It's amazing what ridiculous stories get passed
around the table at a dinner party, or when you're out drinking with your friends. I'm sure you've heard a few gruesome tales
that sound too horrible to be true. Most urban legends are no more than Chinese
whispers; told over and over again, until no one can actually remember if there's any
truth to the damn thing. But very occasionally, it turns out that one
of these creepy tales is actually, completely true and the real-life version is more horrific
than you could ever imagine. The Green Man If you spend long enough in western Pennsylvania,
you will undoubtedly hear the spine-chilling tales of "The Green Man". According to the urban legends, he was a horrifically
disfigured man, with no face and glowing, green skin. The Green Man apparently wandered the streets
of Pennsylvania every night. Drivers would often report seeing this terrifying
figure at the side of the road in the dead of the night. Turns out the real story is actually one of
misfortune and loneliness. The Green Man was not a monster at all but
a man named Raymond Robinson. When Robinson was eight years old, he was
attempting to view a birds nest and was electrocuted by some electrical lines of a nearby tram
line. Robinson narrowly escaped death but was left
severely disfigured. He lost his nose, eyes, an ear and and one
of his arms. The skin on his face was so badly damaged
by the shock that it glowed with a green hue. Hence his nickname of The Green Man. Robinson walked the roads of western Pennsylvania
every night because he could not go outside during the day without causing mass hysteria. The Shadowy Figure Next up is the shadowy figure. I'm sure that everyone has been witness to
this urban legend. At some point in most people's lives, they've
seen a shadowy figure dart across the room, out the corner of their eye. As if someone is there, but when they turn
around, nothing. It's the oldest urban legend in the book and
stories of mysterious shadowy figures have been told all throughout history. But for one man in Fukuoka, Japan. This urban legend turned out to be true. The man, apparently, lived alone in an apartment. He kept telling people how he saw shadowy
figures moving around his apartment, out the corner of his eye. He swore that things kept going missing from
his apartment; the man claimed that someone was eating his food and moving things around. He reported an overwhelming sense that another
being was present with him and that he was far from alone. He was absolutely correct. One day he set up a hidden camera in the corner
of his apartment. And, to the man's horror, he captured footage
of a woman slithering out of his cupboard and using his apartment as if it was hers. Eating his food and using his belongings;
even taking showers. The creepiest part of it all is that when
he was watching the footage back, the woman was still in his cupboard, only a few metres
behind him. The woman turned out to be 58-year-old Tatsuko
Horikawa. She was homeless and admitted to the police
that she had been secretly living in the man's apartment, without his knowledge, for the
past year. Bloody Mary There's an old folklore called Bloody Mary,
that goes likes this. If you turn off all the lights, then light
a candle and stare into a mirror and chant "Bloody Mary" three times. The face of Queen Mary I of England will supposedly
appear in the mirror with a terrifyingly evil expression. In some versions of this urban legend, she
apparently appears in the mirror holding a dead baby in her arms. Which may be a reference to the number of
miscarriages that Queen Mary I had. This may seem farfetched, but there is some
truth to this urban legend, and oddly enough, some science too. A lot of people who try this, do actually
see something peculiar in the mirror. And many perceive it to be the face of Queen
Mary I, but it's not. What you're actually seeing is your own face
heavily distorted, due to something called the Caputo Effect. This effect occurs because of sensory deprivation. Our eyes are being deprived of light, but
our brain is trying its hardest to make out the face in the mirror. This causes the brain's facial-recognition
system to malfunction. The result of this is that we see a distorted
version of our own face, which, in poor lighting, could be misconstrued as the face of Queen
Mary. Because most people who attempt this are expecting
to see the face of an evil Queen, that's what the brain makes us see. Our brain is deprived of visual information,
so naturally, our imagination fills in the gaps. Dead Body in the Mattress There's an infamous story that many parents
have told their poor children in an attempt to scare the living daylights out of them. The legend goes that a couple stayed in a
hotel room and complained about a putrid smell. But, when the hotel staff couldn't find anything
out of the ordinary, they stayed there anyway. Later, they found that the cause of the smell
was a dead body stuffed into the mattress. That's bloody nasty, but it has happened. In fact it happens a lot more commonly than
you might think. Cases of dead bodies in hotel mattress's have
been reported in Las Vegas, Atlantic City, California and Florida. A recent case occurred in 2010 when a Memphis
woman was missing for two months before she was finally found, dead, under the mattress
of a hotel room she had been staying in. In the two months whilst her corpse had been
rotting away under the mattress, the hotel had rented the room to five different people,
and none of them thought to investigate the strange smell. The room had also been cleaned by hotel staff,
several times during those two months. I guess the cleaners just took one look at
the body and thought "I don't get paid enough for this." Black Water According to urban legend, there's an unnerving
tale of a family who moved into a new house. The story goes that a rancid smelling, jet-black
