What If Everything We Believe About The Krampus Is Wrong?

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
In twenty fifteen, a new monster started to appear in
American horror movies, a Christmas monster named Crampus. The Crampis's
appearance varied from movie to movie. Sometimes the creature was
dressed like the Santa Claus of American lore. Sometimes it
was just covered in long, white, shaggy hair, but it

(00:24):
was always shown with an impressive set of horns sprouting
from its head. In the movies, there is seemingly no
agreement about who or what the Crampis actually is, past
the common details that the creature is horned, hairy, and
somehow associated with Christmas. The reason for this large discrepancy
of behavior is simple. The authors of the movies knew

(00:47):
very little else about the actual Crampus themselves. You see,
the Crampus was not a new monster. Trampis is, in
fact a very very old monster. And how ideas about
this monster managed to travel from its native Austria out
to the rest of the world and eventually to Hollywood

(01:07):
and America is a complicated story. What is depicted now
in movies as the Crampus is very different from how
the monster started or even how it is currently thought
of in its native environment. Many modern theories and fictional
stories connect the monstrous Crampus back to the religious and
magical figures of the ancient European past. However, there's no

(01:32):
actual evidence of this being true. So what do we
actually know about this creature's past. I'm Darren Marler and
this is Weird Darkness. Welcome, Weirdos. I'm Darren Marler and

(01:55):
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. We're all familiar with

(02:15):
the poem A Visit from Saint Nicholas, better known as
Twas the Night Before Christmas. But while we know the poem,
we can't be quite as sure about who wrote it.
One of the great and now sadly lapsed Christmas traditions
is the telling of ghost stories, something we're trying to
bring back here at Weird Darkness. On one particular year,

(02:38):
a British teenager took this pastime to a whole other level.
He didn't read about a Christmas Eve haunting, he experienced one.
The past few years have made Crampus the Christmas Devil,
a star of the big screen, But have you noticed
that every version of him is different than the others.
This may, of course be in part to creative license,

(03:00):
but it might have just as much, if not more,
to do with the fact that none of the filmmakers
had any idea of just what Crampus truly is, what
he's all about, and how terrifying he can be. But first,
disaster strikes a small Illinois town on Christmas Eve, stripping
away all that was merry and bright for the families

(03:21):
who lived there. We begin with that story. Now, bult
your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and
come with me into the weird darkness. My school years

(03:48):
were spent growing up in a small town in central
Illinois called Mawekwa, and one of the integral events in
the town's history was the disaster that occurred in the
local coal mine on Christmas Eve teen thirty two. Almost
every family in Mouiqua was affected by the loss of
life at the mine, and even now, more than fifty
years later, I had friends whose families had suffered from

(04:11):
the deaths of fathers, grandfathers, nephews, and brothers. Coal had
been discovered in Mouiqua in eighteen eighty nine, and a
company was formed to take it from the ground by
James G. Cochran, a Freeport, Illinois. The Moiqua Coal and
Manufacturing Company opened in eighteen ninety one and within two
years was employing more than fifty men from the town.

(04:33):
The mine was no stranger to accidents. Four men were
badly hurt in an explosion in eighteen ninety four, and
three years later one died and four others injured in
a fire. By eighteen ninety nine, the Moequa mine was
setting new production records, and an electric plant was built
near the shaft to illuminate the mine and to supply

(04:53):
electricity to many of the townspeople. But more deaths occurred.
A portion of a seal collapsed on Minor Charles Karlowski.
Mine superintendent John Carnes was crushed and nearly decapitated when
boilers being delivered to the mine shifted positions on a
flat car. In nineteen oh five, Thomas Becray was crushed

(05:14):
to death between two mine cars. In nineteen oh nine,
a number of deaths occurred, including the deaths of eight
mine mules, when an electrical fire broke out another man,
Stephen Potsik, was killed by falling rocks. Tony LeCount died
of powder burns. Joe Nanny was crushed to death again
by falling rock. Jacob Newman died from injuries suffered when

(05:38):
the elevator cage fell on him. In spite of what
seemed like one death after another, business at the mine
was thriving. The average payroll in nineteen twenty four was
ten thousand dollars and the average daily output from the
mine was about six hundred fifty tons of coal. At
that time, there were one hundred and fifty men employed

(05:58):
at the mine. By the end of the nineteen twenties, though,
the mine owners began cutting back on the hours and men,
choosing to close down over the summer months and re
hiring the men in the autumn. This practice was followed
until the start of the depression, when the owners decided
that the mine was no longer profitable and closed it down.
This was a disaster for the small community. The mine

(06:22):
paid the bills for scores of families in town, and
there were simply no other jobs to be found in
the area. After much debate, the cooperation was formed by
the miners and the townspeople, and money was obtained through
subscription to reopen the mine. On September seventeenth, nineteen thirty one,
the mine opened again, this time as the Moequa Coal Corporation. Tragically,

(06:46):
though its days were numbered, the end came for the
Moequa Mine and fifty four of the men who worked
under the ground. On Christmas Eve nineteen thirty two, at
eight fifteen in the morning, a methane explosion swept through
the mine and killed the men who had just reported
for work. Only two men who were inside were spared,

(07:07):
the cage operators, whose work kept them close to the
bottom of the shaft. The other miners were going towards
other areas of the mine to work when they were
caught by the explosion. An exact cause of the disaster
has never been determined, but it's believed that an unusual
drop in barometric pressure caused gas that was already present
in the mine to be forced from the unused areas

(07:29):
and into the main corridors of the mine. A spark
was probably set off by a miner throwing a light
switch or by one of their lamps coming into contact
with the gas. Word quickly spread of the disaster, and
the mine manager summoned workers from a mine in Payna, Illinois.
The crew arrived in less than two hours, and mine
rescue teams around the state were also alerted. Not knowing

(07:53):
if any of the men in the mine were still alive,
miners from the surrounding area flooded into Mawekwa to offer
their services. The entrance to the mine had been filled
with fallen rock, so they worked to gain access to
the shafts and to rebuild the walls that had collapsed.
The rescue teams worked continuously through the day and into
the night. On Christmas Day, they discovered a passageway that

(08:15):
was littered with the bodies of twelve of the men.
All of them were dead, and hope began to dim
that any of the miners could still be alive. On
Monday morning, twenty seven more bodies were discovered, and late
that night, the battered corpse of Tom Jackson, the town's
longtime Santa Claus, was found. The rest of the bodies

(08:36):
were brought up out of the darkness over the next
several days, with the last being found on December twenty ninth.
The scene at the surface was chaotic. Rescue squads constantly
came and went, while trucks and wagons moved back and
forth near the cluttered mine entrance. The Red Cross set
up headquarters at the site and supplied food around the clock.

