Category Archives: Legends

Narratives about belief.

Haunted Pike Place Market

Background: My informant, ET, attended the University of Washington from 2009-2013. I asked her about campus/Seattle folklore, and this was her response:

ET: “Pike Place is supposedly haunted. My freshman RA thought it would be fun for the floor to go on a haunted Pike Place Market tour. But apparently people have like, died, at Pike Place Market. They accidentally slipped on the ground with the fish and everything, because you know how they throw the fish around, so there’s apparently lots of haunted fish mongers, and you would see them walking around after the markets closed.”

Me: “Do you feel like Pike Place is haunted?”

ET: “Me? I only go during the day so I hope not, but I also wouldn’t be surprised since it’s so old. It’s also close to the Seattle Underground tour, and people say that place is haunted too, so yeah, maybe it’s just a downtown Seattle thing.”

Analysis: I love a good ghost story. Having been to Pike Place myself, I can confirm that all the traditions–the fish toss across the market every half an hour or so–could naturally progress into ghost stories too. With all of the history and bustle in the market, it seems natural that a place with that reputation would naturally have a few ghost stories as well–it seems entirely plausible that a fish monger in the process of throwing a raw fish across the market died while slipping on the floor. People primarily go to Pike Place for the market itself, but I think the existence of ghost stories like this one once again offer room for multiplicity and variation–I’m sure each fish stall at Pike Place likely has their own variation on this story depending on their brand–but also invites tourists and other visitors to be in the in-group in a location that would otherwise seem like a one-dimensional farmer’s market.

Nashville Hot Chicken Origin Story

Background: My informant, HT, is currently a student at Vanderbilt University. Interview conducted over FaceTime.

Me: “Tell me about the story behind Nashville hot chicken.”

HT: “Okay. So the story of Nashville hot chicken is that there was like a guy, a husband, who was asking his wife to make him fried chicken. But she found out that he was cheating on her, so she was super pissed. She was like, I’m gonna make his fried chicken but spike it with spicy shit, hot peppers. He eats it and is like yo that’s like straight fire. Nashville has a lot of local hot chicken chains like Hattie B’s. But the real hot chicken is not in the chains.”

Me: “Who did you hear this story from?”

HT: “I heard it from my supervisor at the library who’s a Nashville native.”

Me: Do you think the story is real?

HT: Yeah, I mean it makes sense. Plus I trust my supervisor, especially because they’re a Nashville native. That’s like finding a unicorn here.

Analysis: I think the Nashville Hot Chicken story is the perfect example of a legend with room for multiplicity and variation. It’s an entirely logical and plausible story, but I can also see how it could easily be re-told with infinitely small twists and tweaks that would cater to whichever audience it was being told to. As far as food goes, the scenario is extremely common, similar to the creation of fries (I believe potatoes were unintentionally deep fried to the unexpected delight of the customer), which echoes many of the same themes as this story. The way it was also passed through word of mouth to my informant very much makes it a performance, and not institutionalized, particularly through the prevalence of hot chicken outside of chain restaurants as well.

Screenwriting Champion Legend

Basically, the lore around screenwriting admissions is that after you get accepted into USC as a whole, they divide up the screenplay applications and give them to the more tenured professors. And out of every pile that these professors have to read, they pick one, maybe two applicants to fight for. And the professors duke it out to decide who gets in and the professor who picked you is called “Your Champion”. And part of the lore is that the screenwriters find out who is but time is ticking and I still haven’t found mine. 

Context:

The informant is a college student with a major in screenwriting. When discussing the experiences of being a screenwriting major, the informant is reminded of this specific piece of lore within the screenwriting cohort.

Personal Thoughts:

This particular legend demonstrates how folklore can exist within educational communities, and how folklore develops as time goes on. As the informant explained, this is a particular event that would happen during admissions, every year. And while there is no direct explanation of the Champion when students are admitted, students gradually become aware of this legend as they join the school, essentially indoctrinating them into this folk community. This not only allows for the folklore to live on every year as the story is passed on, but it also unifies this specific group as a folk community, since they are sharing this story together and continuing to pass it on as more people become a part of the folk community. 

