Mondo Lizzie Borden

Link.

Boston.com ran an online photo essay detailing a whole slew of what they called “Halloween Secret Spaces.” There are several dozen images offering details of many out of way and obscure scary places one can visit this Halloween season. Very kewl!

I bet you thought that they would include the Lizzie Borden B&B on that list? Well, you would be incorrect. Instead, their Lizzie Borden offering is the Pine Ridge Cemetery in Dedham, Massachusetts. That is where Lizzie buried her pets, Donald Stuart, Royal Nelson and Laddie Miller.

This is the same cemetery where Admiral Richard Byrd’s dog Igloo is also resting.

Buried in Lizzie Borden’s pet cemetery
See which family members Lizzie Borden buried! No, not her parents. Fall River’s famous acquitted child buried her three dogs at Pine Ridge Pet Cemetery in Dedham, with a tombstone that is an exact replica of her parents’ tombstone in Fall River. The pets’ tombstone inscription reads: “Sleeping Awhile.”

A truly important American ballet is Agnes deMille’s Fall River Legend, where she tells the story of Lizzie Borden through dance. The American Ballet Theatre is presenting a production of this great work from October 23 to November 4, in NYC.

Tickets are now on sale.

Kevin C. Murphy’s blog, The Ghost in the Machine, was the source of this information.

The Victorian Trading Company has several wonderful Halloween costumes for sale. One of them is Lizzie Borden. Only $149.95, and it includes the axe!

Lizzie Borden Costume

This notoriously wicked woman is accessorized with the weapon that wiped out her unfortunate family in forty whacks. Includes: Authentic Victorian day dress in a mustard print featuring exaggerated poufed sleeves on the shirtwaist with antiqued metal buttons and pleated skirt back, authentic hat design with elastic chin strap and long netted veil, and of course, her trusty axe.

Extra large is sold out for Halloween.

These are extra creepy kewl.

Eerie Eleanor the Ghostly Victorian Costume

Her 19th c. spirit lingers with an ashen pallor. A oncelovely lace dress and bonnet appear to have accumulated a century of dust. Includes: Widebrim hat, ringlet curls and gown. $129.95

Black Widow Costume

She feigns despair when the truth remains that disposable husbands are a sport and reliable source of income. Created from an historic pattern and millinery design dating to the Civil War. Includes: Mourning Bonnet, black rose and photo of the most recently deceased husband. One size.
#i12257

$ 159.95

You can also choose from Madam of the Brothel, Tootsie Barroom Floozie, Calamity Jane, Ezmerelda the Gypsy Fortuneteller, the Wicked Witch of the West, Juliet, Jessie James, or Marie Antointette.

Would you like to take the COMPLETE Jack the Ripper tour in London? Well, someone taped it for you and here it is in 12 parts. It is fascinating!

Ripping Yarns Ltd, the original and authentic Jack the Ripper started giving guided tours around Whitechapel in 1992, for many years we have gained knowledge and passed that on to thousands of happy visitors to London . To be stood on the spot where Jack the Ripper committed his brutal murders adds authenticity to your tour, so make sure you choose right when being guided around Whitechapel, remember if they take money off you before the tour starts it is not us, we are so confident you will enjoy our presentation of the most famous murders in history that we will let you listen to the story and only if you have enjoyed it, then invite you to pay at the end, we will guide you through the streets at a pace acceptable to the entire tour and be safe in the knowledge, we have never lost anyone.

Your guide will ensure that you all hear the story in his clear and professional way that he delivers the story to you. The weather is not a problem for us, we go around Whitechapel what ever the weather.

The tour starts at 6.45 PM daily at the exit to Tower Hill underground Station on the District and Circle line and that’s every night of the year with the following exceptions, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day, 27th, 28th, 29th, 30th and 31st December and 1st January. Your guide will be holding a sign with our Ripping Yarns logo clearly displayed.

We take lots of different group’s on the Jack the Ripper tours, these range from school groups from the UK, Europe and the United States of America, to Police, amateur dramatics’ and many other club’s and organisations, if you would like to book a group then contact us at info@jack-the-ripper-tours.com and if you want more information on the tours.

For the ladies it’s a great night out, strangely we have more ladies than men on the tours, but what is the attraction? To find out come along and hear this spine chilling series of murder’s.

We also take bookings for Halloween Party’s or people going on to party’s, to get you into the mood to add to the atmosphere for a scary night out in town.

Greetings, Mystery Lover.

We are pleased to announce that our new Mystery Catalogue 84 is available for download. You may view or download the catalogue here:

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Catalogue 84 features over 1100 items including a large number of pre and post-war mysteries, many in dust jacket and a selection of mystery anthologies and mystery reference titles. Also included is a small selection of pulp magazines.

(If you do not wish to be notified of future Dunn & Powell Books Mystery Catalogues, please reply to this message and add “Remove” to the subject line.)

Thank you and good hunting,
Steve Powell & Bill Dunn

Dunn & Powell Books
The Hideaway
13 Hideaway Lane
Bar Harbor, ME 04609
Phone (207) 288 4665
Fax (206) 202 305
dpbooks@adelphia.net

It didn’t sell on eBay the first time because people saw it for what it was. Now it is for sale again. And the seller really wants to get rid of it, they say, but hasn’t lowered the price of $350. Alas.

You too can have bad luck if you buy this purse. And not from any curse on the purse, but by the reduction of your bank account for purchasing it!

Freaky things happen with this purse….Must Sell!!! Please!!!!!!!!!!!!

