BY NATE BALD I NG Chicagoland has a lot of history. Most of it kinda bad. The Mob? Check. Violent cops? Double check. Aetherial hitchhikers from another time? Turns out, also check. The initial meeting with Resurrection Mary comes from Jerry Palus, a cab driver who got very thirsty and ended up dancing with a ghost in 1939. From his description she had “cold hands but a warm heart.” The Venn diagram for both the undead and unintentional parents. At bar close Jerry proffered a lift back to her house — presumably for what in the 30s they’d call a roll in the hay and what in the 1830s was an actual roll in the hay — and Mary asked for a ride up Archer Avenue. This surprised Jerry as there was pretty much nothing up Archer Avenue but a handful of people who could only afford to live next to a cemetery. Jerry and Mary (we won’t make fun of it) kissed and he agreed to drive her past the graveyard. He rode up to the Resurrection Cemetery and Mary got out, walked in and fucking disappeared. Like, straight up evaded reality. Jerry, however, was not deterred. He’d met a cool woman and wasn’t going to be a slave to perception. He got Mary’s address and stopped by, finding her mother, likely still bereaved, who informed him that Mary had been dead for several years. It took a few decades for another encounter but they were prolific. In 1979 a cab driver named Ralph went unpaid when a young woman checked out to a dilapidated shack on Archer Avenue. He apparently didn’t follow up on the fare but was scared out of his mind when the woman evaporated into the night. So much so that he contributed to an article in Suburban Trip magazine, just in case anyone was thinking of taking a terrible trip to the suburbs of Chicago and starting their own version of Roseanne. Hopefully with less litigious entrails. 1980 saw (and make no mistake — 1980 is WATCHING) Clare Rudniki and husband Mark, lesser of the two, ignoring a hitchhiker on Archer Avenue wearing a gauzy dress that might have also been spectral. Clare was very sure she was a ghost. Mark, as usual, had no opinion. Fucking Mark. 1989 Janet Kalel encounters a woman in a long white dress leaping in front of her car outside Resurrection Cemetery. Could be an Ophelia moment but also could be a ghost jumping in front of a car. You decide. What Janet decided was that, having no impact, it must have been Resurrection Mary and not a stranger she ran over. Again, you decide. (She almost definitely killed someone). It’s worth noting that Resurrection Mary’s name isn’t even Mary. While Mary Bregovy had been the given name drawn from the cemetery, it’s more likely that the ghost is Anna “Majira” Norkus, killed in a car accident in 1927 on her way from the Oh Henry Ballroom. Again, we won’t make any jokes. Not that there are any jokes to be made about car accidents. Candy bars, though. It’s possible to get a sit-down with Resurrection Mary. Chet’s Melody Lounge (pay us for the plug?) does a Sunday Bloody Mary which technically summons someone totally different but still terribly frightening. Have fun with the mirror! HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PARANORMAL? SEND THEM TO: WEREWOLFRADARPOD@GMAIL.COM OR TWITTER: @WEREWOLFRADAR. IT’S A BIG, WEIRD WORLD. DON’T BE SCARED. BE PREPARED. No. 121 DIMITRIS KOLYRIS, LEVITATING GHOST
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