Amityville Horror: Where Do You Stand?

[sherbetbizarre]

The Good Housekeeping article has been pulled from the net archives and hosted on our forum at:

http://amityvillehorror.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=1312

Sorry the quality gets progressively worse!

Despite it being written by Paul Hoffman after the split with the Lutzes... George says this account was fairly accurate.

 

[Heckler]

I've never heard of this guy! Who the hell is he?

Loyd Auerbach is a parapsychologist who has written a number of 'sensible' books on the subject:

Bio here.

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Thanks! I'll see if I can get hold of this book - http://www.twbookmark.com/books/9/0446349518/

I take it he actually went inside the house?

 

[Heckler]

Yep that's the book of his that I have.

I'll have to re-read the chapter on Amityville (the book is at home) but IIRC he did a full investigation of the inside.

 

[Mob1138]

Hans Holzer came across as barmier than a bag of ferrets

For more of the same, check out his commentary on the '79 movie DVD :shock:

It's more entertaining than the film itself.

 

[SpaceOddity]

When I watched the channel 4 documentary, I was to frightened to look at the ghost pic of the little boy. Yes I know im a big coward

Just had a look at it now. Does anybody know if he looks like one of the children killed in the murders? More than likely it was just a child there at the time or possibly a deliberate set up. Still quite a scary pic though!

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Apparently it bears a resembelance to John DeFeo.

And it hasn't gone unnoticed that if you take the first two letters of each name... Jo De... = Jody? :shock:

 

[Mob1138]

I saw the remake of the 1979 movie the other day.

I never thought i'd say this, but the original is better and it's an awful film!

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Shame they didn't get an interview with Lloyd Auerbach who did a fairly extensive investigation and found nothing at the house and some fairly glaring inconsistancies in the original book.

I got a copy of Loyd Auerbach's ESP, HAUNTINGS AND POLTERGEISTS from ebay...

BLOWING THE LID OFF THE AMITYVILLE HORROR is a 10 page chapter of secondhand information - there's some interesting stuff, but Auerbach does not go inside the house himself.

He opens with some of the more common book contradictions and concedes they, "could possibly have been due to author Jay Anson, who never went to visit the house." p297

Dr Karlis Osis (American Society for Psychical Research) and Jerry Solvrin (Psychical Reseach Foundation in North Carolina) are both interviewed... with Osis claiming Lutz contacted him while still living at the house. Whereas Lutz has always maintained nobody was contacted until a month after they fled - and after Weber's press conference.

Solfrin says "the whole thing stacked up as not very interesting. There was nothing objective. It was all the perceptions of the family, all subjective phenomena." p299

Osis smells a hoax when Lutz shows him a sample of DeFeo's handwritting - on a book contract. But Lutz has made no secret of this contract, saying it was sent by William Weber. And one of the reason they refused to sign was because of DeFeo's signature being on there!

Both Osis and Solfrin find nothing at the March '76 investigation, but admit, "with all these camera crews it was like a zoo" p300

Auerbach also admits with the Lutzes by now out of the house, "An investigator could not see the Lutz family and their reported paranormal occurrences in any semblence of the situational relationships... in terms of an actual spontaneous case investigation, then, this would have been a poor case, since there was no chance to see any of the original setup of the situation." p302

But he concludes, "The likeliest conclusion is that the case was a hoax... (it's) a prime example of how things can be fabricated and blown out of proportion through utilization of the media." p303


So... Osis and Solfrin would have been interesting additions to The Real Amityville Horror... but apparently Solfrin now cliams he never went in the house! (see below)

In my opinion, both these serious researchers saw Amityville become a media frenzy, and tried to distance themselves from it as much as possible...

My friend Lisa-Marie read the piece, and this is what she had to say:

I learned about Auerbach when I did my article for Tim
on the Moss Beach Distillery. Auerbach is a magician.
He set up some illusions at the distillery so the
owner could show off his "ghost."

I've spoken to Lloyd Auerbach at great length. I tried
to explain to him that the men who gave him his second
hand info have lied to him. Jerry Solfvin, Alex
Tanous and Karlis Osis.

