They could find plenty of whiskey and beer in the saloons of Pastigo, but good clean water was getting harder and harder to come by. The residents of Pastigo and surrounding communities like Aconto and Little Suimico began to prepare for the worst. Logging crews dug fire ditches along the forest edge, and in the towns, workmen set aside barrels of what water could be spared in order to wet down the sawmills. On September 23, a slight change in the wind sent sparks across the Pastigo River and set fire to some sawdust and boards adjacent to the woodenware factory. Loggers, lumbermen, and shopkeepers alike turned out to fight the fire, passing buckets along a human chain that stretched from the river to the blaze. Several other fires broke out on the same day in a number of surrounding communities, destroying barns, homes, and mills. Fires burned in every direction from Pastigo, and it seemed that as soon as one was extinguished, another started in a neighboring town. There were later reports of a fire so intense that it burned up from under the ground. Months of drought and very low humidity levels had caused organic materials under the earth's surface to dry out. Not only were the trees on fire, even the ground beneath them crackled with flame. Pastigos makeshift fire company successfully fought several fires over a three-day period starting on Saturday, September 23. On Monday, the wind cleared the smoke away and miraculously the town had been saved. By Wednesday, the tired and worried residents tried to resume their usual activities, hoping that the worst danger had passed. Many believed that the burned trees bordering the town would provide a natural fire barrier and would protect them if a large blaze broke out. Instead, the trees would act like giant sticks of charcoal in the days to come. Outside of Pastigo, farmers began to bury their possessions in an attempt to save them from certain destruction, while others wrestled with the decision to evacuate the area for safety in the city of Green Bay. No one was sure what to do, for it seemed hard to believe that a danger could be created that they could not face. One local resident later wrote, The surrounding woods were interspersed with innumerable open glades of crisp brown herbage and dried furs, which had for weeks glowed with the autumn fires that infest these regions. Little heat was paid to them, for the first rain would inevitably quench the flames, but the rain never came. During the first days of October, thick smoke blanketed Pastigo, forcing the inhabitants to cover their mouths with handkerchiefs in order to breathe. The sun, which was barely visible, threw an eerie yellowish pall over the land. Then, on October 8, a low-pressure system over southwestern Minnesota, coupled with a slow-moving high-pressure system over the mid-Atlantic states, created moderate southwestern winds in northeastern Michigan. It was this terrible weather scenario that would create a nightmare for the entire region. This cyclonic storm, with counterclockwise winds that would eventually reach more than 60 miles an hour, fanned the flames of the small fires into a hellish inferno that could devour the forests, homes, and residents of the north woods. As the wind began to blow in Pastigo, one resident later remembered, the forest rocked and tossed tumultuously. The air became saturated with heat, enough to almost burn the skin. The noise of the wind became louder and impossible to ignore. Father Pernan, a priest in Pastigo, later wrote that the deafening sound was like the confused noise of a number of cars and locomotives approaching a railroad station or the rumbling of thunder with the difference that it never ceased, but deepened in intensity each moment. Terror mounted as the people listened and looked at the town around them, hazy and yellowish from the smoke. Some came from church, others poured from the saloons, but all came to stand on the sidewalks and in the streets, looking at the towering swaying trees past the edge of town. Suddenly, at 9 p.m., the first fire alarm was raised in Pastigo. Swirling blasts of fire came from every direction at once. One witness wrote, a great flame shot up in the western heavens and in countless fiery tongues struck downward into the village. In less than 10 minutes, the entire town was engulfed in flames. The fires that came on October 8th were unlike any of the fires that had previously threatened Pastigo and the surrounding areas. Many of the survivors claimed that the winds from the fire whirled about like a tornado, attaining speeds like the farmers, loggers and rail gangs all experienced with past fires had never seen before. It seemed to feed on itself, sucking up everything in its path including trees that had already been burned. What the witnesses experienced was a phenomenon known as a fire vortex and these vortices contributed to the speed and destructive nature of the Pastigo fire. Fire whirlwinds of this nature consisted of violent updrafts forming over the fire center. When survivors told of fire tornadoes, they were referring to the rotating movements of the fire whirlwinds which developed within and immediately downwind of the wildfire. They made it virtually impossible to escape the flames. The