Do You Hear What I Hair?

Happy Tuesday, MMers! Today’s report comes from up in Kingman in Penobscot County. Stuart Fields recently contacted us about some corn that he purchased from the local Jones Family Farm. Though the farm grows everything from beets to their famous “big, juicy blueberries,” they are most well known for their corn and their aptly named “Maize Maze.” Well, Stuart gave us a call and had some troubling information for us.

Corn Silk

“You know that kind of stringy hair that an ear of corn has when you are shucking it? Well, I bought a bag of corn from Jones Family Farm the other day, and my daughter and I were shucking the corn while my wife was finishing up the potato salad inside. About  halfway through the bag, my daughter, Anna, screamed bloody murder and threw down her corn. ‘What’s the matter, honey?!’ I asked. ‘That corn! That one has hair in it! Like Mommy’s!’. Her voice was trembling as she tried to get the words out.”

We went on conversing with Stuart for quite some time, but he kept harping on that same point. Hair. Hair in the corn. Blonde hair, like his wife’s. While we all know that corn silk is standard in an ear of corn, we’ve never heard of human hair where the corn silk should be. Stuart contacted us immediately after his experience, but he didn’t dare go back to JFF.

So, MMers, we decided to give a call to the farm ourselves to question further. The owner, Bartholomew “Bart” Jones, was at first unavailable, so we left a message with our contact information, hoping to hear back.

Luckily, around 10:30 AM the next day, we got a call. Our caller ID read the number from Kingman. We were excited to say the least. Unfortunately, it was not Bart on the other line. It was his stepdaughter, Helen. While Helen said that she had no idea why there would be actual hair in their corn, she promised that she would look into it for us.

And here is where the story gets mighty interesting, MMers. Helen called us back around 4 PM, after she had time to speak with her stepdad. She sounded disappointed, frustrated, and a little bit shaken up.

“Well, I went to go ask daddy Bart about the hair, and, well, he just snapped at me. Told me to get the heck out of his office if I knew what was good for me. You see, daddy Bart has a temper, but he’s been so much better about controlling it lately. I don’t know what came over him when I asked him about that hair.”

So, without wanting to push Helen much further than we already had, we here at Malevolent Maine decided to take matters into our own hands. We wanted to see the farm with our own eyes, hear the sounds with our own ears. We arrived at the farm the next day around 11 AM or so, and we quickly approached the barn and bought some corn. After we had brought it out to the car, we tore apart the ears, but to no avail. It was just regular corn with the standard corn silk. Lucas went back into the store for another bag, this time from the back of the rack. Again, nothing. No hair, just silk.

Frustrated, but not completely discouraged, we decided to head down to the “Maize Maze.” Not wanting to appear obvious, we went with a gardening trowel and nothing else. The maze was elaborate and immaculately maintained. It was as if the maze had been groomed that very morning. Even the dirt ground was neat and tidy. Slowly but surely, we worked our way through the maze, grabbing a few pieces of corn here and there and opening them up to see what was inside. After we were in the maze for about 20 minutes, two young boys ran by us, giggling and chasing each other. There was a third boy a few paces behind. He stopped and took one long glance at us before moving on through the maze.

 

Inside the maze

We moved on about another fifty feet or so, and Chris noticed something. “Hey, come here. Do you see that?!” Chris was pointing to what looked like blonde hair sticking out of the dirt on the side of the path. “You sure that’s not just corn silk?” “No. But let’s find out!” Lucas, crouched down with the trowel, grabbed the strands and confirmed that it didn't feel like corn silk, at least not fresh corn silk. Right as he plunged the small handled spade into the ground, we heard a booming voice from behind us.

“HEY! WHAT THE HELL YA’LL DOIN’ DIGGIN’ IN MY CORN?!” As we turned, we saw a big mass of a man moving swiftly towards us. He was well above six-feet tall, and at least 300 pounds. Daddy Bart. At first, we were frozen in space and time, unable to move or speak. Finally, Chris spoke up. “Sorry sir! We just thought we saw something poking out of the ground. We will be on our way!” Bart looked at us, and then at the spot Lucas was still kneeling in. “You boys better get your asses out of here, if you know what’s good for ya!”

And so we left in a hurry, MMers, and we regret that we don’t have more information. While we don’t have enough evidence to contact the police, we encourage you all to stay away from Jones Family Farm, and particularly Big Daddy Bart.

Stay safe out there, Maine!

Rapid Fire - June 2021

Welcome to summer MMer’s, check out these stories, it's another Rapidfire!

