PRPG:

The Real ‘Annabelle’

October 9, 2014

Did you help the evil doll movie Annabelle earn $37 million at the box office on its opening weekend? Believe it or not, it’s based on a true story.

Annabelle MovieVisitors to the Warrens’ Occult Museum in Monroe, Connecticut, can gaze at all sorts of weird wonders. It’s reportedly the largest, and oldest, museum of its kind in the world. Housed in a basement belonging to some of America’s most famous experts on the supernatural, it contains stuff like voodoo dolls, mummies and “magic mirrors.”

Along with all of that, there’s an old Raggedy Ann Doll prominently displayed inside a glass case. It’s nicknamed Annabelle, and a warning on the front of it reads, “Positively Do Not Open.” If that wasn’t freaky enough, the case also has a cross set on top of it.

In 1970, a mother found the doll in an antique store and gave it to her college-age daughter, Donna. Donna and her roommate noticed that the doll would move when no one was looking, going from sitting to upright and even moving rooms. A month later, Donna claimed she found messages scribbled around the house on parchment paper that read, “Help Us.” Some time later, Donna came home and found the doll covered in blood. She contacted a medium, who held a séance and discovered that the doll was possessed by a troubled ghost of a murdered girl named Annabelle. An exorcism was held…but it apparently didn’t take, and the doll remains possessed.

The doll still has a bad temper. If the museum’s curators are to be believed, Annabelle supposedly moves around in her case and has been known to growl at visitors. According to a description next to the doll’s case, it’s responsible for the death of at least one person. A foolhardy visitor to the museum didn’t think the creepy doll was all that intimidating and made the mistake of taunting Annabelle a number of years ago and urged her to “do her worst.” Supposedly, he died in a motorcycle accident a few hours later.