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Top Hat Man

Maybe the cloak aspect was handed down by tales of Spring-heeled Jack as well as melodrama villains. He supposedly wore a cloak.
Sounds like he was a very antisocial acrobat/fire-eater.
 
I can't help but wonder about the canonical appearance of a "hat man" and the depictions of a canonical villain from the 19th century onward. Whether rendered in animation or live action, the archetypal villain follows a dress code involving dark / black color, a coat / cloak / cape, and a hat.

In popular media - most especially the cartoons produced as children's fare - this trope was made dominant so as to recognize the "bad guy" at face value.

The earliest version in American pop culture might well be Simon Legree (Uncle Tom's Cabin), whose name became a synonym for a cruel villain. By the time early 20th century cartoons had stereotyped Legree and / or his obvious derivatives, the long coat and broad-brimmed hat were standard garb.

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The broad-brimmed hat would be the usual headwear for a possessed fiend or the evil authority figure.

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Meanwhile, the more urbane version would wear a top hat ...

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Is it any wonder that a child's description of an anonymous sinister figure would incorporate these canonical elements?

Let us not forget the ingrained though incorrect impression of Jack the Ripper that comes to mind when the name is mentioned to the general public...

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Thank you for sharing this. It was really interesting to hear and fascinating that what seems like a very individual and personal experience actually has lore around it from other individuals. On a personal note I hope you are dealing ok with your bereavement. Many thanks again for sharing.
 
I'm a queer, disabled geek

Now, here's one of my bugbears!
For years and years, its driven me f*****g crazy that anyone who is seen as not being the 'accepted norm' should get picked on! F*****g bullies....aargh...don't get me started!
MissViolet, I'm so glad that The Man In The Hat On The Stairs became The Man In The Hat Walking His Beat!
Not on his watch!
 
The subject is both "fuzzy" and "complicated." I'm no Jung expert, but I have studied his work and his concepts relating to archetypes. Here's what I'd say based on my understanding ...

Archetypes are primordial, universal and shared among us humans as essential and very general patterns or forms.. As such they're "hard wired" in the sense they underlie our basic psychic / mental / experiential structures and operations. The archetypes per se are manifest in human experience via symbolic, figural, or performed manifestations that reflect the patterns or forms of the underlying archetypes. One might say these manifestations (I think Jung called them "archetypal images") are to the archetypes as the shadows cast in Plato's Cave are to the forms casting them. The archetypes themselves are therefore known only indirectly.

Based on this, and circling back to your question, I'd say ... The archetypes themselves don't evolve (at least not so as to be noticeably changing), but their manifestations can be varied and diverse. The specifics of the manifestations or the preponderance of the manifestations in a given context might conceivably vary over time, and thus I'd say it's the projections of the archetypes rather than the archetypes themselves that evolve.
EnolaGaia, thank you for your careful and detailed explanation! I think I understand it a little better now. I like the Plato's Cave analogy. I do wonder what Jung would have said about the Top Hat Man phenomenon had it occurred during his lifetime. Hmmm, now I'm going to wonder how far back stories of such "creatures" go... Lots of food for thought in this thread!
 
Thank you for sharing this. It was really interesting to hear and fascinating that what seems like a very individual and personal experience actually has lore around it from other individuals. On a personal note I hope you are dealing ok with your bereavement. Many thanks again for sharing.
I am amazed at the kindness I have experienced on her with offerings of condolence. Thankyou everyone. My brother had lots of experiences in his life ( spooky) and I think he was a bit of a conduit for things to come through. Since he died I’ve not seen or heard a peep from him but I am sure around. His daughter 21, seems to have inherited it a bit and this all came down from my Nan , a true cockney who saw and experienced things all her life. Thanks again it gives me confidence to share more
 
I can see contemporary appearance being a factor in ignoring possibly paranormal phenomena.

If you flip the proposition to consider non-contemporary appearances it helps to explain some anomalies ...

It's relative appearance (in terms of presumed time period) that defines two of the common categories of Fortean experiences. If you see someone in archaic dress, it's a "ghost." If you see someone in dress that's futuristic (or too modern for an old image), it's a "time traveler."

That of course brings us neatly to the 'Zebs Unified Theory Of Everything'* ... I strongly believe that ghost / futuristic time travellers etc are all one and the same thing, i.e. time slips. Makes much more sense to me that things of a paranormal nature have a common origin rather than there being ghosts AND time travellers AND etc etc.

*trademark pending.
 
Footage from 2011 that has just come to light purportedly showing the Hat Man at the infamous Lemp Mansion in St Louis, Missouri.

As is usually the case with these things, the picture quality is poor and there are claims of fakery. Reading the YouTube comments gives precise times where people have dissected the footage and the suspected hoax.

From the uploader:
In the footage we can see the "Hat Man" standing in front of the window but when she pans back to figure and its gone..Remember that while filming this Entity was not visible to the naked eye.

 
This is strange reading this, I have a memory, I have always thought it was a dream from VERY early childhood (although at times I have thought it really happened). I was about 4 or 5 yo and I 'am outside my old house playing on a tricycle, I see a man across the road on the corner, but he's all black, like a shadow but MUCH darker and standing in 3 dimensional space, it looked exactly like the logo on the bottles of Sandeman port.
 
Ah the terror of childhood toilets... I'd forgotten all about it, but when I lived in a haunted house for a year as a child, the toilet was a place of dread...

The most convenient place to shit yourself though.

What happened in your haunted house/loo?
 
This is... all bringing back some odd memories for me. Or making me reconsider some half-remembered memories, at any rate.

