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The "Grad Night" Series by CrackedMack
Slimebeast
on: 03/08/19, 04:54 AM
Grad Night in the Haunted Mansion
On June 4th, 1983, my high school was one of many that took us to Disneyland for Grad Night. If you've ever been to Disneyland on Grad Night, you know how much fun—and how crazy—it can be. The park stays open extra late, the skippers who drive the Jungle Cruise boats let loose and tell dirty jokes, and there's plenty of opportunities for people to sneak booze and weed in. Getting a bunch of amped high-schoolers in Disneyland is one thing, but with a nightlife and party atmosphere behind it, things can get pretty nuts.
My two friends and I, Anaheim locals, were particularly excited. We all loved Disneyland, and while we didn't get to visit often, living practically in the park's backyard gave us more opportunities than most. In addition, we hadn't been since the new Fantasyland opened earlier that year, going from a sort of Medieval fairground into a storybook village, so I was kind of looking forward to that. Unlike a lot of people who were there, we intended to keep things clean and have a grand old time of it, hit as many rides as possible, and just revel.
But the big plan for the night was kind of ambitious and maybe a little reckless; to this day, I can't remember who suggested it first, only that we all thought it was a great idea. We had already gotten into the park and gone on a number of rides when it was brought up, while we were sitting on a bench in Frontierland eating churros. From where we sat, we could look across the Rivers of America to Tom Sawyer Island, and past that where the river curved to New Orleans Square. Poking above the trees was the cupola of the Haunted Mansion, with its clipper ship weather-vane. The sun had just gone down, and the sky was awash with dull orange and purple clouds, most of which seemed to loom behind the cupola. I pointed out how perfect and spooky the whole thing looked, and that got us talking about it. The mansion was a collective favorite, and being dumb kids, we agreed to do a little exploring: to effectively "spend the night" in the Haunted Mansion.
We laughed about as we got in line for it, moving past the brick columns and up the walk toward the mansion, but inside I was a bit nervous. You have to understand security was a bit more lax back then, so it was plausible that we would be able to pull this off if we were careful. Plus, Grad Night always had kids getting into trouble, and the likelihood of us getting banned for good was not as high as it could have been. But I still felt tense, that feeling you get when you're scared about going on a thrill ride for the first time, excited but hesitant.
The three of us—Mike, Karen and myself—had it all worked out: when you first enter the mansion, you're escorted into a room that seems to stretch and warp before your eyes, which is actually an elevator that takes guests below ground, where a hallway connects to the ride building beyond the park's berm. As everyone else crowded out of the room and into the Hall of Morphing Portraits, we lagged behind (which the disembodied voice of the Ghost Host jokingly warns you not to do) and fell in at the very back of the line. By the time we piled into our "Doombuggy", there was no one else behind us, and the black, endless procession of clam shell-like cars were empty.
We went through the ride as normal, cracking jokes and making banter at all the old familiar scenes, until we reached the exit crypt. We stepped out onto the moving platform and walked toward the escalator ramp that leads from the crypt back to the park outside. If you don't know, the escalator hugs the wall on the right, but on the left is a small crypt scene where a tiny, ghostly bride stands on a stone shelf and tells you to "Hurry back...Hurry back..."
Mike took charge here, deliberately turning backwards as we went up to watch the cast member near the buggies below us. Mike's a big, broad-shouldered guy, a football player through-and-through, and his bulk hid me and Karen from view as we slowly ascended. At his signal, when the cast member monitoring the exit had his back turned, Karen and I climbed over the rail and dropped down into the crypt scene, where we quickly scurried under the dusty space beneath the escalator. Mike was over a moment later, and we laughed and congratulated each other on a job well done.
We must have spent a good hour or so down there, giggling into our hands whenever we heard footsteps and voices overhead of unsuspecting people exiting the ride. Karen even had some snacks she'd brought with her, and we sat there in the dark and ate and whispered to each other. It was like being in a weird clubhouse, and it felt good that we three shared this delinquency together, even as the narration of the ghost bride looped over and over again in the background: "Hurry back...Hurry back...Be sure to bring your death certificate. If you decide to join us, make final arrangements now. We've been...dying to have you."
Eventually the novelty wore off, and we got quiet, and then listless. Sure, we'd managed this much, but then what? Karen pointed out that it had been eerily silent for awhile—other than the monotonous speech of the bride and other spooky ambient sounds, there were no more people coming up the ramp. Mike said he thought maybe the park had closed, but that made no sense because it was open all night on Grad Night. Not wanting to get in trouble, but also wondering what was up, I volunteered to clamber back up and take a look. When I did, using some of the crypt scenery for hand and footholds, I saw that there was no one around, not even a cast member down at the unloading platform at the end.
When I reported this, Mike and Karen climbed back up as well, and we went back down the unloading station to look around. All the Doombuggies coming along the corridor were empty, and there was not a person in sight. It was odd, to say the least, and I felt like something was definitely off to have the place so empty. I was about to suggest turning around and heading back outside when Mike said he'd always wondered where the Doombuggies went after they dropped you off. They rounded a dark corner in the crypt area and vanished from sight, and Mike was curious what was down there.
Now really, I should have said no—that there was no point and that we could get into some serious trouble if we snooped around back there. It was probably just a utility corridor anyway, since the buggies just looped back around to the loading room anyway. But I was young, and I was stupid, and when presented with a golden opportunity like that, it was hard to pass it up.
So we went ahead and jumped into a Doombuggy going by, and it slowly rounded the corner into the darkness. This was uncharted territory for us, and even if it turned out to be boring back there, at the very least we'd get a chance to see it, and maybe get another ride out of it.
Hardly a day goes by where I regret not having said something.
The main thing I remember was how spartan it was. It wasn't quite pitch black, but it was even gloomier in there than the rest of the ride. There were small lights set into the walls on either side of the track, but they were low to the ground and far between. The walls were painted black, and the corridor seemed so narrow that I felt boxed in. It was quiet too, other than the hum of the track moving the buggies. I felt tense, and Mike and Karen weren't helping that, because they looked tense too; I think it was dawning on all of us how much trouble we might get in.
I think a minute or so had passed like this, us going down that dark, featureless backstage corridor, when the ride suddenly stopped and I nearly jumped out of my skin as a voice came from somewhere overhead — and laughed when I realized I'd been startled by the normal breakdown spiel. "Playful spooks have interrupted our tour," the recording went. "Please remain seated in your Doombuggy. We will proceed in just a moment."
The teasing was immediate, as we all pointed out to each other how we'd jumped. We waited for the ride to start again, and every thirty seconds or so, the spiel would play: "We have been unappointedly detained by prankish spirits. Kindly remain seated in your Doombuggy. We will continue our tour momentarily." This went on for good long while—ten, maybe fifteen minutes—and still the buggies hadn't moved; no one had come looking for us. We were getting antsy, and the silence between the announcements was becoming unsettling.
Then Karen leaned out a bit and looked around, and she noticed the door first. Just ahead, past the buggy in front of us, work lights revealed a little alcove and a utility door on the right-hand side of the corridor. We were so sick of being in the buggy by that point we were willing to try anything, so after a short discussion, we all squeezed out of the buggy, pressed against the wall to go past the next one (Mike had trouble here) and stood before the door. I pushed it open, finding it unlocked, and it led to a metal staircase leading down into the darkness, footlights like the ones in the corridor revealing where to go. I was thinking up excuses in my head as we went down the stairs, to explain why were likely stepping into Disney's underground utility corridors—the infamous "Utilidors" said to run like a spiderweb beneath Disneyland—if someone found us. And by this point, I hoped someone did.
At the bottom of the stairs, another closed door with a sign on it, reading "Cast Members Only." We pushed through that as well, and were legitimately surprised to see that it opened into what looked like a themed hallway. Disney, even backstage, seemed to be paying attention to style, as this hall sported the purple "demon wallpaper" and wainscoting of the rooms above. It was even lit by candle sconces on the walls, the fake flickering bulbs coated with cobwebs and dust. Several detailed wooden doors lined the hall, with out-of-place white placards mounted to them. Each was marked as a Prop Room, with a corresponding number.
As we made our way up the hall, we tried each door we came to and found them all locked. The first door, Prop Room 1, shook a bit but wouldn't budge. Same with 2 and 3. Mike chuckled and said he wondered if we would find Walt Disney's frozen head down here, but I could hear a nervous waver in his laugh. Even I was feeling some sense of dread with each door we tried, something hard to place but nagging. At Door 4, I put my ear to the edge of it and thought I heard what sounded like rushing water or faint TV static from the other side, and at 5 I noticed that the faux candles flanking it were flickering more sporadically than the rest, like they were faulty. Door 6, to left and near another plain utility door that marked the hall's end, was the only one that yielded to us, and I was the one who turned the cold handle and opened it for the first time.
It's difficult for me to describe what I saw in there without shuddering, because even now my telling makes it sound fairly normal... That is, as normal as a room hidden under a theme park attraction can possibly be. It wasn't very big, almost like a large storage shed. Unlike the hall, this one was the bland utility black, and lit by a single fluorescent light in the ceiling, albeit a dim one. The walls were lined with metal cabinets, and there was some sort of large, archaic gadget shoved into one corner, not unlike the old computer banks from the 60's. But what caught my attention right away was the grinning figure near the far wall, across from the door—a dummy or animatronic of some sort, lifeless and unmoving but standing on its base.