Solfvin claims he was never in the house. When I said
there where photos of him IN the house he then claimed
that he'd been asked by the Lutzes to "just spend the
night." And he never made an investigation.

So I told Lloyd to watch the History's Mysteries docs
which clearly showed Solfvin - clip board, pen and
flashlight in hand DOING an investigation of the
house.

I asked him point blank why he felt he could do this
"blowing the doors off" article without interviewing
the people who lived through it. He said there was no
need. In my opinion, he knows he can't because his
house of cards won't stand up to it.

Solfvin, Osis and Tanous told Auerbach that they'd
met the Lutzes and there was a contract on the coffee
table. A contract with Defeo and Weber.

I explained to Auerbach that the Lutzes addressed this
contract on History's Mysteries - that Weber had
proposed a deal and they declined. Auerbach is certain
- due to the word of his three lying "friends" that
the Lutzes signed this contract and concocted the
whole story.

His article was BEYOND lame. And like Kaplan - very
hostile.

He's local - here. I've offered to have him come over
and see the photos of his so called friends who never
investigated the house investigating the house. He's
not interested. He flat out doesn't believe me that
there are photos of these men in the house. He is
utterly unwilling to allow me to prove him wrong.

He's neither been to the house and thus never
investigated it. Nor has he interviewed the people to
whom the haunting happened. So he's done no
investigation.

And he flat out refuses to look at the physical
evidence (photos and History's Mysteries docs) that
he's been lied to.

Odd for an "objective investigator..."

 

[Heckler]

Good work Sherbert, like I said it has been a while since I'd read that book :? so my memory was clearly a little skewed.

"An investigator could not see the Lutz family and their reported paranormal occurrences in any semblence of the situational relationships... in terms of an actual spontaneous case investigation, then, this would have been a poor case, since there was no chance to see any of the original setup of the situation."

Now that is a very fair point in the Lutz's favour but if the 'haunting' didn't follow them and isn't at the house then what happened to it?

There was an Amityville Horror 2 book that wasn't a novelisation of the terrible film of the same name but seems to be a continuation of the events after the family left, the only info I can find is:

Much more effective than Jan Anson's Amityville Horror, the second book in the series is better at presenting the Lutzes as humans and not just as victims. I'm sure author John G. Jones embellished events (assuming they happened in the first place, of course), but his story focuses on the characters' fears and not just on the frightening events happening to them. Less an excercise in imagined special effects than a psychological thriller, Amityville II is an intriguing work. (Oct 16, 2000)

Did the Lutz family contribute to this book or is it purely fiction?

Now one of the other hauntings of a similar nature was 'The Haunting' and the haunting once attached to this family did follow it. (assuming for a moment that this 'haunting' has as much veracity as Amityville. The Warrens were involved in both and their drawing room seance scams scare me more than any haunting ).

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Good work Sherbert, like I said it has been a while since I'd read that book :? so my memory was clearly a little skewed.

Thanks for the heads-up on the book, Heckler!

There was an Amityville Horror 2 book that wasn't a novelisation of the terrible film of the same name but seems to be a continuation of the events after the family left.

Did the Lutz family contribute to this book or is it purely fiction?

The novels parts 2 & 3 by John G Jones are described as "fiction based on fact" - meaning George Lutz provided instances of it following them and Jones turned into an overblown novelization, undoing all the "documentary style" storytelling that made the first book so memorable.

As the original publishers, Jay Anson and the Lutzes were sued by the new 112 house owners and poeple mentioned in the first book, I guess a decison was made to fictionalize as much as possible.

Today George says there's not much in those books that really took place.
But he does maintain it followed them - on and off - as "a half-life"... not as strong as in the house.

George & kathy credit the exorcism they had in North London in 1980 by the late Rev.Christopher Neil-Smith as a huge help in ridding them of their problem.

Christopher Lutz remembers many events too after the house too, and if he ever gets to finish his long-mooted documentary maybe we'll get to hear them.

