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Classic Archive Merged: Raggedly Ann

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Anonymous

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DP

Here's a oddly creepy story that happened to me some time around 1995, in San Francisco.

My wife and I, along with our 5 year old son and our new baby, shared a single bedroom and loft near the beach. The bedroom opened directly to the livingroom, and had no door. One night, I came home from work, walked through the living room towards the kitchen where my wife was cooking dinner. Our older son was in the backyard, the baby was asleep. As I passed the bedroom, I noticed a new addition to my wife's collection of stuffed animals. A large, (at least three foot tall) Raggedy Ann doll sat on the bed, facing the bedroom entrance.

I didn't think anything about the doll was odd, at first. I walked to the kitchen, said hello to my wife, and made some small talk. After a moment or two, I asked where she had gotten the new Raggedy Ann doll.

My wife looked at me blankly. She had no idea what I was talking about. She gave me a look as if there were large lobsters crawling out my ears! I repeated myself, but she still didn't understand, so I dragged her to the bedroom doorway to show her the doll.

There was no doll. The hair on the back of my neck stood at attention. Less than 5 minutes ago, a rather large Raggedy Ann doll had been there, and no one could have moved it, as they would have had to walk past me to get to the bedroom.

The more I thought about what had happened, the more freaky the whole scenario seemed. The doll had been looking right at me, with those big, black, empty Raggedy Ann button eyes. The doll had been watching me, smiling in the way for which that type of doll is famous.

I have no explanation for this occurance. If I were to have hallucinated a stuffed animal, what on earth would have made me see that doll? Why not a bear, a cat, or any number of animals? Raggedy Ann dolls have a distinctive look, and are not easily mistaken for another doll.

I have never been able to look at Raggedy Ann (or Andy) quite the same since then. These dolls now creep me out, and probably always will!
 
Raggedy Ann

My mother told me that when she was a little girl she was visiting her Grandmother. From her room upstairs she could see the porch. One night she looked out the window and saw her Raggedy Ann doll get off the porch swing and walk across the porch.

I've never liked dolls. I had a girlfriend in college who invited me to her house to meet her parents. When I got there, I went in the house and stopped dead in my tracks! Lined up along the walls in the living room and going down the hall were hundreds of dolls! I couldn't get comfortable in that house and didn't sleep a wink. The next day I had to leave. Those dolls were one of the reasons I quit seeing her.

I also have a thing about Clowns, but that's a different story...
 
Are these dolls the American ones with ginger hair in plaits? If so, I think they're really freaky. :eek:
I think it was in the film Ghost Story where a doll like this came alive and dragged one of the men across the fields to show him something. Scared the life out of me.
Oh, and I'm scared of clowns too, maybe it's the resemblance between these dolls and the clown make up that makes me feel like this about the dolls?
 
I too have always hated dolls, especially the all-too realistic porcelain ones. *shudders*

I remember reading years ago of a teddy bear that began to make weird noises - heavy breathing, voices etc. The account stated that upon close examination the teddy had 2 small slits on the arms and various small items had been stitched in. It was suggested that the bear had been tampered with by voodoo practitioners.
 
Spooky angel said:
Are these dolls the American ones with ginger hair in plaits? If so, I think they're really freaky. :eek:

Most creatures with ginger hair affect people in that way...
 
Most creatures with ginger hair affect people in that way...

I really hope you're only commenting on non-human creatures with ginger hair, and not ginger people as well:devil:
 
the_discordian said:
I really hope you're only commenting on non-human creatures with ginger hair, and not ginger people as well:devil:

I second that :sceptic:
 
Yeah, watch what you say.

You don't want to go pissing the League off, now do you?

Dolls can be very creepy. I suspect the more "lifelike" ones are creepier because they look too much like little people, with the suggestion that they may come to life at any moment. The same applies to less lifelike dolls that behave in an odd fashion. (I found the doll sequence in Barbarella a bit too disturbing. Admittedly I was very young at the time. But since then, I've been put off by that talking teddy bear in the fabric softener commercial because its mouth moves in much the same way.)
 
Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

I swear the following is true to the best of my recollection, but obviously it might be from some TV show I shouldn't have been watching -the only thing I'm sure of is that it took place in Canada, and we came back to Scotland in early '66 at the latest:

I have a vivid recollection of a nightmare I had when I was about 2 and a half or so years old (1965 or '66, hence the political incorrectness of the doll): basically my golly -red tailed coat, matching bow tie, bright buttons, mitten-hands (no fingers!) and a big cheesy grin- came to life and got off the sofa where it was sitting, came over to where I was (one of those outsized wooden cage affairs my parents kept putting me in in the sitting room to stop me wandering around the house first thing in the morning on their days off), reached through the bars and started tickling me.

It kept this up until I could barely breath, darting around the bars to get at me whenever I moved to get away. Anyone else who hates being tickled knows how frantic you can get if your tickler doesn't take the hint and stop when you make it clear you don't like it: imagine what it's like at 2 years old and the tickler isn't even human.

Eventually I grabbed the toy gun that was in the 'cage' with me and fired it at the attacking golly. The damn thing flew backwards across the room, and without waiting to see where it landed I somehow got out of the cage and made a tearful, hysterical beeline for my mum and dad's room.

They couldn't get any sense out of me and couldn't get rid of me either until my dad took me by the hand back into the room where it had all happened -and there was the golly, back on the sofa where it had started off -except that the side of its chest was ripped apart and all the stuffing was falling out, and there was bits of stuffing all over the floor around the 'cage' thing I'd been in...

IIRC I got yelled at for vandalizing the golly and making a mess of the sitting room.

And then...

A few years ago, I was looking through a mate from work's portfolio of artwork, and came across a bit from a comic strip he'd drawn of a grinning man with long bony fingers called 'The Tickling Man': he told me it was based on a dream he'd had as a kid, maybe about 3 y.o., about this thing that lurked in his gran's attic when he stayed with her, and which would silently come down and "try to tickle him to death" in the middle of the night. He didn't think it was based on a doll at all, but about 2 years later the Buffy episode 'Hush' aired on Sky in the UK -and the imagery associated with 'The Gentlemen' was very similar to that of 'The Tickling Man'...

Grinning ticklers attacking toddlers: tall tale or terrifying archetype?
 
Re: Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

Zygon said:
Grinning ticklers attacking toddlers: tall tale or terrifying archetype?
Synchronicity or what?

I was talking to a friend this morning who thinks she lives in a haunted house. One of the reasons she gives is that her 15 month old toddler, who can't say much yet, was laughing in the middle of the night. Thinking that one of her other kids had gone into the baby's room, she got out of bed and popped her head round the baby's bedroom door. There was the toddler in fits of laughter and ... writhing and contorting as if being tickled! :eek:

This happened fairly recently. She has also found the baby on the floor after she's tucked him up in his cot - and this happened before he started toddling around. :eek:

So your grinning tickler may well be an archetype!
 
Re: Re: Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

Susan Bulmer said:
So your grinning tickler may well be an archetype!

Be afraid. Be very afraid. Bear in mind that in both my memory of that childhood dream, and my mate's memory as well, The 'Tickler' is attempting to tickle us until we choke!! :nooo:

Ever see the Buffy ep. with the grinning child-killing demon in the hospital? There may be something here that needs further inquiry: anyone else out there with 'Grinning Tickler Attack' stories? :eek!!!!:

I will say no more as I am now thoroughly creeped out... :nonplus:
 
Inverurie Jones said:
Well, it seems possible to shoot them dead with a toy gun, so just arm your kids accordingly.

But IJ, there are parents today who don't allow their kids to play with toy guns: what are they to do? Just accept that their kids must be tickled to death? No, we need to set up some sort of Anti-Grinning-Tickler-Organization, to detect, hunt down and destroy these vile toddler tormentors. And their consorts, the Raggedy Ann dolls, as well if need be!! :nonplus:
 
Re: Re: Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

Susan Bulmer said:
Synchronicity or what?