The discovery was fascinating to all of us, and without thinking we all edged into the room and immediately approached the figure. It was clearly meant to be one of the ghosts in the ride, a specter in a top hat with a skull-like face, cartoony bulging eyes and a leering smile; one of the teeth was even painted gold. He stood in a bow-legged stance, one gnarled hand holding a cane and the other a hatbox. None of us had ever seen this particular character on the ride before, though Karen said its face looked a lot like the tall, skinny hitchhiking ghost from the end of the ride.
I was just turning away from the figure to look at the cabinets when there was a combustion roar from the hall outside, like the sound of a passing motorcycle, followed by a loud, bassy boom that made the floor shake. The door to the room swung shut, and the fluorescent light sputtered and went out, leaving us in total darkness. Mike gasped and Karen screamed, and I was just reaching out for them in the dark when I heard a peculiar whirring sound. Another light came on, this one a concentrated green light above the hatbox ghost, showing its skeleton smile for a moment before that light faded and another faded on, illuminating the hatbox. I could see through the material of the hatbox now, and saw the ghost's head grinning at me from inside. The pattern repeated itself rhythmically, making it seem like the ghost's head was disappearing from his shoulders and appearing in the hatbox. It wasn't a terribly convincing effect, but in the dark and with the strange things going on around me, it genuinely scared me.
I turned and stumbled through the room, ready to get out of there, feeling around for the door. Now even the light on the ghost shut off, and I heard Karen and Mike's feet behind me, a crash, and the sound of something solid tapping the concrete floor. I tried pushing the door open, but it wouldn't budge, and somebody slammed into my back in the dark and caused me to hit it hard. I was dazed but unhurt, and another scream from Karen fueled my adrenaline even more. I instead gave the door a tug and it opened.
I was out in the hall without a second thought, without even looking back. I started running, sprinting back the way I had come, gasping for air. I was never a very athletic kid, but panic kept me going. I heard sounds behind me—footsteps, Mike and Karen yelling in terror as they followed, and what seemed like rapid knocking and banging on the doors around me—but I refused to look over my shoulder. Up the stairs and back into the Doombuggy corridor in what felt like a matter of seconds. The Doombuggies were moving now, endlessly traveling through the shadows. I knew it was risky to jump into one in this narrow corridor, and for a moment I stopped, trying to figure out what to do.
I finally looked back, back down the stairway I had come from. I thought Mike and Karen had been right behind me, but they were gone. I called out their names, my voice echoing down the stairs, but there was no reply. Not until I heard something tapping the metal stairs, coming up toward the door, and saw an unfamiliar vague shadow on the wall that I flung the door closed and dove into the nearest buggy, which carried me down the corridor a little ways before finally emerging into the limbo-like loading room.
All of the effects were still running here, including the eerie music and sounds, but there was still no one else around. I yelled for help, but no one appeared. As soon as I could I jumped out of the Doombuggy and ran back up the line, into the Hall of Morphing Portraits. Ahead was the door to the elevator, the Stretching Gallery, but I remembered that this area had a more immediate chicken exit, meant for those too scared to ride the ride and wanted to head back up to the park. The door was marked with an obvious exit sign, sitting between two shuttered windows that made it look like it led outside to a stormy night, and without hesitating I pushed through that as well.
Beyond was another corridor, on either side of me flashing lights pointed at the windows to simulate lightning, flickering with each thunderclap that boomed through the hall, disorienting me even further. Turning left, I followed the hall as the floor inclined gently up, my throat tight and a stitch in my side.
And then my throat closed altogether as I turned a corner almost ran into the hatbox ghost.
It was standing smack-dab in the middle of the hall, between me and the door that led outside. I scrambled backward instinctively, but the figure didn't move. It was a static prop, grinning its cadaver grin, back-lit by a ceiling light further down the hall. The light also broke the illusion of the hatbox, and I could see vaguely the shape of the disembodied head through the scrim.
I was convinced—thoroughly convinced at that moment—that thing was going to suddenly jerk to life and come after me, but it didn't. I had no idea how it had gotten there from down in the sub-level, or how it had so quickly. Maybe the one I'd seen below wasn't the only figure; maybe Mike and Karen were pulling a fast one on me, and had dragged the figure up with them. I was frozen, trying to figure out where to go next, not wanting to go anywhere near the ghost but not wanting to backtrack either, because I still felt like there was something sinister behind me. Nervously, I croaked out the names of my lost friends, but there was no reply. Noises from the ride seemed to come floating down the hall, muted but ever-present.
Then I heard the groan.
It could have been a human groan, or something mechanical, but I definitely heard it. It didn't sound like any of the standard audio, and it came from a point somewhere near or past the hatbox ghost, maybe even from further down the corridor past the exit. As if this were a trigger, I realized that either my eyes had adjusted to the dark or the lighting had somehow changed, because I looked again at the hatbox and saw the thing inside through the scrim.
There was still a head in there, but I know it wasn't the ghost's head. It wasn't even a cartoon caricature of a head. It wasn't Mike, or Karen.
It's at this point the details allude me. I know that what I saw shook me to my very core, and that's part of the reason it has taken me so long to recount this. I remember seeing the thing in the box, seeing that it was indeed a human head—a man's face, a face I didn't recognize, seemingly looking back out at me with shocked, pleading eyes—but after that there's a blur of sheer terror and snatches of frightening images: gnarled hands; tombstones; pneumatic hissing; the stretching room going in reverse, shrinking, shrinking too fast, the ceiling rushing toward me, the corpse hanging in the rafters descending on me...
I try not to dwell on them too much, because now I'm no longer sure which really happened and which were the results of the nightmares I'd have for years after.
The next thing I can remember clearly after that is being on my hands and knees just outside the fence of the Haunted Mansion, vomiting onto the pavement, while around me crowds of people stood. Most of them weren't paying me any mind, there was lots of whispered talk and a few were crying. There were red-and-blue lights, police cars parked nearby, but I couldn't tell why. I just sat there gulping and sobbing until a cast member finally noticed me and led me to a first aid station.
Karen was there when I arrived, and she jumped up and hugged me tight when she saw me. I don't think either of us made much sense; we were both at our wit's end, but it was such a relief to see her after all that that any questions I had fell by the wayside. I'll never forget how haunted she looked, wide-eyed and pale, barely able to form a sentence without tearing up.
Mike never turned up.
That fateful night has never left me, and in the years since then I've slowly begun to piece together the details, trying to (vainly) make sense of what happened. It became sort of a private obsession, something to do in the background as I moved on with my life.
First, it didn't take long for Karen and I to learn why the police cars were there, and they weren't for us. According to the reports we heard later, an eighteen-year-old guy from New Mexico had died while we were in the Haunted Mansion. He and a friend had snuck into a backstage area on Tom Sawyer's Island and stole a rubber emergency boat to go for a joyride around the Rivers of America. Apparently this guy was pretty drunk and it wasn't long before he hit a rock, throwing he and his friend from the boat. His friend went for help, but he drowned before they could find him. His body was discovered an hour later.
I wonder now if that's why there was no one around when we crept backstage. I managed to track down a few cast members who were working that night, and though most of them claim that they were told by management to not cause alarm and keep to their posts, several admitted they had gone to check out the grim spectacle... especially those CMs that were on attractions near the river, like the Haunted Mansion. Was the timing such that everyone turned a blind eye while we stumbled into something hideous?
Mike's disappearance was something Karen and I both felt deeply, and we tried for years to get something from anyone about it. His parents never heard from him, and a missing person's report was filed eventually. We didn't tell the truth... Who would believe us? We at least tried to steer the investigation toward the Haunted Mansion, saying that was where we last saw him, but it never went that far. Disney never got implicated in the incident, of course, though the park was his last known whereabouts.
Karen and I eventually drifted, probably because we blamed each other for what happened. She never expressed to me what she experienced after we got separated, either because she wanted me to feel guilty for leaving them behind (oh Karen, you have no idea) or that she, like me, can only recall so much. We were both too shaken to recount to each other. But time and distance make things easier, and with the advent of the Internet there was suddenly a wealth of new information. I've since begun to piece together clues.
Almost immediately I found our Hatbox Ghost. Plugging that into any search engine will turn up multitudes of pictures of that bow-legged, grinning figure that has often floated through my mind's eye in the dark. It was apparently part of the attraction when it first opened in 1969, and much of the promotional material of the ride at the time featured this character and his ubiquitous hatbox. He originally stood in the attic scene, right across from the ghostly bride with the beating heart, but was quietly removed from the ride after only a week; apparently, the effect of his disappearing head never worked properly, or so the official account goes.
In recent years the Hatbox Ghost has gained a fan base, groups of Haunted Mansion fans that want to see him restored to the ride. It's wishful thinking, I'm sure, because that figure had to have been stored downstairs for a reason.
It took longer to find out about the backstage area where the Doombuggies go, that empty corridor not originally meant to be seen by guests; disabled guests, however, travel that route all the time. Wheelchair access to the ride is done through the Limbo-like loading room, and guests travel back around to this room to reclaim their wheelchairs and head back out. I've posted about it and posed queries for details about that area, but no one has given me a description that sounds anything like what I went through. It's been described as short, bland, and with some sort of catwalk going over the track, but no mysterious alcove or obvious doorway. It takes less than thirty seconds for the Doombuggies to go through, and then you're back in the loading room. I suspect Disney might have changed that area since the 80's, but why?