 

[sherbetbizarre]

http://www.courttv.com/people/2005/1109/amityville_ctv.html

Judge tosses haunted house owner's 'Amityville' defamation suit

LOS ANGELES — A judge has ruled against former haunted house owner George Lutz, who claims he was defamed after being falsely portrayed in "The Amityville Horror" remake as an ax-wielding dog killer.

Lutz's real-life ordeal living in a spooked Long Island home was the subject of the bestselling 1977 book "The Amityville Horror," which inspired the film of the same name and several sequels, including a 2005 remake starring actor Ryan Reynolds as Lutz.

Lutz filed a defamation and breach of contract suit this summer against Dimension Films, MGM, United Artists, and the producers and screenwriters involved in the remake.

Lutz maintains that he was terrorized by demonic apparitions and voices while he and his wife and children lived in the Dutch Colonial home where an entire family had been murdered in their sleep in the early 1970s.

However, Lutz says he never killed his beloved Labrador retriever, nor did he chase after his wife and children with an ax, as his namesake character does in the film.

Lutz claimed he suffered "loss of reputation, shame, mortification and hurt feelings" from the movie's depiction of him as "a homicidal maniac."

But a judge sided with the defendants, saying that the film was a work of fiction protected under the First Amendment, and that it fell within California's anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation) statute designed to protect free speech.

"The remake of 'The Amityville Horror' is an activity of widespread public interest," Superior Court Judge Rolf Treu wrote in his order filed on Oct. 31. "It is a movie viewed by millions of fans and generating millions of dollars for the defendants who participated in writing the screenplay, producing the movie, and distributing the 2005 remake."

While the judge agreed with the studio's request to strike Lutz's defamation complaint under the anti-SLAPP law, SLAPPs are typically identified as suits filed by large corporations against individuals to intimidate or discourage public criticism.

Oprah Winfrey became a SLAPP defendant when she defeated a 1998 libel suit by Texas cattle ranchers, who claimed the talk show host sent the beef market in a downward spiral after telling viewers that she had sworn off hamburgers because of mad cow disease.

Judge Treu also upheld a release agreement Lutz signed nearly 28 years ago with the original film's producers, in which Lutz consented to allowing filmmakers to alter characters and agreed not to sue for defamation.

Lutz's attorney Larry Zerner did not return calls for comment.

The judge's ruling did not affect Lutz's breach-of-contract claim. The plaintiff says Dimension has yet to pay him a promised percentage of net and merchandising profits, as well as $50,000 once the film exceeded $10 million in box-office receipts. The picture has grossed more than $81 million since its April release, according to Lutz's June complaint.

In November 1974, Ronald DeFeo Jr. shot his mother, father, two brothers and two sisters as they lay asleep in their beds in the now-infamous white clapboard house with the jack-o'-lantern bay windows.

Lutz purchased the home a year later. After 28 days, he fled with his family in the middle of the night, leaving their possessions behind, never to return.

DeFeo, 54, is serving 25 years to life in prison. He was denied parole by a three-member review panel in September. His next parole hearing is scheduled for September 2007.

http://www.courthousenews.com/disc8_toc.htm

'Amityville Horror' Libel Claim SLAPP-ed

A Los Angeles judge has ruled against the former owner of the haunted house featured in "The Amityville Horror," finding that George Lutz cannot sue the producers over how he was portrayed in the remake of the cult 1979 movie.

The remake "is an activity of widespread public interest" that "falls within the purview of the anti-SLAPP statute," Superior Court Judge Rolf M. Treu said in an order granting a motion to strike Lutz's claim for libel and slander.

Treu also held that a 1978 agreement between Lutz and the producers of the original movie applied to the remake. The agreement precluded Lutz from claiming that "anything in the Picture" was defamatory.

Lutz's account of his family's paranormal experiences in a Long Island, N.Y., home inspired the 1977 book "The Amityville Horror." The movie remake, produced by Dimension Films and others, was released earlier this year.

In suing for defamation, Lutz alleged the film falsely portrayed him as a "homicidal maniac" who, among other things, kills his dog with an ax and tries to drown his wife. He also said the 1978 deal "only applied" to the original picture.