(08:58):
Every newspaper for miles around set reporters to the scene,
and it was estimated that ten thousand people were in
the little town during the week after the disaster. Meanwhile,
the families of the trapped miners kept a silent vigil
a short distance away, too shocked and stunned to notice
the activity around them. The mine stayed closed for six

(09:20):
months and then reopened for a short time, with cleaning
and repair work being done by miners who worked without pay.
By December nineteen thirty three, coal was again being removed
from the mine. It remained in operation for two more
years and then closed down for good. There was some
talk of opening the mind up again and the years

(09:40):
that followed, but it never happened. Eventually, the main shaft
was filled, the buildings raised, and the Moikua Mine became
an open field on the edge of town. For many
years after, Christmas Eve was a solemn occasion, serving as
a haunting reminder of a terrible tragedy thatccurred in nineteen

(10:00):
thirty two. Even today, it remains a lingering memory of
a dark day during the season of what should have
been joy and light. Up next on Weird Darkness. The

(10:21):
past few years have made Crampis the Christmas Devil, a
star of the big screen, But have you noticed that
every version of him is different than the others. This may,
of course be in part to creative license, but it
might have just as much, if not more, to do
with the fact that none of the filmmakers had any
idea of just what crampis truly is what he's all about,

(10:43):
and how terrifying he can be. That story is up next. Anywados,
if you enjoy the narrations that I bring you throughout

(11:05):
the year, I'd like to ask for a Christmas favor
this month, Please ask two or three people you know
to give Weird Darkness a listen. It's the perfect time
to share some holiday stories with people you know who
typically love paranormal and true crime content. Plus, you'll be
helping Weird Darkness grow, which is the best Christmas gift
you could ever present to me. Drop a link to

(11:26):
the show or a favorite episode in your social media
maybe send a text to a few people to wish
them a very scary Christmas, along with a link to
the website. Email a coworker or two and give them
something even more terrifying than the annual performance review they receive.
Those always scared me. However, you share the show with others,
please know it makes a world of difference, and I

(11:48):
appreciate it more than you know. From all of us
here at Weird Darkness, Robin, myself and Pumpkin Spice. Robin
calls her pumpkin Butt, but that's only because Pumpkin doesn't
understand the English language. Have a very merry Christmas. In

(12:26):
twenty fifteen, a new monster started to appear in American
horror movies, a Christmas monster named the Crampus. The Crampus's
appearance varied from movie to movie. Sometimes the creature was
dressed like the Santa Claus of American lore. Sometimes it
was just covered in long, white, shaggy hair, but it
was always shown with an impressive set of horns sprouting

(12:50):
from its head. In the movies, there is seemingly no
agreement about who or what the Crampus actually is, past
the common details that the creature is horned hair, and
somehow associated with Christmas. The reason for this large discrepancy
of behavior is simple. The authors of the movies knew
very little else about the actual Crampus themselves. You see,

(13:12):
the Crampus was not a new monster. Crampis is in
fact a very very old monster. And how ideas about
this monster managed to travel from its native Austria out
to the rest of the world and eventually to Hollywood
in America is a complicated story. What is depicted now

(13:32):
in movies as the Crampus is very different from how
the monster started or even how it is currently thought
of in its native environment. Many modern theories and fictional
stories connect the monstrous Crampus back to the religious and
magical figures of the ancient European past. However, there is
no actual evidence of this being true. So what do

(13:56):
we actually know about the creature's past. The earliest mentions
of the Crampus come from the small country of Austria,
and specifically from the traditional December visit of Saint Nicholas
to towns and houses in the country. Nicholas was a
Christian monk who lived from two seventy to three forty
three a d. And performed many kind acts and miracles

(14:19):
in his lifetime. After he died, Nicholas was declared to
be a saint, a title that denotes he was especially
favored by the God of the Bible and granted special
powers to help humanity. Saint Nicholas had earned a reputation
for helping children, and some time after his death no
one seems to know when he started making visits to

(14:39):
families and children on December fifth each year, on the
eve of the anniversary of his death. These visits were
and are mostly so the saint could bring gifts to
good children and punishments to bad children, as a reminder
to them that good behavior will always be rewarded in life.
Of course, it's unseemly for a saint to punish children,

(15:02):
no matter how bad the kids are, so Saint Nicholas
almost always visited and still visits, in the company of
a number of companions who have the job of meeting
out any necessary punishments, though nowadays these companions mainly just
frighten or amuse children. These companions vary quite a lot
across the area of Europe that Saint Nicholas appears in,

(15:24):
and in Austria, These companions came to be known as Crampus,
a group name for a set of ever changing companions
of strange and frightening characters that could come with Saint Nicholas,
either singly or in a group. In all cases, these
crampoosa the proper plural term for crampuses, were considered to
be under the overall control of Saint Nicholas, which was

(15:48):
and is often symbolized by the creatures carrying or wearing chains.
Not much is known about these earliest Crampoosa. Their additional
visits with Saint Nicholas were very particular to the rural
areas of just Austria itself, so not well known outside
those areas. The earliest I've seen mention, a very short

(16:09):
mention of the Crampus as a holiday related character, is
in eighteen twenty five, which isn't all that long ago.
A more telling still is that Jacob Grimm, Yes of
the Brothers Grim, in his massive eighteen thirty five study
of German mythology and folklore, only makes a single mention
of the Crampus, and that's as an alternative name for