Most recently though, I've come across an odd factoid that seems more like a morbid curiosity than anything else, unless one's been through what I have. It's not about the Haunted Mansion, however, but its nearby E-ticket neighbor, Pirates of the Caribbean. According to the story—and this has been published in various Disney-owned books, so it's no vague rumor—the Imagineers who built the ride felt that the faux skeletons of the time weren't convincing enough for the underground grotto scenes. So they borrowed real human remains from the UCLA Medical Center, dressed them up as pirates, and put them in the caves. Let that sink in for a moment: millions of people went by on boats and had no idea they were looking at real skeletons, all propped up in pirate garb. Eventually, a later team of Imagineers would replace these with more convincing facsimiles, and supposedly the bones were returned to their countries of origin and given proper burial.
But who's to say they were? What if something was left behind in that basement when the bones were taken? And what if Pirates wasn't the only ride that did this? The show building of the Haunted Mansion was built along with the rest of New Orleans Square in 1963, but it took another six years for the actual attraction to open. Why the delay? It couldn't have just been the gridlock from the 1964 World's Fair and Walt Disney's death in '66, could it?
All of this is speculation, a string of understanding that raises more questions for me than it does answers. I want to get to the truth of what happened that night, but everything I've found doesn't add up to a concrete explanation; perhaps there isn't one, though I desperately want there to be. And I can't go back—I won't—not after the things I saw and felt. I haven't set foot in Disneyland since that night.
Maybe, though... Maybe it's time I tried again.
Karen, if you're out there and you're reading this, I'm sorry about everything. I'm trying to make it right, trying to put some meaning to this. Contact me if you can. I need to know what happened to you and Mike—maybe you have the key to the mystery in your memories. I can't do it alone, but together we might get to the bottom of this.
For everyone else, let this stand as a testament: some things are backstage for a reason, and a company like Disney must have a multitude of skeletons in its closets. Think twice before you pull some stupid stunt like I did, because it might not be security that finds you.
The Man With The Cane
Recently I read a story posted on a Disney forum I frequent, an account of three friends who tried to spend a night in Disneyland's Haunted Mansion back in the 80s. Since I don't know the author's name or gender, or even if said author is reading this, I'm not sure how to address him or her. Hopefully whoever put the story out there in the first place will see this.
I tried tracking the author down, and apparently the story had been posted on several forums and sites under different usernames. I'm not sure when it was reposted or where it originated, nor how long it's been circulating. There's even been a few versions where some sections differ, making me wonder what's been tweaked over time.
But regardless, I read it at first thinking nothing of it but a half-assed ghost story. It was well-researched, sure, but there were certain details that were off and raised doubts. I almost dismissed it entirely when there were utilidors mentioned - because only Walt Disney World has those - but that was before the Prop Rooms got brought up.
My own story has lot of similarities, and I doubt its coincidental. I'm not sure how much this will clear things up, but that realization has prompted me to share my knowledge, maybe get a few things off my chest.
I grew up in Orlando, and have pretty much lived my whole life in close proximity to Walt Disney World. My mother met my father while working as a Cast Member at the Magic Kingdom, and now I work there myself (though I'd rather not say where). For as long as I can remember, I've listened to all kinds of urban myths and rumors circulated among cast members at the parks, mainly through my parents; Mom got her start there back in the 70s, not long after the Magic Kingdom first opened, and in '77 she finally got bumped up from retail to attractions, which she had hoped for since she'd been hired. Her first role was a hostess at the Haunted Mansion, a position she thoroughly enjoyed until one August night that same year, when she encountered the Man with the Cane.
The way she tells it, she was a little on edge that night: earlier in the day, a 4-year-old boy had climbed over a railing surrounding the Cinderella's Castle moat and drowned. It was the first death in the park's short history. Management tried to keep the incident as quiet as possible - so the other guests weren't disturbed - but word of it quickly spread among the cast members, and this was fresh on my mom's mind as she worked the loading area for the mansion. Guests would come through from the stretching rooms and board their doom buggies, blissfully unaware that a life had been lost in their midst.
She was working until late, the crowds getting lighter and lighter as the night dragged on, until they were down to one stretch room. The guests were coming few and far between, so there were long periods where it was just her watching the empty doom buggies flow endlessly out one dark corridor and down another, listening to the eerie music and sound effects.
It was during one of these lonely spans of time that she saw him: from around the corner came a doom buggy that was occupied by a man, sitting right in the middle of the car. She described him to me as being gaunt, almost emaciated-looking, dressed in a rumpled suit, hands resting on the handle of a cane set in front of him. He stared straight ahead with pale blue eyes set far back in his head, his expression bitterly grim. He didn't so much as twitch an eyebrow when my mom tried to get his attention, waving at him and saying hello; he just kept staring at some fixed point right in front of him as the doom buggy moved past and on into the rest of the ride.
Immediately my mom noted his car number - 67 - and called the operator at unload on the phone to ask him about the man he had sent her. The operator responded that he hadn't sent her anyone, at which point both of them became very confused. Together they got in touch with their lead, and the three of them proceeded to wait at unload for the man to come around.
Sure enough, car 67 arrived, but it was empty.
There was no way the man could have sneaked out without anyone noticing. My mom never got to review the security camera footage, and to this day she's not sure if there even is any, but she is thoroughly convinced that what she saw was a ghost. It spooked her enough that she had a hard time working late at the mansion, when there were periods where she would be all alone and felt as if someone else was in the room with her, watching her, and requested transfer shortly thereafter. She ended up on the Tropical Serenade (which is the Enchanted Tiki Room today) a month or so later.
But mom was only the first to see this apparition. Stories of the Man with the Cane began to circulate among CMs working at the Haunted Mansion, and every so often someone would catch a glimpse of him, usually riding alone in a doom buggy but sometimes walking in a backstage area of the ride, often only seen reflected in a mirror. He was always described the same way: gaunt, dressed in a suit, sunken eyes and holding a cane. Some say he's the ghost of Yale Gracey, one of the Imagineers that built the Haunted Mansion, while others have claimed that he's much older, the spirit of a pilot whose small test plane went down on the land WDW would be built on, back in the 1940s. Needless to say, it became a local legend among the Haunted Mansion staff, and even those who didn't see him were unnerved that they might, especially if they had to work alone at night.
So of course this was all going through my head when I went to work at the mansion myself, in the early 2000s.
Unlike a lot of people, I've never been a big fan of the Haunted Mansion, though coming from a Disney family I know a lot about it. I think the main reason is because I've always felt a bit uncomfortable around it - I blame my mom's ghost story, of course. Looking at the facade from a distance is fine, but from the moment I pass the gates into the line, I get this prickle of inexplicable worry in the back of my brain, like that feeling you get when you're in a dentist's waiting room about to get a tooth pulled: you know it's going to happen, and it won't be fun.
Of course the ride isn't really that scary, but that irrational feeling doesn't go away until I've left the area behind. I think that's why I opted to take the position as a hostess in the mansion - like mother like daughter, I guess. Plus, I think it had to do with trying to overcome that stupid childhood fear.
Anyway, I got the job and it was pretty normal, for the most part. I got used to it after awhile, and even started to like the job, despite that nagging tension.
My supervisor, a senior CM on the ride, was a woman named Karen (and yes, I realize it could be a coincidence, but I'm not so sure anymore). She was the one that basically got me acclimatized to the ride, and became a sort of mentor. She was a little severe and seemed high-strung, like she was always on the alert for something to happen. She'd get on anyone's case if they made a shortcut of anything on the ride, citing safety reasons. But she seemed to like me well enough, showed me some level of concern due to my apparent unease about working the attraction at night.
I mentioned to her off-handedly once that working the mansion made me nervous due to the stories of the Man with the Cane. I recall it was just the two of us standing in the "Servants Corridor," which is a CM-only passage from the load area to the outside, and it was just around closing time, so it was just the two of us in that flickering gloom. She became very interested and asked me a few questions, and I told her my mom's story and how it had spooked me.
She stared at me long and hard as I talked. It was just starting to make me feel uncomfortable when she said, very softly, "I've seen him too. Just once. November 5th, 2000."
She didn't elaborate, didn't expand on anything. Before I could ask her any more about it, she changed the subject to the tasks at hand for us closing the ride and walked away. I never did get a chance to broach the subject again, because she seemed to be all business following our conversation.
I'm not sure why I didn't look up the date she mentioned sooner. I guess it never crossed my mind. Not until later.
After that, Karen seemed to take an odd interest in me. During our nightly backstage walkthroughs she started personally showing me all of the various nooks and crannies of the Haunted Mansion, very deliberately pointing out hidden details like a tour guide that I imagine not many other CMs ever noticed. I got to learn the ins and outs of the attraction fairly well. In a way, I felt weirdly accepted, almost initiated... It's hard to describe, but I was grateful anyway.
Which brings me to 2004, and the main reason I tell this story.
I'd been at the Haunted Mansion just under a year by that point, and my initial worries and irrational fears had finally begun to subside. I hadn't seen anything out of the ordinary during my time spent in the attraction, whether on set or backstage. Any notion of real ghost sightings was just the occasional in-joke between CMs, and even I wondered if my mother had just made it up to scare the people that worked with her and it had stuck around as a local legend since.