In September, True tentatively denied the anti-SLAPP motion, saying the defendants had not shown they were beneficiaries of the agreement. But after taking judicial notice of documents submitted by the defense, he later found the defamation claim is "barred by the release and covenant not to sue."

The documents came from separate federal court litigation over the rights to the remake.

The anti-SLAPP dismissal does not affect a breach-of-contract claim against Dimension Films for failing to pay Lutz $50,000 once the remake earned $10 million at the box office.

11/7/05

 

[GNC]

If the remake was a work of fiction why does it say in great big letters "Based on a True Story" at the start? I'm no fan of Lutz, but the portrayal of him in this film was ludicrous.

 

[sherbetbizarre]

I caught some of Dead Famous Live on LivingTV on Friday night... totally rips the Most Haunted Live format... and who should be their studio-based parapsychologist? It was Loyd Auerbach!

 

[river_styx]

If the remake was a work of fiction why does it say in great big letters "Based on a True Story" at the start? I'm no fan of Lutz, but the portrayal of him in this film was ludicrous.

It's the usual legal jargon.

You can say 'Based on..' and then do whatever the hell you like with the story as long as something like the main players' names are the same. And that you don't depict them as doing something they've never been caught doing....

 

[GNC]

You can say 'Based on..' and then do whatever the hell you like with the story as long as something like the main players' names are the same. And that you don't depict them as doing something they've never been caught doing....

Like killing the family dog with an axe, you mean?

 

[triplesod]

Amityville on tonight

Just a heads up that the first and arguably best Amiotyville fillum is on in Britain tonight at 11:45 on ITV.

To the mods, I am sorry to start a new thread for this, I did do a search for Amityville but found nothing (although I am fairly certain I read a post specifically about this even on here a while back). So please feel free to get rid of this when you want but could I suggest that you please leave it up until after teh film has started so people who may wish to see it are reminded. Thankyou.

 

[MaxMolyneux]

It was average and I don't think of it much to be honest anyway.

Agree that it was a hoax too really.

 

[triplesod]

Oh... OK... I will take my post down then, eh?


Well, I am being sarcastic with you but I know that there are a fair ferw on here that want to see the film wether they like it or hate it, believe it or see it as a hoax. I didn't type my message only for your benefit.

 

[TheQuixote]

Hey chill, no need to take the post down

Triplesod - I've bumped the main discussion by merging your thread.


BTW for future reference, we've got a TV reminders/notices thread, check the link below

http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/viewt ... 432#156432

 

[triplesod]

Thanks for that Quixote!

I didn't really consider taking it down, just being sarcastic after the scousers reply

 

[lkb3rd]

Tonight there was a show in the States on A & E television with an interview with Ronald "Butch " Defeo conducted by a forensic psychiatrist from Bellevue. He is the man who killed his entire family in the house before the more famous story happened.
He described his father as a horribly abusive gangster who was hated by the entire family. He now claims that he and his older sister got into an argument and ended up daring each other to go to their father's bedroom and kill him. He claims his father saw him with a gun as he was "trying to scare him", and lunged at him, at which point he shot. He then claims that his mother went for a .38 next to her bed, at which point he killed her. He says he went out and drove around, and when he returned, his sister had killed his siblings, and tried to kill him. They fought, and he killed her. This is in contrast to the evidence, and his story at the time, that he killed them all for unclear reasons after killing his father and mother whom he hated because of their abuse.
The psychiatrist's opinion was antisocial disorder, and his constant lying and history of drug abuse, dealing and crime were typical. Nothing was mentioned about anything ghostly or in any way connected to the Lutz's story. A heroin addicted alcoholic got fed up with his abusive father, and somehow "got on a roll" after killing him and decided it was better to kill them all. Perhaps to eliminate witnesses, or make it look too horrible to believe he would do that to his entire family (my guesses)

 

[sherbetbizarre]

George Lee Lutz passed away on Monday, May 8th.

He was a good friend, and I shall miss him dearly.

Jason.

http://amityvillehorror.com/

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/nevada/2006/may/10/051010070.html

http://amityvillehorror.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=3593

 

[MrRING]

Wow, it just seems so shocking to have such an icon of my childhood fears gone, and still quite young at 59.