(16:30):
a different Saint Nicholas companion that was better known net
Ruprecht or farm hand ruprect or servant ruprect. So while
Crampus was around in the early eighteen hundreds, the creatures
were not considered noteworthy by those taking notes. This lack
of notation is what has led to so many inventive
ideas about the Crampis's past. And while I have no

(16:53):
direct reports about the traditions relating to the Crampus in Austria,
quite a bit can be inferred from what clues do
exist in the places that celebrate Saint Nicholas's yearly visits.
Many families participate merely by leaving shoes out on the
night of December fifth. Good children will find treats and
toys filling their shoes, and not so good kids will

(17:16):
find a switch that their parents are expected to swat
them with. Alternatively, a large number of families in these places,
and this definitely included the rural areas of Austria, would
actually experience a physical visit from Saint Nicholas himself along
with his companions. These house visits were and still are
generally very ritualized. The family would wait for a knock

(17:39):
on the door, then lead Saint Nicholas and the Crampoosa
into the room with the family. Saint Nicholas would give
sweets and small toys to the good children. Then the
Crampoosa would swap the bad children on their legs with
a switch, a warning to correct their behavior before the
following year's visit. These visits undoubtedly were more of an

(18:00):
impression on children the just anonymously receiving treats in their shoes.
But the saint apparently did not necessarily visit every family,
possibly just the ones with problematic children, I would suspect,
So some families started impersonating Saint Nicholas and the Crampus
themselves to ensure such a visit always came to their house.

(18:22):
Of course, some of you are probably skeptical about the
actual existence of Saint Nicholas and the Crampusa. To begin with,
well shame on you. While the costume for Saint Nicholas
was very standardized big white beard dressed like a bishop,
complete with a big hat and staff, there was no
standard idea of what a crampus looked like. The only

(18:42):
requirements appeared to be that any costume created must disguise
who was wearing it completely and be as strange and
frightful as possible. Costumes often included old clothes or clothes
worn backwards or inside out, animal skins and furs, and
anything else that might be available like carpets, horns, animal tales.

(19:04):
Faces were blackened with soot, and masks generally just had
eye holes, easy to create and good at hiding the
wearer's face. As I already mentioned, these practices stayed very
local to rural Austria for a very long time, and
there's currently no good way to determine if any standardized
idea existed or developed of what the crampoosa looked like

(19:26):
during this time. But in eighteen ninety eight, two big
things happened at the same time. First, a very standardized
idea of the crampus was created, and second, the very
idea of the crampus was spread worldwide. In eighteen sixty nine,
the first postal card, a card with pre printed postage

(19:47):
on it, not a postcard, was issued by the Government
of Austria Hungary. These were an instant success because they
were cheaper to send than a letter, and soon the
initially bland postal cards started to support a variet of
designs and images, including holiday images. During the holidays. The
years eighteen ninety eight through nineteen eighteen have been dubbed

(20:08):
the Golden Age of postcards by collectors in the know,
and from this time period come some of the most
stunning examples of Christmas postal cards and postcards. Within this
group of Christmas cards came a new, amusing subgenre sent
out from Austria, cards bearing the image of a devil
like figure and the slogan Grouse Bomb Crampis or Greetings

(20:31):
from Crampis. The cards were clearly humorous in nature, but
presented an idea that was new to the rest of
the world, a monster that participated in Christmas. These cards
presented a very distinct picture of Crampus and of the
creature's activities, all very different from the rural idea that

(20:52):
existed of the creature. It's been speculated this is because
the art was being produced by urban artists who were
largely unfamiliar with the rural traditions. With an incomplete idea
of Crampus, the artists created their own idea of the creature.
The Crampus of the Crispus cards looks like a modified
image of the biblical devil, male with short horns, on

(21:15):
its head, goat like legs, a tail, and red skin
or fur. Another feature sometimes seen in the cards, as
my nephew pointed out, is that sometimes this crampus has
one or both feet replaced with a cloven hoof. Added
to this creature was an abnormally long tongue rolling out
of its mouth. And also knew was the idea that

(21:37):
this crampus wore a basket on his back, specifically for
as many cards demonstrated kidnapping naughty children, what was also
made clear by the context of the cards was that
this Crampus was an individual unto itself. Though sometimes shown
in company with Saint Nicholas, the creature was now only
rarely shown as one of a group, so it was

(22:00):
the Crampus, not just a Crampus. These cards were super
popular and were collected by some people in the way
the baseball or Pokemon cards are today. But while the
cards were being created an idea of a new monster
in the world outside of rural Austria. Back in the
original home of Crampus, the old traditions and bizarre costumes

(22:21):
continued unaltered in all but one way. It seems that
over time, more and more people were dressing up like
Crampoosa for the holiday seasons. Probably the most important change
for the current idea of the Crampuosa in Austria itself
came in nineteen thirty, when sculptor Sep Lang realized that
there was a demand for monstrous masks to be worn

(22:43):
by people dressing up as the creatures. Up to that point,
masks were very low quality and homemade. If they existed,
many people still just relied on anything that would cover
their faces. Masks are not Sep Lang created monstrous visages
from carved wood, paint and animal hair. Lang produced both

(23:04):
wooden masks for performers and full crampus heads for tourist souvenirs,
which meant that by nineteen thirty there were now tourists
visiting Austria to in part see people dressed as Crampoosa.
It's also been stated that early in the nineteen hundreds,
the bodysuit for Crampus performers became more standardized, leading to

(23:26):
actual costumes that would be reused year to year. These
new suits were made from the skins of sheep and
long haired goats, creating shaggy body suits. Chains were still
favored as part of these costumes. But new to the
suits were bells, sometimes huge ones, that would jingle as
the crampoosa walked, alerting and warning people the monsters were about.

(23:49):
While I have no details about exactly when the bodysuits
started to standardize, I suspect it happened about the same
time Lang started to add actual faces to the monsters.
Lang died in nineteen eighty three, but by that time
the creation of crampus masks had become a national tradition,
with many new creators still producing the masks to this day.