It was a February night, and I had just come back for my last shift of the evening. I was assigned to the load area and the crowds were relatively sparse, since it was around parade time and the route at Magic Kingdom passes through Liberty Square. Those riding either had no idea it was happening or ducked in to take advantage of the lull it caused.
I had grown pretty accustomed to being a grim, spooky maid by now, since the Haunted Mansion is the one attraction where CMs don't have to smile. I escorted the few guests that came through into their doom buggies and walked the moving conveyor belt at an easy pace. The people coming through gradually became fewer and fewer, which seemed odd considering it wasn't really that late at night.
And then the inflow stopped. There was a good five-minute stretch after I sent the last couple guests along where no one came down the corridor; just me, all alone, with the constant loop of familiar haunting sounds and the never ending line of doom buggies.
I started to get that itch of worry again as my mom's story popped back in my head, but I tried to push it down. Another couple minutes of nothing, not even another CM to accompany me (usually there's more than one of us in there), and I really started to get nervous. I was just reaching for the phone to communicate with whoever was at Unload when it rang, making me jump.
It was Karen's voice on the other end. "Keep your eyes peeled," she said. It was hard to tell over the crappy receiver, but I think she sounded on edge.
"For what?" I asked. Last I checked, Karen wasn't on duty at Unload, or on the ride in general that night.
Even before she responded, I had this terrible feeling I knew exactly what was about to happen, and I looked up as she said something else I don't really remember.
There he was.
Just like in my mother's story, he came gliding down the line in a doom buggy that should have been empty. Thin, near skeletal hands folded on the head of a black cane, a dusty suit and a face that reminded me of some scavenger bird. He was so still, he could have been a statue - apart from the fine, wispy hairs on his head, nothing on him moved. He didn't blink, and his blue eyes didn't even twitch; it was like he was boring a hole in the back of the car in front of him with his gaze.
Now I was on the verge of panicking, seeing a childhood terror before my very eyes. I stumbled back as the car passed me by, wanting to run but fighting with the logic that this was all definitely some elaborate prank. The man was lifelike, sure, but he was way too still to be real. It could have been some old animatronic from the Hall of Presidents for all I knew, just made scarier and set here to freak me out.
I mean, I certainly didn't FEEL that way, but my brain was going a mile a minute and that was the best explanation that came to me in the moment.
The moment passed and off he went, without a glance in my direction. I watched it go with my heart going crazy in my chest and Karen shouting at me over the phone for confirmation. I picked it up and choked out what I'd just seen.
There wasn't even a pause before she responded: "Get in the next car. Now. Don't lose him."
I hissed to Karen that "this had better not be a prank or I swear to God I'm going to report you, because this isn't funny." She assured me it wasn't (which didn't help) and that it was important I watch my surroundings and not lose him.
Surprisingly enough, I did just that. I was maybe two or three buggies back from the one I'd seen him in, but without even thinking I hopped on the ride and let it carry me into the depths of the attraction.
The ride carried on as normal, just me and a possible ghost somewhere in an endless line of empty clamshell cars. Nothing happened as I went through the library, the music room, and up the stairs surrounded by cobwebs and a giant day-glo spider. I recall gripping the safety bar tighter than I ever had on any roller coaster, looking around every side to make sure I saw him coming - prop or no, I did not relish the thought of seeing him suddenly loom out of the shadows around me if he somehow slipped out of his doom buggy.
As my buggy reached the top of the stairs and turned to face the Endless Hallway, I caught sight of a figure in the shadows behind the floating candelabra and my heart went into my mouth. It opened a door on the righthand wall and slipped inside, closing it behind; in the same instant, I thought I heard a strange bellowing sound that I could only discern because it wasn't part of the normal attraction audio.
In hindsight, I feel stupid for just hopping out of the car. Yet I got out anyway, pushing up the safety bar and stumbling onto the floor. I figured this would trigger the sensors and force the ride to stop on an alarm, but everything kept running. They must have been disabled, I realized - the man had apparently gotten out too without setting anything off - but how? The attraction couldn't run without the safety measures on.
I stood for a bit at the entrance of the hallway, too scared to go down it but eaten up by not knowing what was happening. I'm not sure where the courage came from, but when Karen didn't show up right away I got fed up and moved down the hall toward the candelabra. The "endless" effect of the hall is created by a large mirror at the far end, covered by a thin black scrim that gave the corridor its misty quality. This close to it, I could see my opaque reflection walking to meet me.
Most of the doors down there were facades, though one leads to a small machine shop where animatronics are repaired. I know for a fact the figure had not gone through that door, as it was on the opposite wall, which confused me even more. I was just testing a few of the door handles when a beam of light came bobbing along the corridor and Karen arrived, flashlight in hand.
I immediately rounded on her and demanded to know what the hell was going on. I was scared out of my mind, so it probably came out more pleading than angry.
Karen just sighed and shook her head. She pushed past me and turned the handle on the door nearest the mirror. It opened onto a stark, narrow stairwell leading down and to the right.
"You know this ride just as well as I do," she said, looking back at me. "Did you know that this was supposed to be here?"
I shook my head, no.
"Good," she said, gesturing for me to follow behind her. "Neither did I."
I tried to protest as she started descending the stairs, and followed only because I didn't want to be left alone in the corridor. Karen seemed pretty stoic, which was some small comfort as we went down the darkened stairs, her flashlight showing the featureless gray walls and dirty black steps. It wasn't a very long stairwell, but I was sure it would take us below ground level, making it a possible access point to the utilidors I didn't know about.
I had so many questions, but most of them went unsaid because I felt this tense urge to be quiet, not just from Karen's body language but the faint sounds I heard coming from the bottom of the stairwell. The best way I can describe it was the bellow I had heard before, this wheezing keen, like a person doing a bad impression of a dog's howl. I know it sounds dumb, but it was so out of place that it gave me chills.
The sound stopped just as we reached the bottom. The stairwell ended at a utility door marked with a sign: "CAST MEMBERS ONLY."
Karen hesitated, and I think I saw her visibly shudder as she opened the door. Not once did she look back at me.
This is why I tell this story: the hallway past the door was almost identical to the one described at the Disneyland mansion. It was a long, straight passage lined with doors, themed just like the hall above with the demon-eye wallpaper and flickering candles. And just like the other story asserted, the doors all had plain, white signs mounted on them, marking them as Prop Rooms.
I say "almost" because, looking back and comparing accounts, there were two main differences: first, the hall had eight doors compared to the six at Disneyland; and instead of the hall ending at another utility door, it was a dead end wall, with a mirror in an ornate oval frame hung on it.
At the time, I was more confused and unsettled by that fake-sounding whine that seemed to come from down the hall. Karen tensed and started marching along, ignoring the closed doors. Hesitantly I reached for the handle of the first Prop Room, but Karen said "Don't bother. It's locked."
I couldn't take it anymore. "How do you know?" I cried. "What is this place? Why are we here?"
Karen looked over her shoulder at me, weary and grim. "I don't really know," she said. "But we followed that thing down here, and I want answers. I need you to watch my back."
The way she said "that thing" stuck out to me - I assumed she meant the Man with the Cane, but she didn't refer to him as a "him."
Then it hit me that the shadow I'd seen in the Endless Hallway might not be what I thought it was...
That recurring howl startled me just as I thought of this. It was louder than before, and even more plaintive. I peered down through the flickering gloom and saw the door closest to the end of the hall was slightly ajar.
Karen pointed her flashlight in that direction and started walking quickly, making me have to pick up the pace. I almost slipped on a wet patch, and realized the whole floor past Prop Room 1's door was damp, water having soaked into the thin carpet. Strangely, there was no mildew smell, just just something chlorine-like: bromide. If you've been on any of the water rides at a Disney park, you know the smell I'm talking about.
We pretty much made a beeline to the open door. Some parts of this hall were not up to the usual Disney quality of repair - besides the wet carpet, there was an empty space for a candle sconce beside Prop Room 4, a bunch of exposed wires poking from where the fixture should be. Karen only stopped once, to tentatively test the handle on Prop Room 7, which was locked. Water leaked out from under this door, and I figured this was the source of the soggy floor.
Prop Room 8 was open just a crack, not enough for me to see what was in the room. Karen turned to me again and held up a hand, a clear sign she wanted me to stand back. I wasn't about to argue with her, because I really didn't want to be the first one to open the door into that dark room.
She stepped up and pushed the door very, very slowly. The hinges made no noise, no the slightest creak. She opened it just enough to peer in with her flashlight on, though I couldn't see anything with her bulk blocking the way. I kept looking back down the hall where we had come, feeling like I needed to make sure nothing came up behind us.
Then, while I was turning my head to look, the howl happened again - so loud, so close and with so much more whining agony it nearly gave me a heart attack. I had a moment to realize it had come from the room Karen was looking into before her body suddenly jerked forward into the darkness, like she had been yanked off her feet, and the door swung closed.
I freaked out and rushed to the door. It wouldn't budge, the door was locked. I pulled and tugged at the handle and kicked at the door while screaming for Karen. My adrenaline level was so high I couldn't even THINK about trying something more logical than that, I just knew I had to get to Karen because I suspected something horrible was in that room with her.
