S1E8: Campfire Stories

S1E8: Campfire Stories

History is made up of stories.  Long before the printing press, stories were handed down through families, through cultures… around campfires.


As the stories become older and older and are altered slightly or grow more grand with each telling, the line between fact and fiction gets blurred as they are passed through history.


The stories presented to you today are said to come from true life.  Based in fact and if that is so, they are a terrifying link to our history and it’s culture.


Are you brave enough to entertain the stories passed down to make your hair stand on end?
Fact or fiction… I leave that for you to decide…

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S1E8: Campfire Stories

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Transcript

Bag of Bones Podcast 
Season One: Episode Eight
​Released: October 2020


October is the month that we give ourselves the permission to tolerate just a little bit more scare into our life.  We are willing to watch a scary movie, or dabble in bloody make-up, brave a seance and …engage in scary stories.   
History is made up of stories.  Long before the printing press, stories were handed down through families, through cultures… around campfires.
As the stories become older and older and are altered slightly or grow more grand with each telling, the line between fact and fiction gets blurred as they are passed through history.
The stories presented to you today are said to come from true life.  Based in fact and if that is so, they are a terrifying link to our history and it’s culture.
Are you brave enough to entertain the stories passed down to make your hair stand on end?
Fact or fiction… I leave that for you to decide…


Intro


The BooHag
The slaves that were brought to the low country in the 1500s came from all over Africa.  The many tribes were placed together and each was introduced to another people and their knowledge. The Gullah/Geechee culture was created from the descendants of the original slaves and they literally steeped a culture of their own.
The Gullah people developed their own language, traditions, rituals, cuisine, music… all derived from their African roots.  And stories… they shared their stories.


Today hundreds of thousands of the Gullah people live along the coast from Florida to North Carolina. You can see their craft, taste their unique food and hear the blend of the Southern words and African phrases and dialect and they are more than happy to share the warnings of their ancestors… like from those of the BooHag.
The BooHag is sometimes considered a powerful witch that can be called upon to curse some one.  The Boohag will “ride” the victim until she is discovered and stopped or the victim has gone mad or too weary from lack of sleep or even death depending on the strength of the voodoo that placed the curse.
Sometimes the BooHag closer resembles a vampire-like creature that sucks the air from your lungs instead of blood from your veins.
She is able to slip into any skin and walk among the people but can only use the  skin until it expires and then must find someone else to breathe for her.
Whether she is brought to you by a curse or seeks you out on her own, she can enter your home through the tiniest crack or keyhole, but is more drawn to an open window.
It is believed in the Gullah culture that the color blue is a powerful color to keep away the demons, spirits and haints so much so that you’ll see that the trim around the windows and the doors, even the porches are painted blue to repel the harmful creatures of the underworld.
She comes at night and hovers over the body or presses down on your chest and draws in your breath making you feel tired and weak the next day.  You fall into a sleep paralysis that you are aware of your surroundings, may even be able to see the BooHag but are unable to move or stop her.
Or she can enter your body and drain the night’s life from you and you’ll know she was there because you’ll feel as if you’ve been beaten and your bones ache and you are as weary as if you had walked for hundreds of miles.
Some have woken with scratch marks and reoccurring nightmares or the curse plagues them to insanity
She comes out at night and her having no skin of her own, she is a blood red muscle mass and yet so thin you can see her bright blue veins and organs.  If you see her she will steal your voice so you aren’t able to scream out.
The BooHag will perish if she is between skins when the sun comes up, so the only way to defeat her is to take advantage of her weakness.  She is a curious creature and must keep count of everything in the room.  One chair.  One, two lamps, One, two, three, four pairs of shoes….
Knowing that she must count, and that in order to destroy her, she must be caught by the dawn.
So the Gullah people would have a broom or sieve in their bedrooms for just such an occasion.
Virginia Hamilton says in her book, Her Stories: African American Folktales, Fairytales and True Tales- quote- “The Boohag will stop to count every straw in a broom, every hole in a sieve, and as many needles as can be placed in the cork of a bottle.  By the time she’s finished, dawn will break to stop her wickedness.  For she dare not be seen by the light of day.”
The BooHag is still a powerful tale of warning to live a good life so as not to be cursed and the Gullah folk today are willing to sell you a bundle of fresh, potent parsley as repellant or decorative whisk broom to protect your night’s slumber -but just to be safe, you might want to close those windows or paint your porch a lovely sky blue.


