Article Archives: Bumps in the Night

Patience Worth, Part 2

July 18, 2013 | by Al Hunter

Speaking through a Ouija board operated by Pearl Lenore Curran, a 30-year-old St. Louis housewife of limited education, Patience Worth was nothing short of a national phenomenon in the early years of the 20th Century. Though her works are virtually forgotten today, the prestigious Braithwaite anthology listed five of her … Read More

Patience Worth, Part 1

July 11, 2013 | by Al Hunter

One hundred years ago this week, St. Louis, Missouri housewife Pearl Curran created a stir with a Ouija board by unleashing a legend named “Patience Worth.” Beginning in July 1912 Pearl Curran and her friend Emily Grant Hutchings began experimenting with the Ouija board during afternoon teas while their husbands … Read More

The Real Story of “The Natural”

June 27, 2013 | by Al Hunter

The Major League All-Star game is just around the corner and once again network time usually devoted to regular season baseball games will be filled with baseball-themed movies like Major League, Field of Dreams, A League of Their Own, Eight Men Out and, of course, The Natural. But did you … Read More

The Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus Train Disaster

June 20, 2013 | by Al Hunter

When I was a kid, like most Hoosiers, I visited Chicago often. I was as big a history nerd back then as I am today. I made sure to visit the obvious places: the St. Valentines Day Massacre site, the alley next to the Biograph Theatre where Johnny Dillinger breathed … Read More

Parenting Skills, Part 2

June 13, 2013 | by Al Hunter

Last week, I pondered the parenting skills of our sixteenth President Abraham Lincoln. I came to the conclusion that I probably wouldn’t want to sit next to Abe and Mary’s kids on an airplane. Witnesses, acquaintances and close friends often remarked, sometimes frankly, other times temperately, that the Lincoln boys … Read More