(24:11):
Lang's masks often included fantastic horns, in imitation of the
use of animal horns by the original attempts to dress
as the formless monsters. Lang's horns were much larger than
those of the crampus of the postal cards, but the
postal card crampus did have an influence also, as many
new crampus masks feature variations on the lulling tongue of

(24:32):
the postal devil. With all of this interest in dressing
up like a crampus and an ever increasing number of
people who owned costumes, eventually new excuses were going to
be needed to wear the customs. Otherwise, house visits, which
still occur would have one Saint Nicholas and a few
hundred crampusa. So sometime presumably between Lang's introduction of quality

(24:55):
masks in nineteen thirty and Lang's death in nineteen eighty three,
a new tradition developed, the crampusolov or Crampus run. These
are essentially crampuosa parades, part entertainment, part childhood trauma. People
line up along a proposed route to see the run,
which is started by a person dressed as Saint Nicholas

(25:17):
who leads a huge number of crampoosa on the route.
The crampoosa growl, jump, pose, and sometimes swat members of
the crowd, generally to the cheers of the rest of
the crowd. Brave youth will challenge the beasts and support
a bruise as a mark of bravery. These runs are
often associated with Christmas markets and can occur anytime through December,

(25:38):
giving more opportunities for acting troops to struct their monstery stuff.
The earliest printed mention that I've seen of a Crampus
run is from nineteen eighty, where it was considered a
variant on a much older practice called The Kerchda Run
forral Perchda is another winter solstice monster, but by no
means a companion of Saint Nicholas. Like the Crampus, and

(26:00):
mock battles of women dressed as different aspects of Frauperchda
go well back into the history of Austria and Germany.
The newer comparison of the Crampis Run to this older
tradition seems to imply that the Crampis Runs might be
a very new tradition, indeed, dating from just a little
before Sep Lang died in nineteen eighty three. Interest in

(26:22):
the Crampis Runs greatly grew in Austria through the nineteen nineties,
and more and more people dressed as Crampoosa each year.
Sometime around two thousand and seven to two thousand and nine,
there was something of a rediscovery on the Internet worldwide
of the old Crampis postal cards from the turn of
the nineteenth century. The bizarre images of the clearly devil

(26:45):
like beast scaring and kidnapping children while offering friendly greetings
once again caught the attention of a world that had
largely forgotten about the beast from Austria. Websites like Pinterest,
interested in pictures but not necessarily stories, spread the old
greeting card images far and wide, and soon after newer
sites and books started to explain that the monster was

(27:07):
in fact from Austria, and then started to spread pictures
of the modern Austrian Crampus runs with their fantastic costumes.
But as new interest grew in Carampus, actual details and
legends about its origins were not readily available, as I've said,
and in America, especially, creative people soon started to make

(27:27):
their own stories explaining the monster. The best known of
these new fictional tales is a twenty twelve book by
a creator only known as Brahm, called Crampus the Yule Lord.
Brahm wove an inventive tale relating to Crampus to old
Norse mythology and painting the creature as an individual character

(27:48):
that was seeking revenge for the imposition of the Christian
holiday of Christmas over the older pagan holiday of Yule.
Crampis is presented as being essentially the enemy of the
American Christmas legend Santa Claus, and unfortunately, many non Austrians
now treat Brahm's tale as if it is the correct
legendary origin of the Austrian monster. Since Brahm's book, the

(28:11):
interest in the Crampus has spawned new books and movies,
as well as new Crampus runs from London, England, to
Los Angeles in the United States. But make no mistake,
the true nature of the Crampis is not in the movies,
not in the fictional books, nor even in the postal
cards of one hundred years ago. The true nature of
the Crampus is well and firmly based in the undocumented

(28:35):
past of the folk practices of rural Austria, where a
monster with no known form might still hide. Coming up next,
we're all familiar with the poem A Visit from Saint Nicholas,
better known as Twas the Night Before Christmas. But while

(28:57):
we know the poem, we can't be quite a sure
about who wrote it. That story and more, when weird
Darkness returns, Emenezer Scrooge learned the lesson in just one

(29:24):
night that it is more blessed to give than to receive.
Of course, it took three ghosts scaring the crap out
of him to get the point across. But there's an
easier and less terrifying way of going about it. Just
scare it forward. The next time you're in a drive
through buying fast food, donuts, or coffee, tell the attendant
you want to pay for the person behind you. In fact,

(29:44):
you can miss a Weirddarkness dot com slash scare it
forward and download a print out to give to the
drive through worker that they can pass on to the
person behind you in line, so you don't have to
explain everything. It's a great way to bring a little
joy to someone during the holiday season, a time that's
offen tough for many. And hey, maybe the car behind
you will want to pay for the car behind them
and keep the streak going. It's scareed forward. Get started

(30:07):
at Weirddarkness dot com slash scare it forward. That's weird
Darkness dot com slash scare it forward. The best known
Christmas poem in the English language begins twas the night
before Christmas, We're all through the house. Not a creature

(30:29):
was stirring, not even a mouse. Its history is not
only romantic, but there is also a question as to
its authorship. The poem was apparently first published December twenty third,
eighteen twenty three, in the Troy, New York Sentinel. It
was titled an Account of a Visit from Saint Nicholas,
and it occupied nearly a column and small type, and

(30:52):
was prefaced with a sympathetic note written by Orville L. Holly,
the editor of the paper, which said, we know not
to whom we are in debt for the following description
of that unwearied patron of music, that homely and delightful
personages of parental kindness, Santa claus Is costumes and his equippage,
as he goes about visiting the firesides of this happy

(31:12):
land laden with Christmas bounties. But from whoever it may
have come, we give thanks for it. There is to
our apprehension a spirit of cordial goodness, in it, a
playfulness of fancy and benevolent alacrity to enter into the
feelings and promote the simple pleasures of children, which are
altogether charming. We hope our little patrons, both lads and lassies,

(31:32):
will accept it as a proof of our unfeigned goodwill
towards them, as a token of our warmest wish that
they may have many a merry Christmas, that they may
long retain their beautiful relish for those unbought, homebred joys,
which derive their flavor from filial piety and fraternal love,
and which they may be assured are the least alloyed,
that time can furnish them, and that they may never