Skinwalkers


Wolves and coyotes in the Navajo culture are regarded as helpers, workers, teachers even… but not friends.  In the Southwest, as the tribes moved deeper into the area, they believed that the wild dogs were symbolic to witches.  A sign of danger, warning… potential disaster.  To this day, it is believed that the Skinwalkers still roam about searching for souls to possess.
Stories are passed down of dog-like creatures peering into windows, standing ominously only yards away, seen but not overtly so.  Wolves having amazing supernatural speed- being able to keep up with vehicles or even shooting a wolf and watching it turn back into human form before dying.


Skinwalker.

A word that rarely muttered outloud among the Navajo and even when it is brought up, it tempered with reverence.  Not something to be taken lightly.
Smelling a strong foul odors, red eyes glowing in the distance, scratching noises… all these were considered signs that a Skinwalker was near or that danger was imminent.
The tales of coyotes and wolves are told around the campfires not only for entertainment or to thrill their attentive audience, but have also been used for generations as moral instruction.  The knowledge of the connection between wolves and witches is a dangerous one and in the wrong hands, can be deadly.
Witches according to this legend, are those who intend to do evil to others.  They are considered having close contact with death and are always looking for dark souls to induct into their den.
Therefore, when someone displays characteristics outside of the Navajo culture such as greed, uncontrollable sexual appetites, rage and murder, it is believed that they must be under the influence of witchcraft.  The deeper they follow the dog-like creature down this path of aggression, acquisition, competition and other dominant predatory hunting behaviors, the more dark powers they will gain.  The more they shift from human to a skin-walker.
There is a crossroads where a person must choose to go forward harnessing the powers of good… or evil.
They absorb the powers of the animal kingdom and even transform completely to carry out their task.  They become more powerful the more they call on the darkness and soon, it is no longer something they can control.
These creatures are considered strong, powerful, shape-shifiting witches that are constantly searching for those ready to follow their path down the dark road or the next victim to ensure their survival.  For they must hunt or be in fear of perishing themselves.
They feed on random victims, but they thrive from those who are feeding a black heart.
They can gain access when you make eye contact, making them capable of taking over your thoughts, words, actions even possessing your body. Once they use your body for a crime, they know that it’s just a matter of time that they can claim you.  So if you are feeling eyes on you or sensing any of the other clues that a skinwalker may be near, then perhaps you should check your guilt.  You may think you have gotten away with something but they know… and they will be looking for you.



La Llorona


A beautiful, young widow named Maria fell in love with a rich man.  The rich man wanted to marry her, but did not want to be a father as Maria already had two sons from her first marriage.  At first she denied him.  She loved him deeply, but couldn’t bare to leave her sons behind.
The man pursued her but made himself clear that he wanted only her.
Maria lost her job and had no way to feed her family and emplored the rich man to reconsider. He denied her pleas.
Maria made the fateful decision and took her boys to a bridge.  She stabbed them in the heart and tossed their bodies into the river below.
When she showed up at the door of her beloved and tells him what she has done to prove her love to him, he was so repulsed at the sight of her blood soaked clothes that he slammed the door in her face telling her never to return.

Maria ran back to the water’s edge to try and save her children but it was too late.
She took her own life there on the banks of the river and when she woke at the gates of heaven, she was told that she was not allowed to enter without her children.  So she wanders… she cries and calls out to her slain children along the riverbank, searching.  Forever searching.
Her story, the one of La Llorona, the Crying Woman has been traced back to the ancient Aztec people and carried along through Hispanic legend folklore ever since.



Though the stories vary from culture to culture, making the Crying woman either a saint or a sinner. Either driven to committing the horrific crime of taking away her children’s life for their sake, or that she was unfeeling and only seeks the attention of men, the hauntings and the warnings remain the same.
In the Hispanic legend, she is often seen in either white or black dress walking along side the Rio Grande calling out “Donde estan mis hijos?” (ee-hose). Meaning where are my children?
She is a symbol of pain and suffering caused by selfishness.
Dogs howl when she is nearby and she is heard crying and wailing along the riverbanks and near Crybaby bridges looking for drown children.  She had mostly been seen or heard in New Mexico & Texas but as the Mexican and Spanish cultures move inward, deaths are attributed to her anywhere a child drowning has occurred.
Hispanic and Latin parents warn their children about walking near the water after dark.  If La Lloroa sees them, she may mistake them for her children and take them away.
Anyone can hear her wails … and stories of this happening are many, but she can only be seen by a person who is about to die.
Her presence and whispers of death are the basis of many filicide cases throughout history and in recent days.