 

[MrRING]

In a strange correlation to the case, this has been recently published in Weatherwise:

ANOTHER TALL TALE?

Weatherwise - Washington
Author: Tim Vasquez
Date: Sep/Oct 2006
Start Page: 52
Document Types: Commentary
Text Word Count: 2012

Abstract (Document Summary)

The NOAA Daily Weather Map series was consulted to analyze the weather patterns that moved through New York in correlation with the detailed dates set forth in The Amityville Horror: A True Story by Jay Anson. Vasquez details how weather records question the truth behind the Amityville Horror.

 

[WhistlingJack]

Here's the full article: -

Another Tall Tale?

9/1/2006

By Vasquez, Tim

Weather records question the truth behind the Amityville Horror

THIRTY YEARS AGO, RUMORS OF GHOSTS and demons swirled out of a small town on Long Island, New York. In 1975, George and Kathy Lutz and their three children moved into a three-story home in the town of Amityville. The house had a bleak history that included the death of six residents the previous year at the hands of convicted murderer Ronald DeFeo. The spectre of hauntings quickly arose as the Lutz family proclaimed the occurrence of accidents, misfortunes, nighttime awakenings, strange noises, and ghostly apparitions. After spending 28 days in the house, the family fled at dawn, leaving most of their belongings behind.

The house soon attracted the attention of others, including psychics and a local news team, and it was featured in an article in Good Housekeeping magazine, titled Our Dream House Was Haunted, in April of 1977. But the house became a national obsession in September of that year when The Amityville Horror: A True Story hit the national bookstores. Penned by writer Jay Anson, the book sold 10 million copies. In July 1979, a big-screen film version of the story, starring James Brolin and Margot Kidder, became a box-office smash, earning over $80 million. To this day, the image of a Dutch colonial home still brings to mind the menacing, anthropomorphized house that has become symbolic of the entire Amityville Horror genre.

A compact occluded low that departed the coast of New Jersey overnight on January 1, 1976, could have Instigated an Amityville Incident (the house is indicated by a red square) involving nighttime wind gusts. But moving at 50 mph and measuring only a few hundred miles in scale, its influence would have lasted only a matter of hours. The low is pictured here at 7 a.m., six hours after the novel's blustery incident.

Controversy Grows

The house's "true" haunting credentials have long been a source of controversy, and its most vocal skeptics cite it as a masterful hoax that brought fame and fortune. Subsequent occupants of the house have been unanimous in their assertion that it is not haunted and have cited their frustration with tourists who still drive by the house decades later. Furthermore, William Weber, the attorney for the murderer DeFeo, told the Associated Press in 1979 that he, along with Kathy and George Lutz, had invented parts of the best'selling story "over many bottles of wine."

However, George Lutz continually countered these statements over the years. Author Jay Anson maintained that the story was true, to the extent that he could verify them through his 35 hours of taped interviews with George Lutz, documenting the haunting in exacting detail.

So what is the truth? Extensive debunking of the story has appeared in numerous books and website pages. Nearly all focus on police and hospital records, interviews, and the condition of the house. However, although storms, snow, and wind played pivotal roles in the haunting, official weather records have received only a cursory glance.

Until now. By taking a close look at some passages from Anson's book, we can see how they stack up to the actual weather records.

December 25, 1975

3:15 a.m: "In the winter moonlight flooding the bedroom, George saw Kathy quite clearly. She was sleeping onher stomach. He reached out his hand to touch her head. At that instant Kathy woke up. As she looked wildly about, George could see the fright in her eyes."

The Reality. Overcast layers of altostratus were observed at JFK International Airport at this time, so it is improbable that winter moonlight would have been flooding the bedroom.

December 25, 1975

"At six o'clock that evening, Kathy was preparing supper for her family when she heard the sounds of something tiny and delicate strifeing against the glass of her kitchen window. It was dark outside, but she could see it was snowing. "

The Reality: Snow did fall that afternoon, a large-scale event associated with a surface low moving up the coast. At first glance the snow occurrence appears to support the story, but the snow started at 2 p.m. and reached its peak at 5 p.m. It is improbable that Kathy, who had been shopping during the day, would have noticed the snow so belatedly.

