August 2, 1923. Former VP Hannibal Hamlin, who served under Lincoln and died in 1891, is moved from his resting place in a Bangor, Maine, cemetery to an ancient Indian burial ground, for some reason. He instantly zombifies and starts attacking the townspeople before retreating into seclusion. Some people think that entire region of Maine is haunted, and there may be big bucks there for the storyteller who can put some of the grisly tales on paper. [Link]I can't confirm this story, but when I was a kid in Oxford County (in the next town over from Hamlin's hometown of Paris) I did hear one story about the Vice President. When he was an infant, he became ill and the local Abenaki healer, Mollyockett, was called in to consult. She administered a native remedy that saved the boy's life, giving him the chance to grow up and become zombified.
Mollyockett was not a woman you'd want to cross. While passing by Snow's Falls in Paris during a storm, she stopped at a house there and asked for shelter. When she was refused, she laid a curse on the dwelling. The location has been cursed ever since, and even within my memory has been plagued by flood, fire and failure. The businesses that try to set up shop there are doomed to fail, but the current occupants have evidently embraced the site's history. If anyone cares to take the risk, it's situated on Route 26 in West Paris, just above the Snow Falls rest area.
6 comments:
Wow, this is going to be fun.
...and they're OFF!!!
Well we could start off by going to the Bangor Public Library, where on the second floor we would find the very couch on which Hannibal Hamlin died (he died playing cards, that seems like a good way to go).
(see here for a page with a photo of said couch)
A much more respectable place to die than that chosen by the other Vice President born in Maine, Nelson Rockefeller. He died while canoodling with his mistress.
Wah! And it seems that Nelson Rockefeller's wife's name was Happy.
Not!
After hearing how her husband died, I'm sure she was Grumpy.
There is a guy in Maine who impersonates Hannibal Hamlin and reenacts historical debates. He usually works with an Abraham Lincoln impersonator, but when no on is available, he has a lifesize Abe Lincoln that he takes with him.
I'm not kidding! To finish my history degree, I had to do a senior thesis on Maine history. One of the people in my class did a paper on Hannibal Hamlin and actually met with the man who had the lifesize Lincoln dummy.
The student passed around a photo he had taken of the faux Hamlin posing with his lifesize Lincoln. Upon seeing the photo, I became hysterical.
I've done some investigating, and the impersonator in question is Richard Newcomb of Hamden. According to a 2000 BDN story, he "purchased the Lincoln mannequin from an antique store to help realize Hamlin's connection to the president."
I've searched the web in vain for a photograph of the pair.
One question: he doesn't make the Lincoln dummy talk, does he?
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