There are ventriloquists with the talent of making the public smile by making shows with their puppets. Although many of these tend to have disturbing expressions, in the end, they show us symphaty with their funny jokes.
Charlie McCarthy used to be one of them. He was recognized for being a successful ventriloquist in the 20th century, as during his performances, he used to have a rather peculiar puppet. However, things would change when it was discovered that he had a dark secret that he had been carrying for some time.
In 1920, McCarthy became famous in one of his first shows by introducing Edgar, a ventriloquist puppet with quite different characteristics from a normal one. It represented an 8-year-old boy. His complexion was plump and his facial features were very expressive and somewhat chilling, and even though his eyes were made of wood, it could reflect a look of sadness or even evil.
Still, what made McCarthy grow and turn him into a master, was his ability to change his voice in an extremely different way and without showing any facial movement when interpreting Edgar’s voice. This was what got the attention of many people who followed him through his tours.
However, not all people thought the same back then. There were many who were superstitious and started rumors of McCarthy being an apprentice of witchery, since they believed that he used some evil trick to make the puppet speak. This rumor spread so fast that people began banning children from attending to his performances.
People started talking even more about the topic when it was found out that McCarthy, had a strange fascination with the puppet. He used to take care of him as if it was his own son and didn’t allow the public or the work staff to get close to Edgar. He was the only one who could touch and keep him inside his box.
At the end, his career ended one night while McCarthy was touring the United States. When the show was over, he went to the dressing room and locked himself in there for hours. The theater workers realized that he was still inside the place, so they knocked through the door to warn him they were about to close, but McCarthy didn’t answer.
After countless rumors that ran over the star, it was expected that employees feared coming into the room. They decided to call the police thinking the worst. When they arrived and forced the dressing room door, they found something that left them totally in shock…
McCarthy was lying on the ground lifeless, his neck completely destroyed and soaked in red.
After reacting to the terrible scene, the authorities focused on finding Edgar. They thought that some individual had entered into the dressing room in order to take McCarthy’s life and steal the puppet.
But when they found the box and opened it, the puppet was there with a penetrating and chilling gaze that even the officers themselves feared to grab him, but it was necessary to, since they had to carry out the investigation to discover who had caused that horrible tragedy.
While analyzing the puppet, they discovered something even more terrifying. The investigation into McCarthy’s death was interrupted when they found out that Edgar was not actually a puppet but the actual body of a child.
There were fingerprints on the puppet’s fingers and his face was covered with a latex mask to cover his paleness. They couldn’t figure out the identity of that poor boy and the most dreadful thing is that nobody knew how McCarthy got to keep up the body of that innocent.
Charlie McCarthy wasn’t actually a bad person. There’s this theory which mentions he lost his son and after much sadness and being in denial to accept his loss, he decided to keep his body and turn him into a puppet so that way he could live even if this was only during his shows.
Have you heard about this disturbing story before?