rapidly moving vortices scattered burning debris in a wide area, torching buildings and people located miles from the edge of the main fire. The whirlwinds seemed almost alive. A series of events provided the necessary fuel to keep the deadly vortices spinning. The burning ground cover provided heat for the whirlwind air column, destabilizing the air and creating strong updrafts and drawing surface winds inward toward the center of the tornado. Horizontal surface winds fed the insatiable fire by transporting fuel into the whirlwind, heating the air, enhancing its buoyancy and increasing the whirlwind circulation. The fire was not only feeding itself, it was creating its own weather pattern. Survivors from Pastigo said that the tornado swept in currents and eddies of fire in which many were caught and smothered on the spot, while others with great difficulty worked their way, some to the river and some to an open field on one side of town. Others believed that the large boarding house in town simply would not, on the basis of its size, succumb to the flames. Hundreds crowded into the structure only to be burned alive as the fire swept over it. After the disaster, the building was described as a mass of ashes. No one escaped from the boarding house alive and all that remained was a pile of human ashes, from which can be picked out pieces of human bones, the largest not two inches long and these split and broken. Those who could make it sought refuge in the river. Unfortunately, the speed of the fire prevented many of them from reaching the water. Panicking onlookers groping their way to the river watched as waves of fire ignited everything in their path. Men, women, and children burst into flames in an instant. Many believed that the river bridge led to safety, but flames engulfed both sides of the river. People attempting to escape from either side collided in the middle of the bridge. Then the bridge caught fire, dumping everyone into the water below and many drowned. Others poured into the water from the river banks and immersed themselves in the protective water. For the next five hours, they watched in horror as their city burned to the ground. In the glare of the flames, they saw the sloping bank covered with the bodies of those who fell by the way, few living on the back streets succeeded in reaching the river, the hot breath of fire cutting them down as they ran. Those who plunged into the river thought they would be safe in the water, but even the river could not provide complete protection from the superheated air, burning logs that floated downstream and flaming embers from the sky. Only by constantly throwing water upon their heads did the waterlogged survivors manage to avoid injury from the flames. Many of them had every hair burned off their head during the fire and many lost their lives while protecting others. But fire was not the only danger. The cool waters at the Pastigo River began to chill the refugees and despite the superheated air around them, many were in danger of succumbing to hypothermia. People finally emerged from the river at daylight, but others caught in the chaos of fleeing people, panicked livestock and burning logs did not survive. A report taken from an observation of the scene the next day spoke of mothers and children unable to escape the clutches of the fire, lying in rigid groups, the clothes burned off and the poor flesh scarred to a crisp. Pastigo had been literally wiped off the map. The fire had destroyed everything. The heat and tornado-like winds of the firestorm had melted the wheels of railroad cars, leveled buildings and uprooted charred remains of trees. Less than 700 people remained from the once happy and prosperous town of 2,000 souls. Survivors began the heartbreaking search for friends and loved ones. Nearly everyone had lost someone to the blaze. The dead were not always recognizable and lay in the streets where they had fallen. One account stated where houses stood, the ground was whipped clean as a carpet and the hope of identifying human ashes was idle. One horror-stricken man found the remains of his nephew only recognizable by the boy's treasured penknife which was embedded in a mound of ashes. On Monday evening, about 24 hours after the fire arrived at Pastigo, the long-awaited rain finally arrived. It came, one survivor wrote, gratefully to the living and kindly to the fleeting ashes of the dead. Stories of heroism and horror followed in the wake of the fire. The inferno had struck with such suddenness that there was hardly time for people to save themselves and yet many risked their lives to save others. One farmer, West of Pastigo, found himself in a clearing with his wife and 14 children when the fire swept over the forest. The children were not all his own. 8 of them belonged to a neighbor who had sent them to the clearing for safety. The farmer kept his wits about him as the fire came closer. Using only his hands he dug a hole and then covered all the children and his wife with dirt and then threw handfuls on himself. All survived. A little girl who had managed to survive the fire in Pastigo and yet had lost her entire family was taken in by generous strangers in a canto who eventually adopted her. A poor cobbler who was fleeing