The Doll in the Cradle

When I was in third grade, my school took the whole grade on a field trip to the local museum. The museum was -and still is- rather small, just an old house with a small building holding a display room, conference hall, and gift shop built onto the side as well as a smaller, more historical house supposedly from around the town’s founding a little ways off the side. We spent the day touring the grounds and doing activities like playing old games (one where you had a stick and had to roll this wooden wheel around without it falling over) and making ice cream with a crank. All in all, it was a fun day, except for one small thing.

In the building off the house, there is the display area (as I mentioned). It’s this big stone room (think cinder-block walls) with a bunch of cases going down each side and through the middle. On the wall by the entry door, there is this massive metal door leading to the Vault, the space where they keep a lot of the artifacts not currently on display. There are pictures and posters on the walls, and all the display cases are different types and sizes, a few being simple glass cases and others being tall wooden ones that look similar to a china display cabinet. On the opposite wall from the entry door, also next to the Vault, is the door to the house, which is your typical historic house made up to look like the time it was lived in.

Anyway, since the display room wasn’t too big, they just let us loose in there to look around at all the artifacts. This museum has artifacts from our town as well as from surrounding towns, so there are a lot of different items from different time periods, like photos and guns and tools. I like going to museums, and have always had a thing for history, so my friend and I took our time walking down one side of the display cases, looking around at all the different items.

Then another girl walks up to us from the back, and I can’t remember if she pointed it out or not, but we then notice this long glass display case filled with old porcelain dolls that came about halfway up our bodies. There’s another display case right next to it, one of the big wooden ones, though I can’t remember what was in it because we were focused on the doll case.

Now, I’m not afraid of dolls. I even have a few porcelain dolls myself, two of which sat displayed on my dresser for at least a decade. I’ve never had a problem with them before, but this one doll gave both of us the creeps.

On top of the display case there was this green cradle, which was rocking back and forth by itself as we walked up. As a small child, this set alarm bells off in my head, though it was likely someone else had just messed with it before us since it was just freely sitting on the display case without any protection. Either way, I did not like it, and would rather have just left it alone. I especially hated it after we saw the doll inside, which laid there, eyes wide, staring at the ceiling. But my friend, being the genius third grader she obviously was, thought it would be fun to touch the thing.

I told her it wasn’t a good idea, but she didn’t listen and poked it anyway. At first nothing happened, but as I turned around, I suddenly felt a gust of wind the size of a fist go straight through my back. Keep in mind that the walls are stone and there is the other massive display case shoved right next to the corner of the case where the cradle is, so any draft would have had to travel through a hole in the wall, the wooden back of the case, and the glass front to hit me. There also hadn’t been any wind before this, and it was only against a small area of my back.

As this happened, I arched my back and screamed. I ran halfway up the opposite side of the room, completely terrified out of my wits with my friend following behind me. She had to take a second to calm me down before I could tell her what happened. It was then that the real creepy part happened, and it would take me years to realize this.

We looked around the room and everyone was gone. Everyone. We hadn’t heard anyone calling to leave or anything, and had been down the back for maybe two minutes when this happened. Walking out the door into the big hall outside, we saw everyone (at least 30 kids and three chaperones) all lining up. No one had even noticed we were gone.

And no one had heard me scream.

This has spawned a lifelong interest and belief in the paranormal. I never really put much thought into the existence of ghosts before this, but it was pretty much all I was interested in for the next two years, to the point where my mother (who at the time was into paranormal investigations, but had never let me do or see anything about it before this) actually took me on an overnight investigation when I was around 10 years old. I’ve had a few other experiences after this, but needless to say this was the one that started it all.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that I have been back to the museum several times since then, including a stint of volunteering where I worked in the Vault (the other kid working with me got poked in the back there, but that's another story). Anyway, after going back several times over the years, I have never seen this cradle or this doll again. When asked, I was told it could have been put in storage, though it's been 12 years and I've never seen it on display again. I have no idea if it was damaged or moved to a different museum, and since there are so many other dolls, I can't get much more information on it since I don't have specifics other than the cradle, it's hair color, and the fact that it's eyes don't close when you lay it down. So the current state of the doll and it's cradle will probably remain forever a mystery to me.