The Scratching of the SLAM Effigy

Let me tell you all what, returning to full-time hours has super cut into my literary productivity! Not even gonna lie, it was so nice not working (in the traditional sense) for those 165 days I was furloughed. It truly afforded me the luxury of churning out a blog a week for a (personal) record-breaking 25 weeks! Not to mention all the work I was able to accomplish regarding my book! All that free time truly spoiled me! Even the urban legend I’m going to share with you all here in this post was researched before my Labor Day Weekend festivities! Sadly, I just never had the time to write it up, but I guess having this terrifying tale get pushed back closer to Halloween really only amplifies the chills this local urban legend induces.

BEFORE I dive into the true story of this blog, I’m excited to be able to share with you all that I HAVE LEARNED WHO MY NEIGHBOR IS!

Not sure what in the world I’m talking about? Please read Welcome to the Neighborhood to catch yourself up real quick! For everyone else, my neighbor is an old friend and coworker from my very first job ever back in 2003/04 at Kerasotes Theaters Showplace 12 (now AMC Theaters) in Edwardsville, Illinois! He read my Welcome to the Neighborhood blog and then kindly contacted me on Facebook Messenger. I was so incredibly thrilled when he did! He was so very kind in his message and even apologized for not thinking about how I might not have been able to see him properly. Poor guy, why would any sensible person ever be thinking about something like that? I should be apologizing to him! I was the crazy person pretending to know who I was talking to when the reality was I hadn’t a clue! Definitely taught myself a lesson with this one! I can’t be expectant upon my blog to solve all the mysteries I create, but I certainly can utilize it to share with you all all the mysteries I know…!

I went to the St. Louis Art Museum (SLAM) on the morning of August 28 with the wrong memory of this urban legend. In retrospect, I find this error on my behalf fitting for the occasion given the nature of urban legends to evolve in grandeur and twist in facts as time progresses. I was certain I was there to research the story of an Egyptian Mummy that left scratches on the inside of the glass that encases him. Because of this certainly, I immediately set off for the lower level upon my arrival to SLAM.

When I got downstairs, I found the area that had once housed all the Egyptian artifacts and art was being occupied by something else entirely. I asked a gentleman working there where I might find the Egyptian gallery and he informed me it had been relocated to the third floor. Without hesitation, I set course for the very opposite part of the building, but once I showed up and perused the Egyptian gallery, I found nothing like I was looking for.

I studied the glass encasings of the Egyptian Sarcophaguses with great detail and found zero scratches amongst the lot of them. This prompted me to then inquire about the urban legend with the gentleman working this gallery.

“Oh, you’re looking for Bob,” he replied with a smile. “Well, you won’t find him up here, in fact, you won’t find him at all.”

This highly informative gentleman then told me how “Bob,” as the museum staff have affectionately coined him, was never an Egyptian Mummy, but rather an Oceanic Effigy. (I should note that an effigy is like a sculpture or model of a person – somewhat like a mummy, but not necessarily the same.) He then went on to tell me of how Bob is no longer on display for public viewings, but I should note, as he shared that bit of information and all that followed, his voice dropped considerably lower in both tone and volume.

Before continuing, he asked if I had seen the giant plug artwork before entering the museum. I told him I had passed it on my way inside. He then told me how before that giant plug was there, there used to be a very small pond in that space. He said that a short time ago (“more than five, but less than ten years”), that pond had somehow started leaking into the building and unfortunately, the leak was right into Bob’s encasing.

According to legend, this leak reawakened and angered Bob, causing him to severely scratch the glass that encompassed his surroundings in a completely different place than he had scratched up the first time. Given the fact that Bob lies behind the glass, away from the viewing gallery, all the scratches were on the inside. The man told me this glass was thicker paned than most in the museum and these scratches were large and noticeable, “even a blind man could see them,” he added. Following the second scratching, Bob was taken off exhibit and put away in the museum archives.

Piggybacking off the excitement of the story, I immediately inquired about the events of the first scratching. The museum employee became instantly less talkative, but told me where I might find the Oceanic gallery that once housed Bob. I walked away uncertain if he didn’t know how the original scratches came to be or if there was a slight fear that prevented him from telling me. Regardless, I couldn’t help but laugh when he told me the Oceanic gallery that I sought was on the lower level, “right next door to the gallery space that once housed all these Egyptian artifacts.”

Not even gonna lie, I was lowkey so happy when he told me the space where the effigy used to be was right by where I remember the Egyptian art once being. This meant that while I was still wrong about the glass scratcher, I was pretty on point about it’s former location.

When I got back down to the Oceanic gallery, I immediately struck up conversation with the woman who was working this space. She called the effigy Bob just as the man upstairs had, but informed me she hadn’t worked there too long and wasn’t sure of all the details other than what she had heard from various personnel and patrons.