December 26, 1975

"The roads were reported to be icy from [yesterday's] light snow, however, and it was a Friday night. Traffic would be heavy and slow."

The Reality: The temperature had risen to 38F overnight and had settled in the mid-50s all day.

December 27, 1975

"The weather was bright and clear, the temperatures hovering in the low teens."

The Reality: Weather records showed overcast stratocumulus and 39F, falling slowly from the pre-dawn high of 46F. At no time during the holiday period was the afternoon temperature below freezing.

The weather chart at 7 a.m. on January 14, 1976, correlates to the time that the Lutz family fled their house (red square) after a night when they allege that the haunting became particularly violent and chaotic, and was accompanied by thunderstorms. A front had passed through the area overnight but would have not been able to sustain 16 hours of thunderstorm activity.

January 1, 1976

"The morning snowfall had made traveling on the roads hazardous. As the day wore on, it got colder, and cars began to get caught in drifts and skid on icy spots all over Long Island. "

The Reality: Some light, wet snow had fallen in the pre-dawn hours while the mercury was 33F, but skies rapidly cleared and the temperature climbed all day, reaching 40F under the clear afternoon sky.

January 10, 1976

"He heard a loud clap of thunder. Looking out the windows, he saw the first raindrops strike the panes. Then somewhere in the distance, a flash of lightning hit the darkness and again, a few moments later, came another boom of thunder. George could make out the silhouettes of trees swaying in the rising gusts ... The rain was coming down much harder now, beating heavily against the windows and outside walls."

This recounts a thunderstorm that hit at 8 p.m., accompanied by lightning and heavy rain, with a force strong enough to tear down a telephone pole. An accident occurs in the house and it takes George Lutz fifteen minutes to drive his son to the hospital due to hurricane-force winds raging through Long Island's South Shore. According to the book, the rain continues overnight and all of the house's windows opened, mysteriously. Dawn breaks, revealing severe water damage in the house with rain continuing to whip through the open windows.

The Reality: The weather record for JFK International Airport at 8 p.m. showed clear skies and a temperature of 24F. As the night continued, an overcast layer moved in and light snow fell from 5:30 a.m. until 7:00 a.m. as a warm front approached from the southwest. The air mass was far too cold and stable to support thunderstorm activity.

January 13-14, 1976

"Despite all the noise, George now heard doors all throughout the house beginning to slam back and forth ... A terrible, Winding flash of lightning lit up the bedroom. George heard the thunderbolt strike something close outside. Then there was a smashing blow that shook the entire house. The storm was back, with torrents of rain and wind. George lay there panting, his heart thumping loudly in his chest. He was waiting, knowing something else was about to happen. Then George let out a horrible, silent scream. Somebody was on the bed with him!"

This was the night that the haunting allegedly reached its climax. It began with a thunderstorm which struck at 1 p.m., continuing intermittently for 16 hours with only a short respite around 1 a.m.

The Reality: Meteorologically, 16 hours of thunderstorm activity bears a very strong correlation with flash flood events. Such events may be caused by "training" of storm cells, which requires upper- level flow to be parallel to a boundary. It may also be caused by a stationary source of lift, such as high terrain or a stationary front. It also may result from exceptionally weak upper-level flow which allows for slow progression of a large-scale weather system. In all cases, an inflow of low-level moisture is necessary to support continued thunderstorm development.

None of these factors was present during the week in question. Weather patterns for January 13, 1976, showed strong winds aloft, a fast-progressing surface system which moved 900 miles in one day from the Midwest region to Maine, and exceptionally fast-moving boundaries. Weather records from JFK International Airport indicated light stratiform rain during the afternoon hours and briefly around midnight. Observed rainfall was only 0.21 inch.

The Exception

In spite of the errors and omissions, one accurate correlation was found. On January 1, 1976, at 1 a.m., Anson's novel recounts: "They were awakened by a howling wind roaring through their bedroom. The blankets on the bed had been virtually torn from their bodies, leaving George and Kathy shivering. All the windows in the room were wide open, and the bedroom door, caught by the drafts, was swinging back and forth." After George closed the window, he could hear the wind "gusting violently outside."