As told to me by my mother, this purse was given to my great grandmother by Lizzie Borden.

My great grandmother immigrated from Italy via New York. Her journey to Boston/Maine led her to Fall River/New Bedford area, where she worked for Lizzie Borden doing laundry and sewing for a few weeks. Upon her departure Lizzie Borden gave my great grandmother this purse which has been handed down from generations.

Inside this purse were 2 coins : a silver dollar dated 1890 and a one cent penny dated 1853.

The purse is in immaculate condition as well as the coins. Black sequence with (I believe )is a silver base.

The problem with this beautiful purse is that when it is taken out of storage, strange things happen to the people and those around them that have handled it. We have had strange sensations of being watched, touched, strange sounds, shadowy figures as well as weird feelings, especially when alone. Circumstances seem to occur- that things even break.

We just no longer want this in our house. The purse itself is of real antique value, but the paranormal activities makes this purse more interesting in value.

Marjorie Conn’s one woman show Miss Lizzie Invites You to Tea is being presented in Fair Lawn, NJ this October, starring Karen Asconi. The press release is below. This sounds wonderful! Wish I could go. Buy Tickets here.

(FAIR LAWN, NJ) — Boz and the Bard Productions, Inc. presents “Miss Lizzie” at the Fair Lawn Community Center (10-10 20th Street, Fair Lawn, NJ). Performances run Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 PM and Sundays at 2:00 PM, October 19-21 and October 26-28, 2007. There will be a special Q&A after each Saturday performance. Tickets are $20.00 in advance, $25 at the door. For tickets call 866-811-4111 or visit www.bozandthebard.com for more information.

Boz and the Bard Productions, Inc., a theater production company formed in 2000, is proud to announce their new affiliation, through a borough sponsorship, with the town of Fair Lawn. “We are thrilled to be working in this beautiful, professional new space,” say co-founders Frank Avellino and Steve Hess, of Hackensack. Boz and the Bard has played the Sande Shurin Theater in NYC, the Sanford Meisner Theater in NYC, as well as the Hackensack Cultural Arts Center, where the company revived their NYC debut production of Marjorie Conn’s “Miss Lizzie A. Borden Invites You To Tea.” Robin Schamach, Corporate and Cultural Planner of the theater at Fair Lawn Community Center expressed an interest in this play when Frank and Steve first introduced themselves. Ms. Schamach felt a play about Lizzie Borden would fit perfectly into the October pre-Halloween slot.

Most of us know the gruesome events that took place in 1892 in the Borden home in Fall River, Massachusetts. And, ever since the infamous butcherings of Miss Lizzie’s parents in the heat of that August 4th morning, that old poem about Lizzie Borden taking an axe has been recited daily by children all across the world. Most of us know that Lizzie was arrested, tried, and eventually acquitted of murder. But not many of us know or understand the rest of Lizzie’s story. In “Miss Lizzie A. Borden Invites You To Tea,” we find Lizzie an aging, lonely spinster in 1913. Twenty one years after the murders, the notoriety of her trial has waned and her heyday has passed. Her status as ’social celebrity’ has faded, and has left her forgotten by all but a handful of hungry local journalists, and a bitter, taunting few who won’t allow her peace. In this one-woman tour-de-force starring Karen Asconi of Jersey City, we witness Lizzie’s powerful lust for freedom and learn how such a yearning can drive one to acts of unimaginable desperation.
Conn Artist

In 1999, playwright Marjorie Conn was acknowledged with an award by the National Gay & Lesbian Task Force for her contributions to Gay and Lesbian theatre in Provincetown, MA. She is also the founder of Conn Artist Performance Event (C.A.P.E.) Inc. & the Provincetown Fringe Festival, a non-profit theatre company that believes in risk-taking theatre and giving everyone a chance. The Fringe is now located in Asbury Park. “Lorena Hickok & Eleanor Roosevelt: A Love Story by Pat Bond” was the longest running show in Provincetown from 1994 to 2006 & Conn has performed this play all over the country. The companion piece written by Conn, “The Honeymoon Years of Eleanor Roosevelt & Lorena Hickok” premiered in 2002. This and two of Conn’s other plays about Lizzie Borden and a cross-dressing whaling woman are published in Lost Lesbian Lives. She can be reached at connartists@yahoo.com

Avellino and Hess named their production company in honor of their two favorite writers, Charles Dickens (whose early pen name was Boz) and William Shakespeare (The Bard of Avon). The traditions established by these masters of literature and theatre are the traditions that Frank and Steve strive to carry on in their own work. As B&B continues to become a presence in Northern New Jersey, you can expect more than the usual bill of faire generally seen in the area. This company can flavor a season with a wickedly clever new script, revisit a superbly written comic classic, or shake its audiences to their core by poignantly exposing human foibles and honoring human courage. You can be certain that you will leave the theater talking, debating, inquiring or simply rediscovering the beauty of life. And, since B&B offers Sign Language Interpreted performances, B&B will make sure that whatever the genre, whatever the play, the Deaf and hard-of-hearing audience will experience the same depth of emotion as the hearing audience.

Boz and the Bard Productions, Inc. is proud to bring this revival of their critically acclaimed production of “Miss Lizzie A. Borden Invites You To Tea” to the Fair Lawn Community Center for a special, co-sponsored, limited engagement. Ms. Asconi’s “…fascinating, high-strung performance…under Frank Avellino’s taut direction…is a worthwhile experience,” claimed Peter Filichia, of The Star Ledger, of the 2004 production.