She shared the same basic story about the leak from the old pond, but wasn’t sure of how the scratches wound up on the inside of the glass the time prior. She did go on to tell me something that I hadn’t ever heard before, but found perhaps most interesting of all. Apparently part of the urban legend is that anytime someone would take a picture of this particular effigy, their camera lens would break. Um… WHAT!?! You all know how much I love a good picture! As I’m sure you can imagine, this scared the living daylights out of me! Thank goodness he wasn’t on display! My phone would surely have been shot!

Just before I left the gallery, she told me that all the information I may want to know about Bob’s effigy could be found at slam.org, so naturally, that’s exactly where I went and here’s what I found:

CULTURAL REGION: probably south Malekulan

DATE: probably 20th century

MATERIAL: HUMAN SKULL, wood, fiber, resin, paint, and other materials

FROM: Malampa province, Melanesia, Vanuatu, Oceania

CLASSIFICATION: Sculpture

DIMENSIONS: approximate: 62 5/8 x 32 5/16 x 15 3/4 in. (159 x 82 x 40 cm)

CURRENT LOCATION: Not on view

Rambaramp are memorial effigy figures created for men of the highest rank who participated in a hierarchical, grade-based society in south and central Malakula, one of the islands that comprise Vanuatu (formerly New Hebrides). The body of these figures was created from cane, vegetable fibers, clay, resin, pigment and other materials. The head was made using a male human skull, the skull of the man being memorialized, which was modeled with clay and pigments to recreate living human features. Rambaramp effigies are understood as a direct representation of the body of the deceased man, with facial features as a form of idealized portraiture. As an effigy figure, the rambaramp commemorates the particular hierarchical level that the deceased man had achieved during his life. Each level, or grade, has its own specific associated ritual ornaments and insignia. As such, the markings and motifs present on each rambaramp figure indicate the highest grade the depicted individual attained. Within these graded hierarchies, men engaged in a form of economic and ritual competition through which they achieved higher status or rank. Ceremonies for grade advancement were a complex series of religious initiations, usually involving the accumulation and sacrificing of many pigs, a highly valued resource. Importantly, the ability of a man to purchase or secure the help of others in acquiring the necessary pigs for a ceremony increased his social prestige. In turn, his social skills and ability to be generous to others aided his advancement through the various grades. Only men that had achieved the highest rank in a grade system known as Nimangi were entitled to become a rambaramp following their death. This was the highest honor they could achieve. A man who entered high grades during his life is often considered a living supernatural being, having particularly close connections with the ancestors. Although still living, he is understood to have already joined the company of ancestors and gods. As such, he becomes highly tabooed and usually lives in solitude away from the main community, eating meals by himself. In essence, he is removed from the world of the living. Following death, his body was buried. After a period of time, the skull was removed from the grave, and the rambaramp effigy was created in order to have the spirit and deep cultural knowledge of the man continue to reside in the village. The effigies are stored in the men’s house, located within each village. Their continued presence, as an ancestral effigy figure, continues to guide living men. The transformation of men into rambaramp effigies has largely ceased over the last few decades as fewer men have participated in competing for the higher ranks in the grade system.

I obviously didn’t remember what this glass scratcher looked like given the fact that I thought he was a mummy, but WHOA! He’s so much scarier than anticipated! I would NOT want to be left alone in his gallery late at night! No wonder they took his scary ass off display! Combining the information above about the manner of preservation and cultural faith of the rambaramp, alongside my own belief in the supernatural, I very much believe there could be some form of “life” still inside this effigy. Something scratched the inside of that glass each of those times and I have yet to find any reason to believe it wasn’t this Effigy Figure or the energy of it. This is what makes all these urban legends so spine-tingling for me – I believe in just about all of them!

Well, there you have it, everything I was able to learn about the local urban legend of The Scratching of the SLAM Effigy. I suppose I should’ve asked more than just two people, but it was interesting to me that I wasn’t able to find out about what happened the first time around when Bob scratched up the inside of his glass. Perhaps I need to go back to the museum and inquire with some additional staff members. Surely there has to be someone there who knows when the first scratches happened and if any particular event – like the leaking of the pond – prompted the scratching. Then again, just because they know, doesn’t always mean they’re willing to share…

As always, THANK YOU all for reading and I do hope this intriguing tale helped boost your mood and mindset for what is my favorite time of the year, HALLOWEEN! I would LOVE to hear your take on this urban legend! Like all things urban legends, everyone seems to have their own version, so PLEASE share yours! This your first time hearing about it? Even better! Please feel free to share with me what you thought! I love all comments, so keep them coming! I already started writing my next blog, so hopefully I won’t face any delays in publishing my next post! Until then though, hope you have THE BEST week ever!