A bit of Trivia:
In 2002, in Pilar New Mexico, Bernadine Flores claimed to have been called by La Llorna just before she drown her two children and herself in the Rio Grande.
Only a few days before shooting the pivotal scene for the movie The Cry ( a movie about the mythical La Laorna) they cast and crew discover that they are on the exact ground of the Flores murder/suicide.
To tame the legend a park was built in Las Cruces, NM called La Llora Park.  It boasts beautiful scenery, happy playgrounds, hiking trails and more.  And while it is visited by many, it is built along the Rio Grande… and recommend to leave the park before dark.
To this day, it is said that La Llorna still walks the earth looking for her missing children attempting to redeem her crimes and enter into heaven, but her selfish and jealous side causes her to call out to others to join her in her pain.


Walking Sam


These days you may have heard of Slenderman and may think that he is just the fictional creation of Eric Knudson in 2009… but the idea of shadow people and whispers on the wind that bring about darkness or even death goes back to the beginning.
The Native American’s reluctantly tell of an ancient tribe that was living in the woods when a winter storm hit them.  They were caught off guard and were therefore not prepared to fight off the natural elements.
They ran out of food and began to whither away. The blood in their veins ran slow and thick, as their organs shrunk from lack of nutrients.  The hair that didn’t fall out, became long and stringy, their skin taunt and tough.  Their nails grew hard and sharp as they scratched away at trees for some kind of nourishment.  Their voices turned hoarse and shrill.  Their skin clung to their bones as they slowly starved.
One night, they followed the sounds of whistling to a neighboring village.  The starving people could not hold back.  They tore into the unsuspecting tribe, ripping the flesh from their bones, satisfying their hunger.  Their terrifying screams could be heard through the darkness to villages for miles.  There were those, mere shadows of who they once were who tried to resist, but the need to survive outweighed their moral compass.  They ate until their bellies were swollen with the flesh of beings that they once resembled.
They were so hungry that even licked the blood from the soil that spilled from their victims leaving no trace that humans ever lived there.  So that even today, if a person disappears by being lured by a Stick Indian, nothing is ever found.  The night creature devours every single thing.
The Stick Indians now lure lone victims to them by whistling or animal sounds hoping that you will follow the sound.  The legend says that if they are able to lure you into the woods, they can paralyze you, hypnotize you or drive you mad… if you survive.


And after dark, the Native Indians do no allow whistling of any kind for fear of the Stick Indians.
While this story is frightening as it is, there’s more… There is one who stands alone and has taken the tale of the Stick Indians to another level.  He is known as Walking Sam.  He is far more malevolent, far more wicked… far more terrifying.
His sole purpose is to seek out those he can convince to take their own life.  Many have seen him lurking in the shadows wearing a tall hat.  He is slender and no matter how far away he appears you can hear his whispers as if he were right next to you.  Or worse, he gets in your head and stays with you until he has fixed your mind on your death.  He whispers that you are not worthy of life.  He tells those who give him audience that they are better off dead.  He is said to have the ghosts of his victims dangling from his arms, keeping them as trophies, always with him.  Always searching for more.
His method of choice is hanging and is said to prepare a noose leaving it dangling on a tree for his victims.  His greatest achievement is to keep his presence a secret, the mere speaking of his name causes fear among those who know his story so he is free to prey upon the susceptible.
He targets youth who are more open to his words and is relentless in his methods.  In 2015, there were 103 suicide attempts attributed to the presence of Walking Sam.

Whether you believe or chalk it up to folklore, many teen lives have been lost in his name.  So many, in fact, it has triggered suicide prevention programs to combat the belief of Walking Sam.


America was built on stories.  We all have stories.  But when the voices of the past conjure up tales of horror and death, warnings and premonitions, we can always just chalk them up to stories… cant’ we?

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