Something splashed on the soggy floor near me and I felt drops of water spray my ankles. I froze, my breath catching in my throat, and looked. Nothing was there, but I swear I saw a depression in the damp carpet right near me. Glancing down the hall, I saw only the empty corridor we had come down, but movement in my periphery made me look the other way, toward the mirror on the wall.
The Man with the Cane stood behind my gaping reflection, so close that he could have rested his chin on my shoulder. I felt a cold breath on the back of my neck.
I completely panicked and bolted down the hall, pretty sure I screamed the whole way. I shot up the steps two at a time, nearly tripping on the skirt of my uniform as I tried to put as much distance between me and the man as possible. Soon I had flown out of the door and back into the Endless Hallway, and I turned to run through that artificial darkness...
Or would have, if I hadn't turned the wrong way in my blind terror and collided with the full mirror reflecting the hall.
When I came to, several of fellow CMs were huddled around me where I had sprawled on the floor. I was disoriented and sick with dread and could barely explain to my concerned rescue party what I was doing there. They told me later a guest riding the ride had seen me lying there and had asked when they had added a "dead body" to the attraction, which brought them to me; checking later confirmed I had been unconscious for several minutes.
I was whisked off to get first aid, unable to get a word out in time about Karen and the hidden corridor, dazed and confused as I was. Thankfully my run-in with the mirror had not done any long-lasting damage - either to myself or the mirror - though I suffered a serious concussion and was forced to take a leave of absence to recover.
When I returned to active duty at the mansion, the old feeling of unease was in my gut again, stronger than ever. That first day back, I was so on edge that I would jump at the slightest breath of cool air or sound of my name being called by another CM. Everyone was really kind and welcoming, but I know I came off like a nervous wreck.
Karen was conspicuously absent, of course. I started asking about her right away, and the other CMs said they had no idea where she'd gone. Word was she had either transferred or quit, though no one I spoke to had seen or heard anything concrete. Management seemed unable to give a straight answer either, since they claimed they didn't know. It was like she had vanished completely.
Frustrated, I went back to the Endless Hallway after hours and tried all of the doors along it. All of them were stuck tight, and appeared to be facades. Blueprints and layouts I managed to procure after revealed no sign of an access point from that scene to anywhere else, apart from the machine shop. It made no sense.
I could tell by the end of the first day the other CMs were thinking I was a basket case, I could see it in their sidelong glances. One of them, a friend of mine who I'll also leave anonymous, said he had no reason to blame me, and said everyone just felt relieved I hadn't died too.
That gave me pause, and I asked him what he meant.
He seemed surprised I didn't know, but explained that the night I'd gotten hurt and Karen had "retired," another CM had been in an accident backstage. The man, dressed as Pluto, had been struck by a parade float and killed. Those working outside had immediately gone into damage-control mode, halting the parade and keeping things as quiet as possible to the guests.
I put in a transfer request the following day.
Thing is, throughout all of this I worked to convince myself that everything I had experienced that night was the result of my head injury, weird dreams and hallucinations I had while I was out cold or semiconscious, coupled with the short-term memory loss. I had to, because for a long time after I couldn't bring myself to look in a mirror, out of fear I would see something behind me that shouldn't be there. Even now, it sometimes makes me uncomfortable.
It was the only logical explanation I could come up with, the only way I could convince myself to keep working at Disney World. And it succeeded, made perfect sense.
Until I read the grad night story.
Now it's all come back, nagging at me, telling me everything I saw and felt that night were all too real. Putting all of this down has only helped refresh my memory, and it scares me. I keep glancing over my shoulder, worried I'm going to see the gaunt visage of the Man with the Cane standing there, staring at me. I also keep thinking about the way Karen jerked through that door, like something had grabbed her and pulled her in...
I'm not sure how much this will clear up, but it needs to be done. Something bigger is going on here, hidden under both Haunted Mansions in both parks. I would go so far as to say something evil. And with everything in mind, I've done research, compared accounts.
The day my mom saw the apparition, someone had died; the date Karen had mentioned - November 5th, 2000 - another in-park death, this one on Splash Mountain; and someone else had been killed the night I saw him.
With that last accident in mind, by 2004 eight people had died on Walt Disney World resort property. There were eight doors in that hidden hall.
The author in the grad night incident described a fatal accident happening the same night. Looking that up, there were six deaths at Disneyland counting that one as of 1983, and six Prop Room doors mentioned.
I fully understand this is speculation and the whole thing could be coincidental, but at this point I doubt it. I understand now why Karen rushed over to the mansion when she heard someone had died. She'd put the pieces together. She knew, somehow, the Man with the Cane would appear.
Who he is, what his role is, and what he wants I don't know. Is he anything like the Hatbox Ghost at the Disneyland mansion? I have heard Disney is putting old Hattie back into the attraction soon, but I get the feeling whatever they add won't be what those three kids saw backstage in 1983.
That's really the worst part of it, not knowing. All of this just raises more questions for me, and the only reason I haven't left WDW is to keep my ear to the ground and get more information. All I can say is I have a feeling, that if someone managed to find either of those hidden corridors beneath their respective Haunted Mansion, those hallways would be longer now, and have more doors.
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Haunted Mansion > The Grand Hall (Discussion) > Disquieting Metamorphasis (Rumors) > [MOVED] HM Conspiracies?
cacklemeyer (17 Mar 2016 16:49):
I'm sure these kind of things have been floating around the web for awhile, but I found a couple of weird stories once about real ghosts and secret tunnels underneath the Disneyland and WDW mansions. There's one written by a guy who was at DL on a grad night in the 80s, and one by a CM working at Magic Kingdom. I think they got reposted and taken down a few times, because now I can't seem to find them anywhere. Does anyone happen to know where they might be, and if so, how valid any of them are?
Freddie The Bat (17 Mar 2016 17:11):
Try here [link] and here [link]. I think they're just creepypasta.
Thanks Freddie. That was driving me crazy! I guess they finally found their way onto some archives, the first story's been circulating for a few years at least.
MadamLamprey (17 Mar 2016 18:07):
OMG I remember these stories! Finally someone found them their pretty good but are they real? 'cause normally people write stories about the ghosts and the mansion like I do, not about it in real life.
YoungMasterGracey (17 Mar 2016 18:32):
Freddie's right when he says they're creepypastas. Kudos to whoever wrote them though, some of the details are scary accurate, right down to the events being timed around real deaths in the parks. It's pretty morbid.
True, it's part of why I asked in the first place. I know some of it can't be verified, but some of it is pretty spot-on. Just enough to tickle my brain, make me wonder about it. If anything I figured it would be fun to discuss the mystery parts, you know?
Personally it lost me when the author mentioned utilidors under Disneyland in the first story. I mean... come on. XD
Honestly it's not that weird to make that mistake though, especially if the writer is saying this was something he/she thought about as a kid in the 80s. There was probably false information spread around by kids who didn't know all the facts. Also the woman in the other story pointed that out too.
The point where you realize these stories are fake is when the two named characters in them are Mike and Karen, but again, points for a fun little wink and nod from the author.
Wait theres also two different versions of the grad night story because Mike comes back and takes the car and leaves in the one I read before but in the one that was linked its different! Mike disappeared for good! Why is it different??
Such is the nature of the internet, Lamprey. Must have gotten changed or edited somewhere along the way if it was posted anonymously in the first place. Who knows.
If I were the writer I wouldnt write anything anonymously though I'd want people to know I wrote it. That way if anyone made a change I could bring out the original version and show them wrong!
Ravenswood (18 Mar 2016 16:22):
Moved this thread to the Rumors section, it seems more fitting there with a title like "HM Conspiracies?" Let's try not to go into NoSleep territory here, if you please.
Whats NoSleep?
Thanks Ravenswood.
Lamprey, try Googling it.
I guess my point with this thread is that it seems like both stories are alluding to some sort of grand conspiracy, which is really intriguing to me. Whatever is happening under the mansions has to do with when people actually die in the parks. I know that the "Man with the Cane" really has been sighted by a few CMs working at Florida's mansion, or at least that's the claim. I don't know if anyone has ever described a roaming Hatbox Ghost at Disneyland, but the popular urban legend for that mansion is the one about the crying boy. I'm surprised that never came up!
Anyway, fake or not I want to discuss theories with y'all!
Alright cackles. I'll bite. XD
Took another read through both of them. Whenever someone dies in the parks, these rooms and halls kind of appear beneath the mansions, and are accessed in weird ways. I guess they're supposed to be like extra-dimensional spaces or something. Some of doors have little out-of-place touches to them that could also be matched to how each person died - chronologically speaking, of course. Definitely get that part of it.
What isn't really delved into is why people dying in the parks causes this to happen, or why the Hatbox Ghost and the man with the cane are there when it happens. That all seems random to me. Are they guards? Prisoners? Soul-collectors? No solid answer, which I guess is kind of the point since they're creepypasta and some of it has to be left unknown.
Maybe each mansion has its own guardian ghost, who appears when something like this happens. Could be they're released for a bit when someone dies nearby, perhaps to catch the lost soul and stick them in the prop rooms. WHY that would happen I have no clue!
How did you line this up, Freddie? Any chance we can see a list of Disney park deaths? (Yikes. That's a morbid request...)