Indeed, a wind event did occur that night as a surface low moved up the Atlantic coast, causing winds at JFK International Airport to gust to over30 mph as winds backed from northeast to northwest. This wind reached its peak at 2 a.m., and the weather records support the story.

Fact or Fiction?

In summary, analysis of weather maps and observations show unresolved discrepancies with Anson's novel. One possibility is that due to inaccurate reconstruction, the calendar dates are in error. However, none of the events could be accurately supported on adjacent days, and in many cases the character of the weather could not be explained by any observed meteorological pattern at all. Furthermore, the National Climatic Data Center publication Storm Data shows a complete absence of damaging thunderstorms in coastal New York during January 1976. No thunderstorm was reported at JFK International Airport during key events, and in many cases no weather phenomena were observed at all.

Although the weather records may debunk Anson's novel, it is fallacious logic to assume that the evidence invalidates the haunting. It is possible that Anson crafted the weather events to reinforce the story. The novel's weather moved through three distinct meteorological phases, from serenity to bitter chill to dark tempest, serving as its own metaphor for the haunting. Indeed, weather has had a close association with the supernatural since Egyptian and Roman times, and countless writers have expertly used meteorology for dramatic effect, from Shakespeare to Shelley and from H.P. Lovecraft to Stephen King.

So it remains up to the reader to examine other evidence to decide what really happened in Amityville. Author Jay Anson passed away in 1980 and Kathy Lutz succumbed to emphysema in 2004. The central figure of the hauntings, George Lutz, died of heart failure on May 8, 2006, shortly before this article was written. The truth about the hauntings is now obscured forever, passing into the pages of American lore. Regardless of whether the Amityville Horror saga is fact or hoax, it remains one of America's most popular and gripping modern ghost stories.

NCDC to the Rescue

A useful source for climatic information, the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) keeps detailed weather records going well back into the 19th century. As part of this study, I used the Form 10 Surface Weather Observation from NCDC for JFK International Airport, which is located 18 miles west of the Amityville house and is representative for most types of weather events. These records show hourly observations taken by federally certified weather observers. In addition, the NOAA Daily Weather Map series was consulted to analyze the weather patterns that moved through New York in correlation with the detailed dates set forth in The Amityville Horror: A True Story.

TIM VASQUEZ lives near Austin, Texas, where he keeps busy as a weather consultant and software developer.

Copyright Heldref Publications Sep/Oct 2006

(c) 2006 Weatherwise. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Debating the Amityville weather isn’t new, but this the most comprehensive article I’ve seen on it.

In an interview shortly before his death, Jay Anson admitted to "rearranging" the events the Lutzes had recorded onto tape, from which he was compiling The Amityville Horror.

So that pretty much renders a day-to-day comparison useless, but as the article admits, there’s a “possibility” the “calendar dates are in error.”

Although the weather records may debunk Anson's novel, it is fallacious logic to assume that the evidence invalidates the haunting. It is possible that Anson crafted the weather events to reinforce the story.

Kind of. In an interview with Jeff Belanger for his Our Haunted Lives book, George Lutz said:

That night was worse. It was reported years later that there was no storms, but for the five of us in the house there certainly was.

George would also talk of making excuses never to leave the house, as if it were trying to keep them close. The “storms” were part of this.

I’m not sure how common this type of thing is. Can anyone think of other examples where false realities are planted into the minds of the haunted?

More interviews with George:

Jeff Belanger

ABC News chat

Tim Yancey

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Here's a newly uploaded audio interview between Tim Yancey and George Lutz:

http://www.amityvillefaq.com/truthboard/viewtopic.php?t=4318

George talks about the weather around the 11 minute mark.

 

[sherbetbizarre]

Anyone remember In Seach Of... the 70's paranormal series with Leonard Nimoy narrating... Did it even air in the UK?

Here's the Amityville episode on YouTube:

Clip 1

Clip 2

Clip 3

 

[Anonymous]

Amityville is all a Hoax form what seen on tv.