(31:55):
part with that simplicity of character which is their own
fairest ornament. And for the sake of which they have
been pronounced by authority which none can gain. Say, types
of such as shall inherit the kingdom of heaven. Thus,
the first publication of the poem is shrouded in mystery.
Whether the copy of it was sent in anonymously, or

(32:16):
whether the editor deliberately falsified in proclaiming ignorance of its source,
no one will probably ever know. But the fact remains
that the very first sentence of this appreciative editorial comment
only serves to render the solution of the problem more difficult.
The poem was used unillustrated as a carrier's address by
the Troy Sentinel in several succeeding years, and was printed

(32:39):
in the Morning Courier, New York City on January first,
eighteen twenty nine. It was again used as an address
by the Troy Sentinel in eighteen thirty and apparently was
not again reprinted until it appeared in a little volume
entitled Poems by Clement C. Moore lld. And published in
eighteen forty four by Bartlett and Welford, seven Astroplace, New

(33:00):
York City. This book contains a lengthy preface which begins
as follows, My dear children, in compliance with your wishes,
I here present you with a volume of verses written
by me at different periods of my life. I have
not made a selection from among my verses of such
as are of any particular cast, but have given you

(33:20):
the melancholy and the lively, the serious and the sportive,
and even the trifling, such as relate solely to our
domestic circle, and those of which the subjects take a
wider range. We are so constituted that a good, honest,
hearty laugh, which conceals no malice and is excited by
nothing corrupt, however ungenteel it may be, is helpful to

(33:41):
both body and mind. And it is one of the
benevolent ordinances of Providence that we are thus capable of
these alterations of sorrow and trouble with mirth and gladness.
Another reason why the mere trifles in this volume have
not been withheld, is that such things have been often
found by me to afford greater pleasure than what was
by myself esteemed more worth. This evidence of an appreciation

(34:04):
of the lighter things of life is an important factor
in this controversy, because doctor Moore was a man of
serious nature and without reputation as a humorist. He was
born July fifteenth, seventeen seventy nine. His father, right Reverend
Benjamin Moore, was the second Protestant Episcopal Bishop of New York.
He assisted at the inauguration of President Washington and administered

(34:26):
communion to Alexander Hamilton when the latter was dying after
his fatal duel with Aaron Burr. Doctor Moore was educated
for the Church, became proficient in classical languages, and, upon
the opening of the General Theological Seminary, of which he
was the founder and benefactor, served as a professor of
Oriental and Greek literature. The trend of his mind was

(34:48):
distinctly sober and grave. But when it's remembered that Alice
in Wonderland was written by a teacher of mathematics, and
that nonsense novels and the elements of political science have
the same authorship. It may not seem incongruous that the
writer of a Mary Jingle also compiled a compendious lexicon
of the Hebrew language with an explanation of every word

(35:10):
in the Psalms. The combination of grave and gay in
literature has happened more than once. The commonly accepted story
of the first publication of the poem, while lacking documentary authenticity,
is explicit and plausible, and has gained credence through frequent repetition.
It relates that Miss Harriet Butler, eldest daughter of Reverend

(35:32):
Doctor David Butler, rector of Saint Paul's Church in Troy,
while visiting doctor Moore's family in eighteen twenty two, heard
the poem read, copied it into her album, and in
the Christmas season of eighteen twenty three, sent it to
the Troy Sentinel. It's also been printed that doctor Moore
was chagrined over the publication, which he apparently considered quite
beneath the dignity of a theological professor, but it is

(35:55):
difficult to reconcile this statement with the fact that the
poem appeared without affording the slightest clue to its author.
Up to the time of his death July tenth, eighteen
sixty two, doctor Moore was evidently undisturbed as to any
future question of his fame, for he had made no
effort to substantiate his own position. He published the poem
under his own name in eighteen forty four, twenty one

(36:18):
years after it had first appeared, and on March twenty fourth,
eighteen fifty six, he furnished a holographic copy in response
to a written request, stating in his letter that I
wish the enclosed was more worthy of attention. In eighteen
sixty two, the New York Historical Society sent a representative
to interview him. The report of this agent, published in

(36:39):
the Bulletin of the Society under date of January nineteen nineteen,
is disappointing in its lack of detail as to the
origin of the poem. Doctor Moore, than eighty three years old,
did not state that he had furnished the original copy
to miss Butler, but, according to the interview, explained that
she had copied the poem from another copy furnished by

(37:00):
one of doctor Moore's female relatives. He was further quoted
as saying that a portly rubicund Dutchman living in the
neighborhood of his father's country seat. Chelsea suggested to him
the idea of making Saint Nicholas the hero of the
Christmas piece, which he added had been written forty years
previously for his two children. As a matter of fact,
doctor Moore had three children in eighteen twenty two. The eldest, Charity,

(37:24):
named after her mother, was six years of age, Clement
was a baby of two, and Emily was only eight
months old. Only the eldest child could have the slightest
interest in hearing about Saint Nicholas. The interviewer made no
inquiry of doctor Moore respecting the original draft, which so
far as known, is not now in existence. Apparently, the

(37:45):
original manuscript is not in the custody of the Moore family.
For Casmir der Moore, grandson of doctor Moore, writing in
answer to an inquiry, says, my grandfather Clement C. Moore
wrote it for the enjoyment of his children and had
no intent of publishing it. A connection of the family
saw it while on a visit to my grandfather, copied
it and had it published anonymously in a Troy paper.

