There is a common thread between the incidents that inspired the movies The Conjuring, Annabelle, The Amityville Horror and The Haunting In Connecticut besides being popular horror movies. They all are real-life cases solved by the ghostbuster-couple Ed and Lorraine Warren.
Ed and Lorraine were introduced to the world and to common parlance in The Conjuring, quickly followed by Annabelle where they were portrayed as the leads. Both these movies show them braving every odd to rescue people from one particularly malevolent ghost.
But as fabricated and glued together by one’s imagination as it might seem, the story of the ragged, malicious doll Annabelle is definitely not the figment of the scriptwriter’s imagination.
Why do we think so? Because the Raggedy Ann doll at the Warrens’ basement is (living and breathing) proof of that.
Caged in a glass coffin, the Ann doll, named Annabelle, might challenge your inner braveheart to touch it but you might not live long to tell the tale. Although the Ann doll that inspired the movie Annabelle might seem one of its kind, the Warrens’ museum will quickly refute that notion.
As tangible proofs of their exciting and deadly jobs, the ghostbusting duo had preserved most of the artifacts from their many cases. The Warrens claimed to have solved around 10,000 cases.
Edward “Ed” Warren Miney was a self-taught demonologist and Lorraine Rita Warren is a clairvoyant and light trance medium. The duo married at the young age of 17 and worked together till Ed passed away in 2006.
They have been involved in a number of cases throughout the latter 20th century. Some of their popular cases have been made into Hollywood movies and television series.
At one point, they began stacking up artifacts from their cases, defiled by evil forces, in the basement of their Connecticut home and cryptically called it ‘Museum Of The Occult’.
Not only is it claimed that the museum is one of its kind, it also claims to house “the largest array of haunted artifacts and items that have been used in occult practices throughout the world.”
The establishment is filled with voodoo dolls, satanic altars, mummies, magic mirrors, shadow books, a vampire’s coffin, a child tombstone that was allegedly a satanic altar and a great number of dolls that will make you see them in a whole new light.
But the centre of the museum is Annabelle, locked in a glass box with an alarming warning that says ‘Positively Do Not Open’.
It would do one good to pay heed to that sticker as the doll is “believed to be responsible for the death of an individual who came in to contact with it” and is apparently responsible for the death of the last person who touched it. As the story goes, he challenged the doll to do its worst and ended up dead in a motorcycle accident a few hours later.
Ed and Lorraine also started the New England Society for Psychic Research in 1952. The museum is now run by Lorraine and the Warrens’ son-in-law.
The museum can be visited during ‘Warrenology’ events which occur every week. Only, it is highly, highly advised that one does not touch the artifacts.
But pray, tell me, if you had a chance, would you not go and poke Annabelle in her eye?