water came out of all the taps in their new home. When they investigated, they were horrified
to discover that the cause of the black water was a decomposing human body in their water
tank. It makes one's skin crawl to think that this
could actually be true, but it is. However the real story is so much worse. Because it happened in a hotel, not someone's
home. In 2013, for a whole 19 days, hundreds of
guests at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, were bathing in, brushing their teeth with
and even drinking the water from a tank on the rooftop that contained the decomposing
corpse of a college student named Elisa Lam. Seriously guys, just stay away from hotels,
they're bad news. Buried Alive We've all heard the horror stories of people
who have been buried, six feet under, presuming they were dead, but, they weren't. Are the tales just urban myths, or is there
some truth to it? Unfortunately it's true and not only is it
true, but it's happened literally hundreds, if not thousands of times. In the late 19th century, when the medical
profession hadn't yet fully developed, people were mistakingly buried alive quite regularly. There were 219 known and reported cases of
people being buried alive during the late 19th century. But that's just the ones that were later dug
up, only to find scratch marks on the inside of the coffin where they tried to get out. Just think how many more people this happened
to without anyone's knowledge. Because, you know, once you bury someone,
it's usually a permanent arrangement. You don't usually make regular checkups to
see if Granddad is still alive down there. In fact, this happened with such regularity
that wealthy people would invest in "safety coffins" before they died, to prevent premature
burial. These specially built coffins had a device
that allowed the supposedly deceased person to ring a bell above the surface, if they
were still alive down there. Some people believe this is where the phrases
"saved by the bell" and "dead ringer" come from, but there's still some debate going
on over this. Many designs of these safety coffins were
patented during the 18th and 19th centuries and they sold in their thousands. You can still buy more modern versions of
safety coffins today for the ultra-paranoid out there. Carnival Corpse When you went on the haunted house ride at
the carnival as a child, did your parents ever tell you that the paper mache corpse
handing up was actually a real human corpse? Well in at least one fairground this turned
out to be gruesomely true. In 1976 a camera crew was filming an episode
of The Six Million Dollar Man at the Nu-Pike amusement park in Long Beach, California. The crew was moving a hanging man prop whilst
preparing to film inside the haunted house. When, they accidentally knocked off one of
its arms. To their horror this prop wasn't made of paper
mache, because inside they found real human bones. Turns out the whole thing was a real human
cadaver, hung up for all the little kiddies to see. It wasn't any ordinary corpse either. It turns out the body was that of a criminal
mastermind Elmer McCurdy, who was shot and killed whilst robbing a train in 1911. His body was embalmed by the local undertaker. The undertaker was so pleased with his work
that he put it on display in his funeral home to show off to clients. Like some kind of horrible, macabre portfolio
of dead bodies. McCurdy's corpse remained on display in the
undertaker's funeral home for several years until one day McCurdy's brothers showed up
and claimed the corpse. Turns out these guys weren't his brothers
at all, but carnival promoters who were too lazy to make their own artificial props for
the haunted house ride. McCurdy's corpse went on a whirlwind carnival
tour all across America, scaring the holy hell out of little kids everywhere it went. Until it was finally discovered by the film
crew in Long Beach, California, and he was finally buried. Insects Infesting Your Brain There's hundreds of urban legends about people
who get a creepy crawly inside their ear and the bug then lays its eggs inside their skull. Well I truly am sorry to tell you this, because
after hearing it you will probably never go outside again. But it does happen. It happens very rarely, but one recent case
happened in 2013 to Rochelle Harris from Derby, England. She was on the flight back from a holiday
in Peru when she began to develop headaches. She ignored them until a few hours later when
she started to get shooting pains down the side of her face. Then to her absolute horror, she heard scratching
sounds inside her own head. The next morning she woke up to a pillow soaked
in fluid which was pouring out of her ear. Harris went to the hospital in Derby. After a brain x-ray the doctor told her she
had maggots living inside her ear canal. At which point she instantly burst into tears,
rightfully so. The maggots had burrowed a hole 12mm deep
into her ear canal, luckily they hadn't yet reached her brain and caused any serious damage. Harris had minor surgery to remove the maggots. The surgeons found a colony of 8 large flesh
eating maggots inside her ear. After laboratory research it was discovered
that the maggots must have hatched in her ear after a Screw-Worm Fly had flown into
her ear and laid its eggs, whilst she was in Peru. So if there's anything you can take away from
this video, it's that if you ever go to Peru, cover your ears. Also, don't stay in hotels, ever. Check all your cupboards in your house because
there might be someone living in there. Oh, and if you ever go to a carnival, don't
touch the props.
The green man makes me sad....he was disfigured....so was my dad and kids always made fun of him...i know the mindset...and i know if i came across seeing this person i too would freak out in the right situation...but....look how nice he looks besides his face.
I thought the green man of philly was Charlie.
Hold up. Isse..isse saying "the green maM"? Anyone catching this or am I having a stroke?