Ask and ye shall receive! I put together a quick list here of all deaths associated with Disneyland up to 1983:
[ul]
1964 - Teenage boy stands up on Matterhorn, falls out, dies three days later
1966 - Teenage boy crushed under Monorail after trying to sneak in on the track
1967 - Teenage boy crushed to death under Peoplemover car while jumping between cars
1973 - Teenage boy drowns in Rivers of America (sensing a pattern here?)
1974 - Female CM crushed between walls in America Sings.
1979 - Woman falls into coma after riding Space Mountain, dies a week later
1980 - Teenage boy crushed to death under Peoplemover car while jumping between cars (AGAIN!)
1981 - Teenage boy fatally stabbed in Tomorrowland during fight.
1983 - Teenage boy drown in Rivers of America (the Grad Night death)
[/ul]
And here's WDW until 2004:
1977 - Child drowns in Cinderella's Castle moat
1980 - Young girl becomes ill riding Space Mountain, dies later
1982 - Toddler falls from tram in parking lot
1982 - Toddler hit by falling menu board
1984 - Family of three killed when small plane crashes in EPCOT parking lot
1986 - Man and woman drown after car crashed into retention pond, EPCOT parking lot
1992 - Man commits suicide with a shotgun in EPCOT
1995 - Girl with heart condition loses consciousness on Body Wars, dies later
1999 - Male custodian killed in fall from Skyway gondola
2000 - Man killed when hit by Splash Mountain log trying to exit
2004 - Male CM run over by parade float (the Man with the Cane death)
And that's just in close proximity to the parks! Don't even get me started on the deaths that have happened in other parts of the resort or the water parks. You all know about River Country...
Main thing is that there's way more deaths at DL and WDW listed here than there are doors under either mansion, so that feels like a definite debunk there. Should have been way more doors.
I'm almost sorry I asked, haha. That's messed up.
I'm not so sure. Do you know about Disney's policy of never declaring people dead in the parks? Its a weird thing they do whenever they can feasibly do it. Even if someone is killed instantly, Disney always tries to say that the victim did not really expire until they were beyond the park. You can imagine a lot of people passed "in transit" to a hospital, at least on paper.
Well that complicates things. I didn't know about that. There's some obvious cases where someone didn't die until later, but for others now it's even harder to tell.
Thats bonkers! Disney cares about their image that far! Can't spoil anything for the guests, right?
So keeping that in mind, the Grad Night prop room numbers still make sense. WDW is still a stretch but its a lot more feasible. Maybe we're missing a pattern. What circumstances cause the doors to appear and what factors add another room? And what are they storing down there?
Ok I see whats happening now! This makes me inspired to keep writing my Phantom manor story even tho its not about the ride its more about how Melanie and Constance meet each other and fight over grooms. Hey speaking of could if you guys are talking about this could you please maybe go and read what I have so far in the Library board? Its called Trials Of Dead Brides 2.
ohyestheydo (22 Mar 2016 10:00):
Ha. The only pattern I see in these stories is how much they get wrong. How you can take any of this remotely seriously despite the glaring flaws is beyond me, especially the second one. Any CM worth their salt would know what is accurate. I call foul.
Care to elaborate, ohyes? I'm honestly interested in what you have to say.
Wow thats really kind of rude ohyestheydo! How would you feel if someone said your stories were bad and had flaws huh? I bet that would make you really sad!! You dont have to be so darn rude!
@MadamLamprey: You'll understand when you're older what criticism is, dear.
@cacklemeyer: Speaking as an actual CM who has worked at the Haunted Mansion, there's a number of well-done guesses on the part of the writer, but it stops short of being believable for these reasons:
There's only one security camera, in the load area. All other methods of detecting whether someone gets on or off the ride where they aren't supposed to are through intrusion mats and infrared beams. The ride won't even run unless they're turned on, so when the narrator says she got out and nothing halted, she should have known that what was happening was impossible.
Walking through the attraction with the lights on is nothing special. We do it all the time for regular maintenance.
There is a little workshop that is accessed through the Endless Hallway, and I think the writer mentioned that door. But there is no utilidor access from the show building in that corridor, which the CM should have known.
Furthermore, you cannot go past the scrim at the end of the hall unless you break it.
WDI never stores props underground.
Also, in the first one, I'm pretty sure you can't go under the upramp in the Disneyland mansion. There'd be no space down there what with the equipment used to keep it running.
That place the doombuggies go through to loop back to load isn't that long and looks nothing like that.
ohyes, you must be a lot of fun at parties.
[This message has been removed.]
Letting you off with a warning, MadamLamprey. I expect everyone to keep discussion civil and not resort to insults. As much as you might disagree with ohyes, personal attacks will not be tolerated.
Those are good points, ohyes, but I think you're missing the point on a couple of them. Obviously something supernatural and reality-bending is happening in these stories, which would mess with normal operating procedures and other elements. The "prop rooms" and the overlong loop for the buggies are part of that. The gist we're getting is that they only appear when someone dies in the parks and whatever is actually haunting the mansions is about. Everything else is speculation.
There could have been more security cameras in the 70s too. Feels like nitpicking to me.
I noticed something on another readthrough, by the way: in the second story the author said specifically eight people had died "on Walt Disney World resort property." Maybe she's referring to eight cases where people were actually declared dead, or confirmed dead before they crossed the property line? It's a small thing, but maybe the narrator knows an exact number we don't. Or could be as in the dark as we are. Who knows! *doffs detective's cap*
It's possible! It could be that these places appear every time there's a even a near-death experience, but only some doors appear. I think that the Man with the Cane and the Hatbox Ghost manifest whenever this happens, and if a person actually dies within the parks, that's when we get another prop door.
Cannot tell if we're understanding a hidden theme or drawing attention to the author's lack of research. XD
Hey what about Tokyo and Paris? Both have a mansion and theres also Mystic manor even though that one isnt really a haunted mansion. Has anyone ever died in those parks? I want to know because my dad's taking me to Disney Paris soon to see my uncle who works there and maybe I can investigate too! Also can someone please read my story and leave a review???
That's actually a good question, Lamprey. Did a little more morbid research (I think that's becoming my specialty) and surprisingly I couldn't find any reports of any fatal accidents at Tokyo Disneyland or DisneySea. Considering how long they've been around I'm impressed! Worst I found were couple of urban legends about child abductions and the usual stories of real ghosts in the Haunted Mansion there - objects seen on the ride that weren't there before, a ghostly woman standing at the end of a hallway, etc. Nothing spectacular.
Paris, on the other hand, is not so lucky. There's been three incidents that resulted in a death at the resort - that's still pretty small compared to DL and WDW!
Yikes. Thanks again, Freddie. Based on that it's likely that nothing would appear under Tokyo's mansion. Paris, though... What do you think that would be like?
For all we know, in these stories there's nothing beyond Disneyland and WDW's mansions. If you think about it - the real skeletons on Pirates of the Caribbean, the plane that went down in Florida before the park opened - those things give the idea that something macabre or tragic had already happened before the mansions were built. That doesn't apply to Tokyo and Paris.
OK, but Walt once said that he wanted to make a place for wayward ghosts from all over the world when they built the Haunted Mansion. That was part of the story gimmick for the ride but what if, in these stories, the people who die in the parks get stuck there, but need to be kept away from places that would upset guests? Simple solution: build a haunted house attraction and then keep the haunts in there. Kill two birds with one stone. That would be an interesting angle.
Gotta love that diabolical Disney logic! Not a bad theory at all! You sure you didn't write these yourself, cackles? XD
OMG that makes so much sense! I always knew the mansion was really haunted ever since I frist rode it when I was 4 and I wanted to meet all the ghosts! Hey do you think that happened in Paris too? I'd be really scared if I saw the Phantom walking around like the HB ghost and the man with the cane but if it was Melanie Id feel a lot better because shes so pretty and has nice green eyes like my dad! My uncles friend who also works there said he'd take me backstage when I visit so I can see how everything works so maybe I can help get some answers!
Uh, Lamprey you know we're just talking about creepypasta, right?
cacklemeyer, that is a pretty neat idea, but without a third story in this "saga" we'll never really know. I kind of like the ambiguity though, since it lead to this discussion.
If its just a story then why are you guys spending so much time talking about it instead of reading my story?? I asked you a nicely a couple times! No ones left any comments on it or any of the other ones I posted and I know the other arent very good but I'm really proud of my bride story! Why cant you guys Read and talk about theries on mine?
Anyway their in the Library go read them please
Another strike, MadamLamprey. You're straying from the topic.
Well how else am I going to get peopel to read my stories Ravenswood tell me that huh?? Why are you all ignoring me?
If you're monitoring this I'd like to know what your thoughts are, Ravenswood. Now that your namesake attraction has been brought up I figured you'd have more to say!
Spamming links will also not be tolerated. I hate to ban, but ban I have.
Freddie, I also gave them a read. I feel like you all might be overthinking them, but I won't rain on your parade. They're entertaining and so is this topic. Just keep it in the realm of discussing fiction and you're good.
It's OK boss. Lamprey was obnoxious but she just really appreciates Kingdom Hearts. I won't hold that against her. XD Plus we made it clear from the onset that we're just talking about pastas.
Thanks again, Ravenswood. Poor kid has no social skills.