to the river stopped and picked up a frightened little girl and carried her to safety. The child turned out to be a relative of the Governor of Michigan who handsomely rewarded the cobbler's bravery. Some preferred to die by their own hand rather than face a painful death by fire. One young man reportedly returned to his family home, found his parents dead and slashed his own throat in despair. Another apparently uncertain whether he was safe from the flames by hiding in his well wrapped the bucket chain around his neck and hanged himself. One man, search parties believed, murdered his children and then himself after watching his wife die in the flames. About 260 people died in the upper, middle and lower sugar bush settlements west of Pastigo. The farms were isolated and the residents had nowhere to flee once they found themselves surrounded by the flames. The desolation caused by the fire was so complete that many who survived the fire starved to death before rescue parties could find them. It is estimated that at least 1500 people perished in the October 8 fire. At Pastigo it was written, the names of half the dead will never be known, they are buried all over Pastigo and the boards that mark their graves are marked two unknown, three unknown, etc. The injured packed into a nearby understaffed and overwhelmed hospital and spoke of the tragedy. Most of them suffer from the hurts of the mind then hurts of the body it was reported. One woman cried of hearing the screams of her daughter and her crippled son as they perished in the flames. To make matters worse, communications between the burned out areas and the outside world were hampered by the destruction of the telegraph lines. A telegram from Green Bay did not reach the state capital of Madison until October 10. By that time news of the great Chicago fire was known throughout the country. At the same time that Chicago was burning and even greater fire was engulfing the land a few hundred miles to the north. It was America's greatest natural disaster but was overshadowed by the fire in Chicago. William Ogden turned out to be a victim of both fires, losing well over three million dollars to the flames. By the time that the news of the Pastigo fire reached Madison, Governor Lucius Fairchild was already on his way to Chicago with a train load of supplies for fire victims in the city. It was the governor's young wife, Frances, who received the telegram with news of the North Country devastation. She immediately took charge of the situation and began to organize a relief effort to provide material goods to meet the needs of Wisconsin's fire victims. She even commandeered a supply train headed for Chicago. In a matter of hours, Mrs. Fairchild had gathered enough blankets to fill a train car and it was soon on its way to Green Bay. Over the following days, Mrs. Fairchild continued her efforts to acquire more supplies and with the return of her husband from Chicago, the state began a massive relief effort for the survivors. A number of private agencies and communities throughout the state offered their assistance and support eventually came from every state in the union as well as from foreign countries. Frances Fairchild is still considered a hero to the people of northern Wisconsin. The Pastigo fire remains today a unique disaster in American history. It was a perfect storm of various events that came together to create a conflagration unlike any other. Specific weather conditions and an abundance of fuel combined to create a series of tornado-like fires that dramatically and permanently altered the landscape of northwestern Wisconsin. Entire towns were destroyed, homes were wiped out, and entire families perished in the flames. And yet, the people of the region wasted little time in rebuilding their lives. William Ogden vowed to resume operations as soon as possible to rebuild Pastigo and do a larger winter's logging than ever before. His positive and much publicized outlook infected others and the area became a hive of activity in the aftermath of the fire. Homes were rebuilt, stores reopened, and farmers returned to their land. In the face of tragedy, strong wills prevailed. New Audio Books have narrated. Sign up for the email newsletter, find other podcasts that I host, including Church of the Undead, and a new, retro-style science fiction podcast called Auditory Anthology. You can visit the store for Weird Darkness merchandise and more. WeirdDarkness.com is also where you can 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 on Weird Darkness are purported to be true unless stated otherwise and you can find links to the stories or the authors in the show notes. Stories of Sleep Paralysis is by Christopher Schultz for Ranker and from U.S. Ghost Adventures. The Great Pastigo Fire was written by Troy Taylor from his book and Hell Followed With It. And Mermaid Mythology is by Louise Preik for the conversation. Weird Darkness is a registered trademark. Copyright Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. Proverbs 12 verse 18. Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing. And a final thought. We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones. Stephen King. I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.