I was talking to a friend this morning who thinks she lives in a haunted house. One of the reasons she gives is that her 15 month old toddler, who can't say much yet, was laughing in the middle of the night. Thinking that one of her other kids had gone into the baby's room, she got out of bed and popped her head round the baby's bedroom door. There was the toddler in fits of laughter and ... writhing and contorting as if being tickled! :eek:

This happened fairly recently. She has also found the baby on the floor after she's tucked him up in his cot - and this happened before he started toddling around. :eek:

So your grinning tickler may well be an archetype!

It could have been a typical baby dream, where the baby was dreaming of being tickled. It probably woke up laughing.
Babies don't have much to dream about, so they often kick their legs in their sleep, and dream about pleasurable experiences - such as being tickled!
 
Re: Re: Re: Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

Mythopoeika said:
It could have been a typical baby dream, where the baby was dreaming of being tickled. It probably woke up laughing.
Babies don't have much to dream about, so they often kick their legs in their sleep, and dream about pleasurable experiences - such as being tickled!

How do you know what a typical baby dream is like?

And to anticipate one possible reply, how do they know what a typical baby dream is like?

It's not like 8-month old Jaime/Janet/John keeps a dream diary. Or posts on the dream threads on this board either, for that matter... :nonplus:
 
Re: Re: Re: Creepy dolls and scarred childhoods...

Mythopoeika said:
It could have been a typical baby dream, where the baby was dreaming of being tickled. It probably woke up laughing.
Babies don't have much to dream about, so they often kick their legs in their sleep, and dream about pleasurable experiences - such as being tickled!
I agree that the baby could have dreamed about being tickled. But do people really tickle babies that vigorously? Those annoying adults who tickle kids till they ache usually plague older ones who can at least walk and talk. I really doubt that such a young child would have experience of being tickled so vigorously that the memory of it haunts their dreams.

Back to Raggedy Ann and more synchronicity!
I was looking for something to read this weekend and happened upon a collection of Ray Bradbury short stories I bought years ago in a second-hand book shop and never got round to reading. The first story, called "The Small Assassin" was about a 4-month-old baby who killed its mother by crawling around during the night dragging a patchwork doll to the top of the stairs for the mother to fall over and headlong down the stairs. :eek:

Alternative reality?
I wonder whether the original poster had a glimpse of a parallel reality, in which the parallel parents had bought a Raggedy Ann doll.
 
Here, check this out. I think most of us, when we were younger, belived our teddies were alive, or our favourite stick or stone was -alive- somehow.

http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/religion/blfaq_theism_animism.htm

I used to get the Tickling Man thing, and wonder if it was this little plastic doll I had (called Baby Boy) coming to life and tickling me! Strangely, it stopped once I progressed from him onto a teddy.. :eek!!!!:

That's got me thinking.. I really miss Baby Boy and Ted. :(
Does anyone think a 26 year old buying a replacement teddy in a shop would look a bit strange? :)
 
Snowman X said:
I used to get the Tickling Man thing, and wonder if it was this little plastic doll I had (called Baby Boy) coming to life and tickling me!

Aha!! The anecdotal evidence begins to mount.

Originally posted by Snowman X
Does anyone think a 26 year old buying a replacement teddy in a shop would look a bit strange?


Hell no. I'm 40 and I've still got a teddybear given to me some years ago by an ex -it's hanging limply from a picturehook on the bedroom wall. (I should probably put/give it away and hang a picture or something, but I really can't be arsed... Too much of a hoarder. :nonplus:)
 
Not at all strange. I had a teddy bought for me by one of my class a couple years back. It was really sweet, came in a balloon with ribbon. :D
 
I've still got both of my original teddies and a few hangers-on that joined them over the years.
 