Honestly I'm not sure how much more there is left to talk about. Unless someone writes a story about hidden tunnels under Phantom Manor I think we're out of material for solving the mystery. We'll never know what happened to Mike and Karen, who our respective narrators were, and why the HBG and the Man with the Cane do what they do. My theory is still that they appear when there's a death and then either guide or ferry the soul to the hidden places beneath the mansions, all to preserve the guest experience. In a way that makes the whole thing darker, imagining that all these poor souls are trapped down there in the limbo-space. Maybe they even get used for props, hence the labels on the doors? Who knows!
Either way, it does lend itself to a proper conspiracy discussion, even if it's not real.
Playing catch up a bit, now that Lamprey's gone. It's about time. She was spamming other boards too. You want to talk about laughable stories, well...
But keeping on topic (thank you, Ravenswood), I don't think it's nitpicking at all to point out where things aren't realistic in a story. I just wanted to make the case that whoever wrote at least the 2nd story is likely not a real Cast Member, or at least not a very good one if there are so many little errors. I would simply advise the author to do more research and revise it but... Well, it's already out in the internet. Too late for that, especially now that I've seen a few readings of it on YouTube (and I don't really like those).
ghostLAMP (1 Apr 2016 04:13):
BUMP!!!!!!!!!!
Hey you assholes thought you could keep me out but GUESS WHAT its me!! I made another account and I know ravenswood is going to be a douche again and try to ban me but it doesnt matter anymore. I made this just so I can come back and say that you all never gave me a chance so Im going to show you all wrong!!! Also youll never see me again anyway after this but thats fine because everythings going to be awesome from now on! Everyone else is scared of going into the prop rooms but not me!! Im going to learn the truth and when I do I wont tell any of you you think these stories are fake but I know better! No I'm not going to die or anything I just have a plan to get the ghosts to come out just like in the stories you all seem to looooove so much! Anyway you all suck and I dont care if I meet the Phantom or Melanie when I go because youll all be sad that you wont know the REAL story! SO THERE!!!!!!!!!
Ravenswood (4 Apr 2016 11:29):
I'm shutting this thread down.
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Jo has tabled a Parliamentary motion to help local health researchers find new medical treatments.
Jo has been working with Biopta Ltd, a specialist research service based in Bearsden, in an effort to increase the availability of human tissue on which to test new drugs. Testing treatments on human tissue samples can help to make them safer and reduce the risk of harm to living people, while avoiding wasting time and money on unsuccessful drug trials.
Jo is calling on the Government to do more to help researchers gain access to tissue samples which might otherwise go to waste, including ensuring all surgical patients in NHS hospitals have the opportunity to give samples for research. Jo has been carrying out some research into how many hospitals routinely ask their patients to donate samples, the results of which will be published shortly. Many hospitals regularly incinerate tissue samples which could be put to good use. By tabling a Parliamentary Motion on the issue, Jo hopes to put pressure on the Government to act to help make medicines safer and speed up the process of finding new treatments for diseases which affect people all over the country.
"The progress of medical researchers in the UK in finding treatments for common diseases is impressive, and we have some excellent research facilities here in East Dunbartonshire, such as Biopta and of course the Beatson Institute. However, for many people who are affected by diseases for which no adequate treatment is available, that progress cannot happen fast enough.
That this house recognises the importance of access to human tissue samples for health research by academics and the pharmaceutical industry; notes that carrying out initial research on human tissue samples can help create more effective drug therapies, reduce the risk of harm to human subjects in drug trials and prevent waste of resources on unsuccessful trials; notes that lack of access to suitable human tissue can slow down progress towards finding treatments for many diseases; believes that encouraging surgical patients to consent to the use of their residual surgical tissue for research purposes is a valuable objective for government to pursue; notes with concern that there is no established standard mechanism in NHS hospitals for sharing and making researchers aware of human tissue which is stored across the UK for research purposes; calls on the government to make an exerted effort to look for ways to increase the accessibility of human tissue samples for health research.


Ball joints are a component of the front suspension of a car. The front suspension is a complex assembly of links, joints, bushings and bearings that allow your front wheels to move up and down independently and turn left or right together. Throughout the motion of the suspension it maximizes the tire's contact with the road for optimum vehicle control and tire wear. Ball joints are the critical component of the front suspension that connect various links and allow them to move. Ball joints consist of a ball and socket similar to the hip joint of the human body. Ball joints of your front suspension provide pivoting movement between the steering knuckles and control arms to provide a safe, smooth ride and allow you to precisely control your vehicle.
What do ball joints consist of?
Ball joints consist of a metal housing and stud. The stud can swing and rotate within the housing. Bearings inside the housing can be comprised of metal or plastic. The socket is filled with grease to provide lubrication, keep debris and water out of the socket, and maintain noise free operation. A rubber boot opening of the joint to keep debris out and grease in. Many original equipment ball joints are designed as sealed units. If the protective boot fails, water and road debris will quickly cause wear and ball joint failure. Some aftermarket ball joints use an improved design that allows lubrication to flush out contaminants to extend the life of the joints.
What are the symptoms of worn ball joints?
Maintaining a good dust seal and lubrication in the socket are important to maximizing ball joint life. Worn ball joints contribute to looseness in the front suspension. If the looseness is severe, the driver may notice steering looseness, steering vibration, or unusual noises but it often causes other problems before it may be noticeable to the driver. For instance, worn ball joints prevent your vehicle from maintaining wheel alignment. This may result in the tires not maintaining optimum contact with the road. This may contribute to excessive tire wear, shortening the life of your expensive tires.
What are the risks of driving with a bad ball joint?
A worn ball joint is not a problem that should be ignored. If the wear becomes severe, the stud may separate from the housing resulting in immediate loss of control of your vehicle which may put everyone in danger. Should you suspect worn ball joints, you should have your vehicle checked by a professional mechanic who has experience with diagnosing suspension problems.


Filtering by: Date 1889 Remove constraint Date: 1889 Language English Remove constraint Language: English Publisher Philadelphia : John J. Hood, c1889. Remove constraint Publisher: Philadelphia : John J. Hood, c1889.


text:
To Protect Birds From Wind Turbines, Look To Hawai'i's Approach
American Bird Conservancy, Michael Hutchins
The state of Hawai'i has an ambitious goal of achieving 100 percent renewable electrical energy by 2045. As some of the most isolated islands in the world, Hawai'i's costs for importing oil are very high. A move towards generating renewable electrical energy thus makes a lot of economic and environmental sense.
Unfortunately, this plan is not without its own environmental hazards. It means vastly more wind turbines and solar farms on or around the islands, and one of the biggest challenges is their potential impact on Hawai'i's endemic birds and bats.
As result of its long isolation, Hawai'i is home to many bird species that are found nowhere else in the world. These include threatened and endangered species and subspecies, such as the 'Alala (Hawaiian Crow), Nene (Hawaiian Goose), Hawaiian Common Gallinule, Hawaiian Black-necked Stilt, Pueo (Hawaiian Short-eared Owl), 'Akohekohe, Hawaiian Petrel and many others. At least 95 of Hawai'i's unique birds have already gone extinct, making conservation of the remaining endemic species and subspecies a very high priority.
Poorly sited wind energy projects on the mainland are killing hundreds of thousands of birds and bats annually, including threatened and endangered species. In the case of birds, that number goes into the many millions when wind projects' associated power lines and towers are also taken into consideration. As the number of turbines and power lines increases, these fatalities are mounting every year. The presence of turbines and power lines also drives away many species, including grassland birds and Greater Sage-Grouse, often resulting in brood failure. Read article
This entry was posted in Bats and Birds by wind resist. Bookmark the permalink.
11 thoughts on "To Protect Birds From Wind Turbines, Look To Hawai'i's Approach"
Sommer on 07/31/2016 at 09:03 said:
"In Hawai'i, however, this work is done by independent, third-party experts. Wind developers in Hawai'i are also subject to greater scrutiny, including expensive fines or even prosecution, for killing federally protected birds. Having trusted third-party consultants do this work and report directly to regulators avoids an obvious conflict of interest."
Why did we not do this Ontario? A situation was set up here that would allow dishonesty and conflict of interest!
Barbara on 07/31/2016 at 13:51 said:
Ella: FYI
Advanced Energy Economy, Washington, D.C.
Co-founders:
Hemant Taneja
Thomas F. Stayer
Liz Gilchrist, VP & also on the Board of Greenpeace USA
Board includes:
Thomas S. Carnahan, Jr., Chair. of the Board AWE/American Wind Energy
http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/people.asp?privcapId=170951109
Look for any up-dates as things change.
Greenpeace USA
Elizabeth Gilchrist
Jeffrey Hollender
http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/about/board-members
JeffreyHollenderPartners
'Five Reasons Why I Love Greenpeace'
No.1, "We bring corporations to their knees."
http://www.jeffreyhollender.com/?p=3158
ScepticalGord on 07/31/2016 at 17:52 said:
"Dr" David Colby knows all about sore knees.
Solutions, Launched 2010
For a sustainable and desirable future
Editorial board includes:
Bill Becker
Gus Speth
David Suzuki, Canada
Peter Victor, Canada
http://www.thesolutionsjournal.com/EditorialBoard
See: Sponsors section.