Electrician Ghost Story

So my uncle was at this bar, in like Philly, and he’s sitting there. My Dad and his brothers are so talkative, and they will just talk to strangers. And so my uncle introduces himself to the person next to him and they start talking and the guy says that he is an electrician. My uncle asks if he has any crazy stories from his job and the guy says “actually I do. I’ll never forget this day”. So the electrician begins to tell the story: “This old lady asks me to do work on this closet. And this guy comes into the room and I freak out because I thought just the old lady lived there. And I explain I’m there to do the electricity and the guy just leaves. And the old lady comes and I explain, oh your husband comes in, and the old lady says that she does not have a husband. I find a photo of the man and I explain that this is the man I saw, and the old lady says that’s her husband but he died ”. So the electrician freaked out and left. And my uncle goes “That’s so crazy, I’m also from rural pennsylvania, what area” and the electrician goes “Westchester” and my uncle goes “wait so am I, what street” because Westchester is a small area and he says the street and the house he was in and my uncle goes “Oh my god, I used to live there and my mom still lives there”. So supposedly, this electrician saw the ghost of my grandpa. 

Context:

The informant is a college student explaining different folklore from their family, diving into how their family has lore and traditions that are particular to their folk community. 

Personal Thoughts:

This particular ghost story shows how different folk groups can overlap, sharing similar lore. As the electrician shares this legend, the uncle is able to connect with him on being related to the ghost, allowing for lore to grow between them. This also demonstrates how folklore can live on in different folk groups, as both the uncle and the electrician are a part of other folk groups, and as this legend gets shared by both of them to their respective communities, this will allow the ghost story to continue to spread. And since they may have their own interpretations of it, more variations of the legend will come up, allowing for this legend to live on even more. 

Bloody Mary

Informant Information — GD

  • Nationality: American
  • Age: 57
  • Occupation: Teacher
  • Residence: San Pedro, California
  • Date of Performance/Collection: March 20, 2022
  • Primary Language: English

This informant learned about Bloody Mary in elementary school in the late 1960s. Most of her friends from school also attended the same church and Bible study group, so they felt like they were a part of a very tightly-knit religious community. She shared this information with me in an in-person interview. 

Interviewer: 

Can you tell me the story of how you first experienced Bloody Mary?  

Informant: 

When I was in fourth or fifth grade, my group of girlfriends and I learned about the Bloody Mary game from some older girls. Our school bathrooms were really dark– they didn’t have any lights except for windows near the ceiling so they were really creepy. 

In the game, you had to lock yourself in the bathroom alone and stand in front of the mirror. You were supposed to close your eyes, say “Bloody Mary” three times, and then open your eyes. When you opened your eyes, you were supposed to be able to see a ghostly woman in a ballgown with black eyes and crying tears of blood. 

If you were a true Christian and believed in God, she wasn’t supposed to be able to touch you because you were too holy. If you only believed a little bit, she supposedly scratched you and left three bloody lines on your face. And if you didn’t believe in God at all or if you were evil, she was supposed to bring you into the mirror with her. 

Interviewer: 

Did you ever play the game? 

Informant: 

My friend went first, and she said that she saw Bloody Mary. I went after her but didn’t see anything in the mirror. I wasn’t sure what I did wrong so I lied about it and never admitted that I hadn’t actually seen her. 

Analysis:

This adaptation of Bloody Mary is very interesting to me as it reveals the large role of religious belief in the informant’s folk group. In this story, being exposed as a non-believer results in removal from the community as they are dragged into the mirror and disappear with Bloody Mary. Those of wavering faith are physically marked, seemingly teaching the person a lesson and informing others that the individual needs to be brought back into the community.