Well on the chair beside my bed I have the raccoon radio I had when I was 13, a cuddly rabbit I had from my sis in law, a Winnie the Pooh I had from my dad, a teddy from one of my class, a small pink teddy (lavender scented) I had from my nephew and a cuddly elephant I had from an online friend a couple years back.
They look so cute all sat in the wooden chair. lol :D

Now this is spooky, but the batteries in the raccoon radio have never been replaced and I've had it for 17 years! :eek:
 
scarey dolls

When I was "sharing" a house with a gal pal in Scotland years ago, she had a big [4 foot tall] blonde plastic headed doll that gave me the fecking shits, I used to hang my jacket on it to stop it looking at me ....
 
Spooky angel said:
Now this is spooky, but the batteries in the raccoon radio have never been replaced and I've had it for 17 years! :eek:

Heres a "Twilight Zone" moment for you, Spooky...
some day you'll open it up and find out --
there have NEVER BEEN batteries in it!!!

Or did I see that in one of the Chucky movies? ;)

TVgeek
 
I have bunnies, and my daughter has some too....and we have a stuffed cheetah named BooKitty to keep 'em in line because (you're gonna love this) my daughter used to say that they would come into her bed and tickle her then scratch her...until we got BooKitty. I'd write this off to toddler imagination, but the whole subject came up because of scratches on her arms and belly.

Interestingly, since we got BooKitty a couple years ago, the bunnies seem to end up all over the apartment except for my kidlet's bedroom - where BooKitty resides.
 
A friend of mine has a freaky looking miniature cigar-store indian (about 2 ft tall) in the corner of his hallway, which always seemed to have moved out of the corner (not far, less than a foot) when we visited - even if we had been there already at some point in the day, left with friend in tow, then come back (so he couldn't just have moved it while we were away).

We used to all go up there on Friday nights for a few laughs. One of my mates was terrified of it, and would make it face the corner when he went to the toilet (the bathroom door is adjacent to the corner it stood in, so your eyes fell on it as soon as you opened the door to leave the bathroom - his hallways are papered with plain white paper and a blue carpet, so it was the only thing in view). A few times it'd turned around by the time he was finished (none of us had touched it).

One of our other mates swears that twice he'd stayed there ad had awoken during the night, seeing a strange old woman with red glowing eyes (He was able to move, and tried to wake his girlfriend, so it wasn't OH). The first time she was stuck to the wall in the corner of the living room anbove the dining table (like spider man - back to the wall, in a crouching position, with parms back, palms and soles of feet flat on the wall. The second time they were asleep on the floor in front of the couch, and he awoke with a start to see the old woman standing between the wall and the couch (the couch was still hard against the wall), reaching fo him. By the time his GF woke up, it had disappeared.
 
Fallen Angel said:
I have bunnies, and my daughter has some too....and we have a stuffed cheetah named BooKitty to keep 'em in line because (you're gonna love this) my daughter used to say that they would come into her bed and tickle her then scratch her...until we got BooKitty. I'd write this off to toddler imagination, but the whole subject came up because of scratches on her arms and belly.

And so the evidence mounts.

Beginning to formulate a tentative theory that these Toddler Ticklers can be thwarted by toys that are also 'strong totems', e.g. bears, large cats (common animal totems in ages past) and toy guns (equivalent modern, mechanistic totem for a more mechanistic age). :)
 
TVgeek said:
Heres a "Twilight Zone" moment for you, Spooky...
some day you'll open it up and find out --
there have NEVER BEEN batteries in it!!!

Or did I see that in one of the Chucky movies? ;)

TVgeek

Funnily enough I've never checked to see. I don't think I will now. :eek:
It could be worse though, it could have been a talking toy.

Fallen, that is really spooky! Make sure you never get rid of Bookitty!
 
Spooky, I'm not convinced that there may not simply be some bits of "trying to fool Mommy" or even sleepwalking. But oddly enough last night I ran for the phone and tripped over a bunny. And she's been at her Dad's the last two days. Did I just not see it before? Maybe saw it but it didn't register and I automatically stepped over it? Hmmmm.

BooKitty slept in my room last night.
 
Maybe they are like the topiary in The Shining and move when you aren't looking!

When I was small, I used to think how great it would be if my dolls would come alive, but then I'd think better of it when I realised how scared I'd be initially. lol
 
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