(38:06):
I believe there were at once several persons who claimed
to be the author, and it was not until urged
to do so that my grandfather acknowledged that he was
the author. This I have understood from my father, uncle,
and aunts to be the facts in the case. I
think my grandfather's reputation stands sufficiently high in warranting me
and saying that he never could have said he was
the author unless he was so. In fact, what became

(38:28):
of the original manuscript I cannot say. Although the poem
A Visit from Saint Nicholas is universally known today, it
does not seem to have acquired instant popularity. As already stated,
It was occasionally used as a newspaper carrier's address, its
appearance in eighteen thirty being made memorable by a wood
engraving executed by Myron, King of Troy, in which the

(38:51):
children's patron, Saint and his eight tiny reindeer were depicted
levitating over the housetops. In eighteen forty nine, Griswold published
a second edition of his Anthology of American Poetry, in
which the poem was included with credit to doctor Moore,
and a reprint also appeared in the Encyclopedia of American Literature,
published by the deut Nicks in eighteen fifty five. In

(39:13):
eighteen sixty two it was issued in a separate volume
with illustrations by F. O. C. Darley, since which time
it has found a place in nearly every school reader,
with annual publication as a Christmas feature in a large
number of newspapers. The doubt as to doctor morris authorship
has assumed definite form, and this is due to the
intelligent and unremitting industry of William S. Thomas, a well

(39:37):
known physician of New York City. Doctor Thomas is the
great grandson of Henry Livingston Junior, who was born in
seventeen forty eight and died in eighteen twenty eight, residing
throughout his life at Locust Grove near Poughkeepsie, New York.
He was a man of distinction, a student, a surveyor,
a landed proprietor, a major of infantry in Montgomery's ill

(39:58):
fated expedition into Canada, and so much of a patriot
that in his old music book he altered God Save
the King into God Save the Congress. Above all, he
was a deaft manipulator of rhymes, and for more than
a century there has been a tradition, or rather a
positive belief among his descendants, that he wrote the famous
Christmas poem. Doctor Thomas has attempted to discover the foundation

(40:21):
for this belief. Naturally, the effort has been attended with
much difficulty, owing to the length of time which has
elapsed since the rhyme was written. But the massive testimony
which he has collected is worthy of consideration in the
hope that eventually the question of authorship will be definitely settled.
It must be admitted, first of all that the evidence

(40:42):
is purely circumstantial. There is not extant a single written
document which shows that Henry Livingstone himself ever laid claim
to authorship, but this might be explained by the fact
that he'd been dead sixteen years when Doctor Moore's volume appeared.
There is no doubt that his family regarded him as
the author, and a succinct expression of this belief as

(41:03):
found in the letter of Missus Edward Livingston Montgomery, as follows.
The little incident connected with the first reading of a
visit from Saint Nicholas was related to me by my
grandmother Catherine Breese. The eldest daughter of Henry Livingstone. As
I recollect her story, there may be a young lady
spending the Christmas holidays with the family at Locust Grove.
On Christmas morning, mister Livingstone came into the dining room

(41:26):
where the family and their guests were just sitting down
to breakfast. He held the manuscript in his hand and
said that it was a Christmas poem he had written
for them. He then sat down at the table and
read aloud to them A Visit from Saint Nicholas. All
were delighted with the verses, and the guest in particular,
was so much impressed by them that she begged mister
Livingstone to let her have a copy of the poem.

(41:47):
He consented and made a copy in his own hand,
which he gave to her. On leaving Locust Grove, when
her visit came to an end, this young lady went
directly to the home of Clement see Moore, where she
filled the position of governess to his children. So well
grounded is the faith of the Livingston family in their
ancestors authorship that as long ago as eighteen sixty five

(42:10):
to eighteen seventy, when doctor Thomas's father was teaching in
Churchill's Academy at Saint Sting, New York. He had an
argument with a grandson of Doctor Moore, who was among
his pupils, because the latter naturally credited his grandfather with
writing the poem. Again, in eighteen seventy nine, Missus Elizah
Livingston Thompson wrote that the poem was opposed and believed

(42:30):
in our family to be father's. And I well remember
our astonishment when we saw it claimed by Clement Seymore
many years after my father's decease, which took place more
than fifty years ago. At that time, my brother, in
looking over his papers, found the original in his own
handwriting with his many fugitive pieces which he had preserved.
And Henry Livingston of Babylon Long Island not only substantiates

(42:53):
this statement, but again refers to the original and accounts
for its disappearance as follows. My father, is long ago,
as I can remember, claimed that his father, Henry Junior,
was the author, that it was first read to the
children at the Old Homestead below Poughkeepsie when he was
about eight years old, which would be about eighteen oh
four or eighteen oh five. He had the original manuscript

(43:14):
with many corrections in his possession for a long time,
and by him was given to his brother Edwin, and
Edwin's personal effects were destroyed when his sister Susan's home
was burned at Wukeshaw, Wisconsin, about eighteen forty seven or
eighteen forty eight. There are, of course, some discrepancies in
these recorded recollections. If the poem was first read in
eighteen oh four or eighteen oh five, it could not

(43:36):
have been in the presence of the Governess of doctor
Moore's children, for doctor Moore at that time was only
twenty five or twenty six years old and unmarried. A
reconciliation of these conflicting statements is suggested by Gertrude Fonda
Thomas of Cambridge, Massachusetts, a granddaughter of Henry Livingstone. She
says that the governess was connected with mister Livingstone's family.

(43:58):
Another factor in the case is Eliza Clement Brewer, who
lived at Russ Playtt's adjoining Locust Grove, and who married
Charles Livingstone, son of Henry Livingstone. Her granddaughter, missus Rudolph Dennig,
wife of a retired commodore of the Navy, states that
her grandmother told her that in eighteen oh eight, while
visiting at the Livingston home, she heard mister Livingstone recite

(44:19):
the poem as his own. When Charles, who had been west,
returned in eighteen twenty six to marry Miss Brewer, he
carried back with him a newspaper in which the poem
had been printed, and kept it in his desk for
many years. In view of the possibility that this newspaper
was the Poughkeepsie publication to which mister Livingston contributed, a
search has been made of the now incomplete files, but

(44:42):
thus far without success, and it is probable that the
newspaper was the Troy Sentinel. The fact that he had
the paper and carefully preserved it is a matter of
family history. All of these threads of family tradition are
tied together with what might be called internal corroboration. Major
Livingstone left a manuscript volume of poems, many of which

(45:03):
were printed in a Poughkeepsie paper and in other publications.
The fact that they were all printed anonymously or under
the pseudonym R is alleged to account for his failure
to publicly claim the authorship of the now famous poem.
An examination of the forty five productions included in this
collection shows that nineteen are the same meter as the

