Voodoo Queen

by Calvin Windless Jr.

If you haven’t heard of her, she is known as the “Voodoo Queen of New Orleans”, according to many eyewitness accounts. Her title as Marie Laveau was earned due to the hard work she did while she was alive but, the thing about it is that she still holds on to that name to this day because of how powerful she was as a mortal. 2 Still to this day the crypt where she's buried, which is St. Louis Cemetery #1 is said to be the most haunted cemetery in America. If you ask some of the visitors, they claim to have seen the ghost of the Voodoo Queen herself. According to road trippers they have said to see the voodoo queen inside the cemetery, walking around tombs, in her trademark turban, while whispering a Santeria Voodoo curse to disrespectful gawkers. If you visit her grave, you'll notice that people still leave offerings, candles, flowers, Voodoo dolls, all in the hopes that Laveau will bestow her supernatural blessings. When people make a wish at her tomb, they return if their wish comes true and leave three X marks as a sign of their gratitude.

Some background information about this amazing and mysterious woman is that she was introduced to multiple religions and was well acquainted with all of the leaders in the “French Quarter” and so they taught this older teenager at the time what they knew. She had multiple tutors, some taught her religion like Catholicism, which was Pere Antoine who was the high priest of her time. On the other hand, the voodoo side of her teaching came from a man by the name of Bayou John, he taught her things like how to prepare spells and charm bags which were called a “Gris-Gris” which was used for prosperity and protection if used right. She was a person who didn’t just do things out the goodness of her heart, which is something most people do. For instance, she used her influence on her client to get a brand new house equipped with anything she would ever need and want. She used the man to get her a house, in exchange for an acquittal for their son in court. Her legacy followed her mostly by word of mouth. It was told by her having abilities to sway a justice system an determine a verdict amongst many other things that she was infamous about.

Works cited 
“St. Louis Cemetery.” Road trippers, https://maps.roadtrippers.com/trips/19417349. Accessed 29 October 2018.

Hehe, Joshua. The Voodoo Queen of New Orleans. Medium.com. 3 February

Links for Further Research
www.womemhistoryblog.com.
http://www.womenhistoryblog.com/2012/07/marie-laveau.html.
This article entails information on her story and how she became known as the “Voodoo Queen.”

www.allthatsinteresting.com.
https://allthatsinteresting.com/marie-laveau.
This is to explain how she worked up to be the leader and advice giver from when she was young.

www.atlasobscura.com.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/marie-laveaus-tomb.
Tells about the story of her tomb and its history.

The Fox Sisters

Te’a Olivas

The Fox Sisters were known to be famous for being the creators of spiritualism. The spirits communicate with people known as psychics and mediums. That is what you can call the Fox sisters. The names of the three sisters were Margaret, Kate and Leah Fox. In 1848, the sisters lived in Hydesville, New York. The Fox sisters started to believe in spirits because they heard unusual noises throughout the house they lived in. They were convinced the house was haunted. The noises they would hear included furniture being move and knocking. The fox sisters decided to come up with a prank to scare the mother into believing in the bad spirits and ghost in the house. After all, the mother didn’t need a prank to be convinced that there was a ghost in house. She started to ask questions to the ghost by asking it to knock and answers the questions getting ask by moments in the house. Soon after, The Fox family found out there was a murder in their house two years earlier. The spirit was known as an older man in his early thirties who was married with five children of his own. That is when the sisters started to communicate with spirits. The Fox sisters claimed that they could receive messages for people from different spirits amongst the dead. The sisters started to perform rapping’s that were similar to the noises happening in the house. For example, the fox sisters used their toes for the crackling noises. The noises in the house triggered the Fox sisters to produce creative ideas about spiritual rapping’s. The sisters perform their very first rapping at Corinthian Hall in Rochester. The sisters wanted people to believe in spirits after the rapping’s to prove they could communicate with spirits, and can deliver messages from the spirits. Many people in the 1800's questioned the Fox sisters on if the rapping’s were real. Did the Fox sisters communicate with spirits? It was even more difficult to believe because one of the sisters claimed that communicating with the spirits were fake as well as the rapping’s that were performed in the 1800's. Until this day the world has no evidence that the rapping’s were real or fake. We will never know if the Fox sisters really communicated with spirits. The fox sisters will always be famous for their mysterious and suspenseful performances.

Work Cited:
Bann, Jennifer. "Ghostly Hands and Ghostly Agency: The Changing Figure of the Nineteenth-Century Specter." Victorian Studies 51.4 (2009): 663-85. 
http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/stable/pdf/10.2979/vic.2009.51.4.663.pdf

"Speaking With Spirits." Skeptic 19.2 (2014): 65. Academic Search Premier. 8 Oct. 2016. http://ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=96430250&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Stuart, Nancy Rubin. "The Raps Heard Around The World." American History 40.3 (2005): 42-80. Academic Search Premier. 8 Oct. 2016, http://eds.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=11&sid=657367c5-b699-4264-bdde-ec45603b2b42%40sessionmgr102&hid=113

Walliss, John. "Continuing Bonds: Relationships Between The Living And The Dead Within Contemporary Spiritualism." Mortality 6.2 (2001): 127-145. Academic Search Premier. 15 Oct. 2016. http://ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=6006954&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Williams, Kathy. Western Folklore 69.1 (2010): 131-32. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/stable/pdf/25735293.pdf.


Links for Further Research:

Valente, K. G. ""Who Will Explain the Explanation?": The Ambivalent Reception of Higher Dimensional Space in the British Spiritualist Press, 1875-1900." Victorian Periodicals Review 41.2 (2008): 124-49. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/stable/40587440. 
This source from the web, the John Hopkins University, gives information on how spiritualism begun. Also, it provides who was involve in creating spiritualism.

Monroe, John. "Making the Séance "Serious": "Tables Tournantes" and Second Empire Bourgeois Culture, 1853-1861." History of Religions 38.3 (1999): 219-46. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/stable/40587440. This web source, from University of Chicago, provides information about the Fox sisters experiences in the house that influence them to communicate with spirits. It gives information about the spiritual rapping performed by the Fox sisters.


Kattelman, Beth A. "Magic, Monsters, and Movies: America's Midnight Ghost Shows." Theatre Journal 62.1 (2010): 23-39. http://www.jstor.org.ezproxy.usca.edu:2048/stable/40587440. This web source, from the John Hopkins University, provides information about how spiritualism grew after the world heard about the Fox sister’s experiences. People started to be involved in the sisters spiritual rapping performances.