I'd planned on putting all this into another account I'm drawing together about the house I grew up in (newish semi-detached, built on former farmland, and we know no-one ever died in there since we knew the first owners) which always had a bad atmosphere. But a lot of very strange things happened over the 28 years my folks lived there - many involving me - and when they moved in 2005, my mother said it was like a huge weight had been lifted off her.

But anyway. As a kid of about three or four, I frequently talked about 'Shell Ghost'. Shell Ghost lived in my wardrobe. Shell Ghost was black. Shell Ghost had a hat. Shell Ghost came out at night and stared at me in bed. Shell Ghost moved my toys. Shell Ghost was not my friend.

My parents remember me talking incessantly about all this, and I even wrote stuff like the above in my Primary 2 jotter. But I don't specifically remember Shell Ghost, or what it was supposed to have looked like. Or where the weird name came from (this is years before Ghost In The Shell, btw).

Until recently, when I was watching a YouTube compilation of 1980s adverts, and this came on:



Crikey Moses, that's where it came from.

The creepy figure in the (deeply creepy) advert for Shell is, seemingly, what my younger self perceived as the match of the figure from my wardrobe.

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And reading the above posts, I'm now wondering... did I have a Hat Man also?

I genuinely can't remember exactly what the figure looked like; only that there was a figure, and I remember talking a lot about the figure. But, even after I stopped talking about Shell Ghost (apparently I solemnly informed everyone that he was "going away" sometime in early 1987), the corner of the room where the wardrobe once stood remained a bit of an odd area, where furniture would shake and things would disappear, often permanently.

And the room was always, always cold, despite getting full sun all day.

Mmm... might need to dig a bit deeper into this one. Thread duly bookmarked...https://youtu.be/2oSO2zJM0OI
 
This is... all bringing back some odd memories for me. Or making me reconsider some half-remembered memories, at any rate.

I'd planned on putting all this into another account I'm drawing together about the house I grew up in (newish semi-detached, built on former farmland, and we know no-one ever died in there since we knew the first owners) which always had a bad atmosphere. But a lot of very strange things happened over the 28 years my folks lived there - many involving me - and when they moved in 2005, my mother said it was like a huge weight had been lifted off her.

But anyway. As a kid of about three or four, I frequently talked about 'Shell Ghost'. Shell Ghost lived in my wardrobe. Shell Ghost was black. Shell Ghost had a hat. Shell Ghost came out at night and stared at me in bed. Shell Ghost moved my toys. Shell Ghost was not my friend.

My parents remember me talking incessantly about all this, and I even wrote stuff like the above in my Primary 2 jotter. But I don't specifically remember Shell Ghost, or what it was supposed to have looked like. Or where the weird name came from (this is years before Ghost In The Shell, btw).

Until recently, when I was watching a YouTube compilation of 1980s adverts, and this came on:

Crikey Moses, that's where it came from.

The creepy figure in the (deeply creepy) advert for Shell is, seemingly, what my younger self perceived as the match of the figure from my wardrobe.

View attachment 35480

And reading the above posts, I'm now wondering... did I have a Hat Man also?

I genuinely can't remember exactly what the figure looked like; only that there was a figure, and I remember talking a lot about the figure. But, even after I stopped talking about Shell Ghost (apparently I solemnly informed everyone that he was "going away" sometime in early 1987), the corner of the room where the wardrobe once stood remained a bit of an odd area, where furniture would shake and things would disappear, often permanently.

And the room was always, always cold, despite getting full sun all day.

Mmm... might need to dig a bit deeper into this one. Thread duly bookmarked...

I've just been reading about the Shell ad a few minutes ago! I didn't think I remembered it until your post, and I watched the clip and it all came flooding back. It didn't give me nightmares, though the chapter in the book is about how 80s ads went nuts for a while, happy to scare the audience which I doubt they do now.
 
Not exactly Hat Man relevant, but your memories of childhood 'things' reminded me of my brother's scary imaginary friend who used to visit him and hated mashed potatoes.

It was Ray Davies of the Kinks. Yes, my brother's imaginary friend was a famous pop star of the day. He lived with us (well, in my brother's imaginings he did) in a cupboard behind the television, which was also our toy cupboard. He'd accompany us on day trips and, as previously mentioned, refuse to eat mashed potato.

My brother was slightly scared of him but it didn't stop him hanging around...
 
I've just been reading about the Shell ad a few minutes ago! I didn't think I remembered it until your post, and I watched the clip and it all came flooding back. It didn't give me nightmares, though the chapter in the book is about how 80s ads went nuts for a while, happy to scare the audience which I doubt they do now.

Heh, that's some more peculiar synchronicity, right there... been a long time since I saw the ad, and it certainly put the chills up me!

I'm not sure whether it seemed more 'real' to me because my father drove a very similar Morris Marina estate, and there was a stretch of wooded rural road not far from home that I didn't like (still don't) which put me in mind of the nightmare road in the ad...

Kind of begs the question though - what came first? Did I see the ad, and the figure somehow came after - or did I see the figure first, and only develop the vocabulary to explain what was there once I'd seen the ad?
 
Wow. Just finished watching a movie on the London Live channel. It was called 'The Man from Nowhere' and it was made in 1976 by the Children's Film Foundation. The story was set in 1860 and was basically about a young girl being menaced/haunted/stalked by a phantom-like man dressed in black with a top hat (classic silhouette) who seems to come and go like a ghost and pops up when least expected (or when most expected) to scare the bejesus out of her. Quite a few creepy moments and one or two Hitchcockian shocks. Also definite echoes of the Child Catcher from 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang'. Must have given the kiddies of the mid Seventies a few sleepless nights, I reckon. Not a bad movie at all. Probably one of the better productions from the CFF. A couple of pics below....
 
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