(45:23):
poem in controversy, while in Doctor Moore's volume, all of
the thirty three poems are iambic, with the exception of
a Visit from Saint Nicholas, and the Pig and the Rooster.
The Pig and the Rooster, beginning on a warm sunny
day in the midst of July, a lazy young pig
lay stretched out in his style. This is distinctly inferior
in theme and treatment to the Christmas effort. Major Livingstone

(45:47):
evidently loved the anapestic meter, which Edward Everett says is
better adapted than any other measure to lively and spirited subjects.
In his connection, there should be mentioned three of his poems,
one a letter in rhyme to his brother Beakman, which
begins thus, to my dear brother Beakman, I sit down
to write ten minutes past eight, and a very cold

(46:07):
night not far from me sits with a ballancy cap
on our very good cousin Elizabeth tappon, a tighter young
seamstress you'd ne'er wish to see, and she blessings on
her is sewing for me, And this conclusion of the
carrier's address written in seventeen eighty seven, and now the
end of all of this clatter is but a small
and trifling matter, a puny sixpence to a shilling from

(46:30):
willing souls to souls as willing. And the tribute which
he paid to Nancy Crook, who was a bell and
Poughkeepsie for her name is still a treasured memory, and
which concluded as follows, if a pen or a handkerchief
happened to fall, to seize on the prize fills with
uproar the hall, such pulling and hauling, and shoving and

(46:50):
pushing as rivals the racket of key and the cushion,
and happy thrice happy, too happy the swain who can
replace the pin or bandanna again. These are, to say
the least, in the style of a visit from Saint Nicholas.
A further examination of Livingstone's versifications discloses his delight in
the use of such rhymes as clatter and matter, belly

(47:13):
and jelly, elf and self, all of which are to
be found in Saint Nicholas. He was fond of repetitive phrases,
such as to the top of the porch to the
top of the wall. He invariably used the word mama
when referring to his wife, while the adverbial use of
the word all in the odd usage of gave, occurring
frequently both in his verses and the Christmas poem, are

(47:35):
cited as additional evidence in his favor. Then, further, he
was fond of the idea of levitation, while Tinninus frequently
appealed to him. In one of his poems, he describes
Oberon as writing in a tiny royal coach made of
a nutshell, drawn by green Katie DIDs. And finally, he
repeatedly wove into his lines some references to articles of clothing, shoes,

(47:57):
soft shammy gloves, ruffles, wristbands, new shirts, cravats, and even chineses.
Just as in Saint Nicholas, there's a description of Mama
in her kerchief and I in my cap. Surely, if
Livingston did not write a visit from Saint Nicholas, he
wrote much that was cast in the same mold. And
even if this is all that can be said, it's

(48:18):
enough to excite curiosity. To say the least, it recalls
the famous observation of Martin Hewitt, that two trivialities pointing
in the same direction become at once by their mere agreement,
no trivialities at all. Perhaps this idea was in the
mind of Benson jay Lassing, the historian, when he wrote
to one of Livingstone's descendants as long ago as eighteen

(48:39):
eighty six, that the circumstantial evidence that your grandfather wrote
a visit from Saint Nicholas seems as conclusive as that
which has taken innocent men to the gallows. The circle
in which the question has been discussed has been restricted
because of the previous unwillingness of mister Livingstone's family to
allow publicity for a belief which has been cherished by

(48:59):
them for a century. The work which has been undertaken,
and which is here only partially recorded, is of course
a labor of love, and it has been prosecuted with
full appreciation of the difficulty in overturning an apparently established fact.
Doctor Moore's authorship, resting upon the inclusion of the poem
and his published volume, has stood practically unchallenged, and the

(49:21):
burden of disproving the claim of a man of his
high attainments and unblemish character is not a light one.
From its literary side, the problem is not without interest,
but in a broader sense, the result is immaterial no
matter who wrote it. The poem has been a joy
for generations, and it'll continue to live as long as

(49:42):
the human heart is touched with the spirit of Christmas tide.
And I will share that poem when Weird Darkness returns.
Up next, it's a visit from Saint Nicholas, better known
as Twas the Night before Christmas, and by well, I
guess it doesn't matter. Plus one of the great and

(50:04):
now sadly lapsed Christmas traditions is the telling of ghost stories.
Even though we are trying to revive it here on
Weird Darkness. On one particular year, a British teenager took
this pastime to a whole other level. He didn't read
about a Christmas Eve haunting, though he experienced one these stories.
When Weird Darkness returns a visit from Saint Nicholas, credited

(50:45):
to Clement Bmore, Twas the Night before Christmas, when all
through the house not a creature was stirring, not even
a mouse. The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
in hope that Saint Nicholas soon would be there. The
children were nestled all snug in their beds, while visions

(51:06):
of sugar plums danced in their heads, and Mama in
her kerchief and I in my cap, had just settled
down for a long winter's nap, when out on the
lawn there arose such a clatter. I sprang from the
bed to see what was the matter. Away to the window,
I flew like a flash, tore open the shutters, and
threw up the sash. The moon on the breast of

(51:27):
the newfall and snow gave the luster of midday to
objects below. When what to my wondering eyes should appear
but a miniature sleigh, an eight tiny reindeer, with a
little old driver, so lively and quick I knew in
a moment it must be Saint Nick, more rapid than eagles,
his coursers. They came, and he whistled and shouted and

(51:49):
called them by name. Now dasher, no dancer, now prancer,
and vixen on, comet on, stupid, on Taunder and blitzen,
to the top of the porch, to the top of
the wall. Now daway, darsh away, darsh away, all as
dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly when they
meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky, so up

(52:10):
to the housetop the coursiers they flew with a sleigh
full of toys, and Saint Nicholas too, And then twinkling.
I heard on the roof the prancing and pawing of
each little hoof. As I drew in my hand and
was turning around down the chimney, Saint Nicholas came with
a bound. He was dressed all in fur from his
head to his foot, and his clothes were all tarnished

(52:31):
with ashes and soot. A bundle of toys he flung
on his back, and he looked like a peddler just
opening his pack. His eyes, how they twinkled, His dimples,
how merry his cheeks were like roses, his nose like
a cherry. His droll little mouth was drawn up like
a bow, and the beard of his chin was as
white as the snow. The stump of a pipe he

(52:55):
held tight in his teeth, and the smoke it encircled
his head like a wreath. He had a broad face
and a little round belly that shook when he laughed,
like a bowl full of jelly. He was chubby and plump,
a right jolly old elf, and I laughed when I
saw him in spite of myself. A wink of his
eye and a twist of his head soon gave me

(53:15):
to know I had nothing to dread. He spoke not
a word, but went straight to his work and filled
all the stockings, and then turned with a jerk, and
laying his finger a side of his nose, and giving
a nod up the chimney. He rose. He sprang to
his sleigh, to his team, and gave a whistle, and
away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim. There he drove out of sight.