• Body in the Gravel: With all the road work going on right now to fix all those damn potholes, there are gravel trucks everywhere. One road crew led by Larry Ouellette reported to us that they had an awful scare. As they were spreading out the gravel they uncovered what looked like a human arm sticking out of the pile, it was covered in scrapes and cuts as if it had been through the blender, “we all took a few minutes to settle our nerves called our supervisor” Larry told us, “but when we went back to dig out the rest of the body, there wasn’t nothing there at all, like it got up and walked off on its own.” Was this some prank from a fellow road worker, a body that someone dragged off, or something more sinister, something undead?  Either way be on the lookout for strange things as you pass road work this summer

The model of table Bernie owns

• The Bonebiter: Bernie is a massage therapist in Lewiston, he booked a new client a few weeks ago and he has major regrets about that. The man seemed normal enough at first, said he had thrown out his back a month or so ago and really needed some massage for pain relief. “He said he was nervous cause he had never gotten a massage before, asked me if I would just stand by him for a minute or two before I started and hold his hand. So here I am sitting in this guy’s living room holding his hand, when he leans over and sinks his teeth into my forearm.” Bernie immediately drew back from the man and pushed the massage table over, catapulting the man onto the floor, the man quickly grabbed his clothes and ran from the house, as Bernie ran to his car locked his doors and called the police. “I gave them the guy’s information but, they couldn’t find any record of him and it wasn’t even his house, it was up for sale but he had apparently removed the for sale sign before I got there.” Bernie went to the ER after and had his arm treated, he complained of deep pain in his arm so they did an X-ray, apparently the man’s teeth had actually sunk into the bone, and left it full of micro-fractures. Bernie is still recovering, “first I had to fight the infection off, now I  have to wait for the bones to heal. The whole time I have just felt terrible, I have no energy, I’m tired all the time. I just wish I had avoided that client.” If you are a massage therapist in the Lewiston Auburn area, please be careful as you book clients, this man is still at large, we can only hope that he has stopped biting bones!

A photo of Emily from last month

• Girl from Nothing: We need your help MMers! This story comes to us from Emily Thomas who was raised in the Maine Children’s Home for Little Wanderers in Waterville. Emily, like most people who grow up in her situation, is trying to find her biological family. However the weird part is, no one who works or who has worked previously at the Children’s Home has any recollection of how Emily came to be there. There are no documents that show when she arrived or who dropped her off. The state has no record of her parents or even a birth certificate for her, she has never been issued a social security card either. Officially she doesn’t exist and yet she is a living breathing human being. We will include a picture here of what she looks like now but there are no pictures of her as a child, but all the employees remember that she has been in the Children’s Home since she was four years old. If you know of any children dropped off at the Children's Home in Waterville around 16 years ago, please get into contact with us. 

• Homeless Prophet: Multiple people have reported that there is a man roaming around Portland talking about fate. Everyone who reports interacting with him says he doesn’t seem drunk, or under the influence in any way, he speaks eloquently and doesn’t display any odd behaviors, all he does is approach people and talk with them. His favorite topic is how time is fixed, that people will always make the same choices, the future cannot be changed, fate is inescapable. He tells people that he was always meant to live a vagrant life, he tried to have a family, a job, a home and it just wasn’t meant to be. He says he has seen his own future, and as long as he spreads his message of fate being set, something good will happen to him. If you are in Portland and want to hear more of his message, seek him out, buy him a meal and settle in for the philosophy of unchangeable fate. 

• The Mad Splicer: A sharp eyed reader named Trevor has made a connection between several stories we have published. He pointed to our stories Arctic Cat, The Pamola, and Specimens in the Shed, and said there were similarities between them. In an email Trevor laid out his theory, “It was the jars in the shed that was the connection, the feather, antler, and finger, couldn’t that be related to the Pamola? The things on its back could have been wings that had died and shriveled up. Then there was another jar with a cat’s ear, and a few bolts, that was the Arctic Cat! Whoever owned the shed was doing crazy experiments combining things, and some of his creations are still walking around!” Trevor went on to label this unethical scientist, the Mad Splicer, and we can’t think of a better name ourselves. If you have information on this man or have run into one of his creations, please reach out to us, we will keep you all updated with any further developments in this story. 

Is this a sketch of the Mad Splicer?

As always, MMers, if you encounter something spooky, something unexplainable, something supernatural or otherworldly, send it to us. Who knows, your story might just make the blog?

Stay safe out there, Maine.