Corporate Knights Magazine, Posted June 5, 2014
'Man on Fire', Tom Steyer interview by Tzeporah Berman
http://www.corporateknights.com/channels/responsible-investing/man-on-fire-14019830
T. Berman was with Greenpeace Canada and Greenpeace International.
More information on the internet.
Advanced Energy Economy Institute, Washington, D.C.
2014 U.S. IRS Form 990: Download
P.7: compensation for any current office, director, or trustee
Thomas Steyer, Chair.
Bill Ritter
Elizabeth Gilchrist, signed the tax return/form
https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/800373801
Public information.
Advanced Energy Economy Inc. San Francisco, CA
2014 U.S. IRS Form 990: Download 2014
P.7: Compensation paid:
Hemant Taneja, Chair.
Elizabeth Gilchrist, signed the return/tax form
Grants and Other Assistance to Organizations, Governments,and Individuals in the United States
$100,000 to Michigan Energy Innovations Business Council, Lansing, MI.
Other years tax returns can also be downloaded.
Wikipedia: Tom Carnahan, Missouri
Short biography at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Carnahan
NextGen Climate Action, San Francisco, CA
2013 U.S. IRS Form 990 > Download 2013 Form 990
Part III: Statement of Program Service Accomplishments
Line 4a
"Keystone XL Pipeline Campaign – Provide Information On the Keystone XL Pipeline And Educate The Public On The Potential Environmental Risks That Accompany The Keystone XL Pipeline"
Thomas F. Steyer, President/Director listed on this Form 990.
http://www.guidestar.org/PartnerReport.aspx?ein=46-1957345&Partner=Demo
U.S. only or would have been reported as foreign country/Canada activity.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


Oklahoma City, OK (November 20, 2017) - Infinity Capital Partners ("Infinity"), a full-service investment banking firm based in Oklahoma City, OK, acted as exclusive financial advisor to Drill Right Technology, Inc. ("Drill Right") in the sale of the company's assets to Integrity Directional Services ("Integrity") for cash and other consideration.
Founded over 15 years ago, Drill Right is an independent full service directional drilling tools company providing performance motors, MWD equipment, and specialty servicing and maintenance. Integrity is expected to move key non-field employees from their Dallas and Midland offices to operate out of Drill Right's Oklahoma City headquarters.
Infinity Capital Partners worked closely with Drill Right ownership – advising all phases of the transaction including marketing, due diligence, and structuring of the transaction. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Infinity offers a full-suite of investment banking services for small and middle-market businesses. Headquartered in Oklahoma City, OK, the company has established a reputation working with closely held businesses with the utmost integrity, discretion, and professionalism. For more information about Infinity Capital Partners, including a list of current projects, please visit our website at www.infinitycappartners.com.
Newer PostLifeSpring In-Home Care Network Receives Growth Capital Investment From Deaconess Associations, Inc.


Coriste and Camerata will give a special concert to benefit Spectrum for Living, a NJ-based non-profit organization dedicated to the philosophy that persons with developmental disabilities have the same rights as others to a fulfilling and meaningful life. To purchase tickets ahead of time, please contact Allysa Oliver at [email protected]. Tickets are $25 in advance and $30 at the door.


The Conversation Project - Limited time professionally printed Starter Kit discount – only through April! The Conversation Project | Limited time professionally printed Starter Kit discount – only through April!
As always, you can print all of our starter kits for free off our website. If you are interested in ordering professionally printed kits, we are offering a special discount on Conversation Starter Kits through our online marketplace through April in honor of NHDD!
If you would like to take advantage of this limited-time offer, click here!


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text:
Five Principles for Interoperating Data Platforms
Version C April 8, 2020
The NCPI has adopted the following interoperating principles to help guide our efforts.
Over the last few years, a growing number of cloud-based data platforms have been developed that provide the research and translational community with access to data that is integrated with computational resources, services and workspaces, as well as knowledge resources, semantic services and AI services.
As the number of these platforms grows, it is becoming critical to establish some operating principles so that platforms can interoperate, allowing researchers to access, explore and integrate data from multiple platforms.
Interoperating data platforms in this way is a critical step towards creating a data ecosystem that benefits: the users of the platform, who can access the data they need for their research; the funders and other supporters of the platforms, whose efforts and investments are leveraged and available to a broader community; and the patients, study participants, and other data contributors whose critical contributions have a greater impact.
One Definition - Trust Relationship
Before we introduce the principles, we need one definition. A trust relationship is an agreement between two or more data platforms about security, compliance, and liability that provides the foundation for two or more platforms to interoperate. A trust relationship also includes an agreement about any fees or charges required to access data in the platform.
Five Principles
Form trust relationships and interoperate with other platforms: The first principle is to form trust relationships with other platforms and use these as a basis for interoperating with them.
Follow the golden rule of data resources: If you access someone else's data, let them have access to your data, assuming you are operating at the same level of security and compliance. Any restrictions on data access or use (including the ability for data to flow across platforms) should be based on transparent and clearly documented policies. For example, limitations may be imposed by patient consent or data security matters, but not investigator or consortia preferences.
Support the principle of least restrictive access: If your data is open access, provide an API. If your data is controlled access and you have a trust relationship with another platform, provide access to your data in the least restrictive manner possible. Whenever possible, a data resource should provide an API so that an application in another platform can access data directly. If this is not possible, then support the ability for approved queries or analyses to be run over your data and the results returned. Sometimes this is called an analysis or query gateway or a federated analysis or query.
Agree on standards, compete on implementations: It is important to open up your platform to competition to ensure that it provides the best quality services to end-users. Try to keep your system open so applications can compete to provide the best experience for researchers. Remember that not all researchers have the same requirements, or the same preferences, and in general a mix of applications, systems and platforms is better than a single one.
Plan to support patient partnered research: Plan for a future in which individuals can provide their data and have control over it within your platform. Even better, provide such a capability today within your platform.
As usual, we use the term controlled access if access and use of data requires the signing of data use or data access agreements that specify specific levels of security, restrictions on how the data is used (secondary use restrictions), or similar types of restrictions. If this is not the case, we say that the data is open access.
These principles do not circumvent the need for data access controls for all controlled access data on each platform. Indeed, when two platforms have a trust relationship they agree specifically on the policies, procedures and controls when one platform accesses or transfers controlled access data from the other. In this way, two interoperating platforms can protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of controlled access data and yet make this data available across different systems and platforms.
Sometimes platforms impose a requirement that an account be created and fees paid to remove data from their platform, even if the data remains within the same public cloud. Although there are reasons for this particular architecture choice, this type of platform or vendor lock-in creates significant barriers to researchers using the platform. In particular these types of fees violate Principle 3. It is important to note that these types of fees are different from the egress fees charged by cloud service providers.
Notice that with this definition above of a trust relationship, a data ecosystem is naturally formed by a platform and all the other platforms that have a direct trust relationship with it.
We might also consider saying that two systems have a data peering relationship if they have a trust relationship as defined above, allowing them to exchange both open and controlled access data. Recall that peering between two internet service providers is an agreement supporting the exchange of traffic between users on the two systems.


Nanopads are flexible game boards designed for maximum versatility. The 16" for our casual builders. Both versions share a full sized chess board on one side.
IronWeave (aka [FE] weave) is developed to withstand the impact of strong magnets. The material is not inherently magnetic but Nanodots stick to Ironwave like glue.


Name : Amy Winehouse - Back To Black Amazing Live Performance! Views : 734.996. ... Back to Black amazing live performance! Amy Winehouse LAST TRAGIC PERFORMANCE.
Amy Winehouse — Back to Black amazing live performance!
Amy Winehouse singing 'Back to Black' @ on ... It's three years from now that we tragically lost the wonderful and talented Amy Winehouse.


text:
Michigan Avenue
David Thomas Visit Author's Page
David Thomas, CEO at Evident, is an accomplished cybersecurity entrepreneur. He has a history of introducing innovative technologies, establishing them in the market, and driving growth – with each early-stage company emerging as the market leader.
August 30, 2012 AT&T To Open Chicago Flagship Store
AT&T this week announced that it will soon open a new, 10,000-square-foot flagship store on Chicago's Michigan Avenue.
December 1, 2006 DS1206 Timeline.August
RadioShack Suffers Gains and Losses In the end, the summer was no vacation for RadioShack, while the company appoints James Gooch as executive vice president and chief financial officer, an executive who's experience includes management roles in such corporations as Kmart, Sears Holdings, Helene Curtis and The Quaker Oats Company, the company loses COO Claire Babrowski when she announces her departure. Babrowski stepped up to temporarily act as president and CEO, after Dave Edmondson resigned following a controversy over false credentials on his education background months earlier. And later in the month, RadioShack divulges plans to reduce its workforce by anywhere from 400 to
August 1, 2006 Garmin to Open Retail Outlet in Chicago
Garmin International Inc. announced plans Monday to open a retail store on Chicago's "Magnificent Mile" on Michigan Avenue, home to 3.3 million square feet of retail space. The store, which should be open in time for the 2006 holiday season, will showcase Garmin GPS navigation tools and give customers access to product demonstrations, interactive kiosks, training, seminars and product support. The Garmin retail network will also use this space for meetings and training. Dr. Min Kao, Garmin's chairman and CEO, explains, "We want to use this location as a destination to excite and energize our customers, generate buzz, and further propel