(53:37):
Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night.

(54:04):
On the night of December twenty fourth, nineteen forty four,
sixteen year old Basil Saville's thoughts were not on holiday cheer.
He was not looking out for Santa Claus, but for bombs.
The world was at war and Seville was one of
a team of fire watchers. His job was to spend
the night guarding the Great Abbey of Saint Albans in Hertfordshire,

(54:26):
keeping an eye out for enemy bombers and making sure
the abbey and its firefighting equipment were in good order.
On this particular night, Seville was left to patrol the
abbey alone. Being inside a vast, ancient church lit only
by moonlight would be an eerie enough experience for most people,
but the teen took it in stride. He had spent

(54:46):
his life attending the old edifice, so it felt nearly
as familiar as his own home. However, an unfamiliar feeling
of unease began to creep upon him. Although he did
not see or hear anything, he had a nagging sense
that he was not alone. When Sevilla reached the fifteenth
century watching chamber, this strange feeling grew more intense. Worse still,

(55:09):
he realized this feeling was not unfounded. When he shone
his flashlight into the chamber, he saw two wooded figures
staring in his direction. When he dashed up into the loft,
he saw nothing but two monks habits lying on the floor.
Seville did his best to convince himself that his imagination
had merely been playing tricks on him, and continued on

(55:31):
his tour. As he was climbing the staircase which led
to the roof, he suddenly heard the tolling of one
of the abbey's bells that he nearly fainted from the shock.
All of the abbey's bells had been put into storage
on the ground floor. He just passed one on his
way to the staircase. What was he hearing? He managed
to work up the courage to open the belfry door.

(55:54):
The tolling had ceased and the belfry was empty. After
taking a few minutes to pull himself together, Basil began
heading downstairs, unaware that the Venerable Abbey had a few
more Christmas Eve surprises in store for him. The church
organ began to play. Seville noticed a candle flickering in
the organ loft. Put that light out, he yelled to

(56:17):
whatever was up there. As he moved closer, he could
see the pages of a music book turning and the
organ keys being pressed by invisible fingers. Then, from the
direction of the high altar, a phantom choir began to
burst into song. As the stunned boy ran towards the
high altar, he suddenly saw a procession of monks, led

(56:37):
by their abbot, leaving the altar and passing into the
Saint's Chapel. Seville followed them into the chapel, only to
find it dark and empty. When he went up to
the organ loft, he found an old, yellowed music book
and a spent candle, so perhaps he wasn't going mad
after all. The book was a copy of Albanous Mass,

(56:59):
an early sixteenth century work that Robert Fairfax had written
especially for the abbey. When he returned to the vestry,
Seville rejoiced to see that one of his fellow fire
watchers had arrived. He'd probably never been so happy to
have company in his life. Seville told his colleague about
the Knight's experiences. However, when the pair went to the
organ loft, the candle in the book had vanished, same

(57:23):
with the monk's habits. Seville had seen in the watching chamber.
That spectral Christmas Eve Mass remained the most memorable night
in Seville's life. Many years later, he told paranormal researcher
Betty Puddick, I'm not psychic or anything like that, and
I've never seen anything like it, either before or since.
People may not believe me, but I know it happened.

(57:47):
For some years, Seville, fearing he'd be mocked, kept his
story to himself. It was not until nineteen eighty two,
when a newspaper published his account as part of a
roundup of Christmas stories submitted by readers, that his strange
tale became public. Seville, it turns out, was hardly the
only one to see and hear phantom church services in

(58:07):
the abbey. There were reports from the nineteenth century of
people hearing a ghostly organist during the night. Numerous people
have seen the ghosts of Benedictine monks in and around
the church. Robert Fairfax had been organist and director of
the abbey choir for many years. He is acclaimed as
one of the greatest English musicians of his time. In

(58:28):
nineteen twenty one, to commemorate the four hundredth anniversary of
Fairfax's death, his Albanus Mass was performed in the abbey
for the first time since the great composer's death, well
performed for the first time by living musicians at any rate.
One Frank Dracard told Betty Puddick of a conversation he'd
had with Canon Glossip, who lived near the abbey, the

(58:50):
morning after the concert. Did you enjoy the Fairfax music
last night? Canon Drakeard asked yes, the canon replied, but
you know, dracard I had heard it. He went on
to explain that on more than one occasion he had
heard that very music coming from the abbey in the
middle of the night, at times when he knew there

(59:10):
was no human choir inside. The monks and musicians of
Saint Alban's clearly loved their church and see no reason
to leave it just because they happened to be long dead.

(59:40):
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.
All stories in Weird Darkness aren't purported to be true
unless stated otherwise, and you can find source links or
links to the authors in the show notes. Christmas Eve

(01:00:00):
Mind Disaster was written by Troy Taylor. The Christmas Poem
That Started a Feud was written by Henry Litchfield West
for Victoriana magazine Crampis, The Christmas Monster is by Garth
Haslum for Monsters Here and There, and the Phantom Choir
of Saint Albans is from Strange Company. Again. You can
find links to all of these stories in the show

(01:00:21):
notes Weird Darkness is a production and trademark of Marler
House Productions, Copyright Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming
out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little
light Matthew one, verse twenty three. The version will be
with child and will give birth to a son, and
they will call him Immanuel, which means God with us.

(01:00:43):
And a final thought from Norman Vincent Peel, Christmas weaves
a magic wand over this world, and behold, everything is
softer and more beautiful. I'm Darren Marler. Thanks for joining
me in the Weird Darkness. AB

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