Episode 3: The Haunted Statue

FOR A MAP OF THIS HAUNTED LOCATION PRESS HERE

Sadly, this historic bronze was witness to the deaths of two young children who played, perhaps too adventurously, amongst the rocks and water at its feet. Psychic Lee Barron was able to sense the death imprint of two separate incidents where young boys met their last day by receiving fatal concussions on the boulders while playing in the fountain. Lee senses that the incidents are twenty five years apart, due to the varying strengths of the "signals".

Here is a photograph from 1927 depicting the statue in its original state as the centerpiece for a peaceful fountain in front of the Fox Carthay Circle theater. The popular cinema palace no longer stands, but was on par with Grauman's Chinese Theater in reputation, and hosted grand premieres and celebrities of the day. Click here to read the amazing history of this cinema palace and to see photos of the modern monstrosity which now takes its place.

WATER LEVEL: MEDIUM (FORMER POIND, PIPES UNDERNEATH)

UPDATE! 3/16/08

In a bizarre GHOSTS WANTED twist of fate, the statue of the miner at Carthay Circle, which was the subject of our last episode, was hijacked by scrap metal thieves and nearly boiled down and shipped to China.

Article reprinted in full from Los Angeles Times, February 16, 2006:
Police strike pay dirt in hunt for stolen statue of miner
The bronze miner who stood for 80 years in a Mid-City park suffered the height of indignities.

He was ripped from his pedestal in the park two blocks from Beverly Hills, cut in half above the knees and trucked to a scrap yard on Alameda Street south of downtown. There he was thrown amid the lumpen metal masses -- common copper plumbing, old radiators, transmissions and beer kegs.

Fortunately, police found the miner before he was crushed in the bailer, sent to China and melted in a foundry forge. And they may have ended a peculiar crime spree as well.

Residents of Carthay Circle were delighted to learn the old miner survived, albeit with amputated legs.

"I'm glad he's only cut in half and not melted down," said Judy Moore, president of the Carthay Circle Neighborhood Assn. "At least he didn't go into the witch's brew to become God knows what." Moore said the neighborhood association is willing to help pay to fix the miner.

UPDATE 7/6/08

GHOSTS WANTED returned to this location to follow up on another ghost.

TO SEE "INVISIBLE VAUDEVILLIAN" EPISODE PRESS HERE

UPDATE 1/8/09

The "cursed" statue returns home! ...But, for how long?

UPDATE 1/8/09

According to an L.A.Times article dated Feb.19, 1939, the intersection where the "cursed" statue resides was infamous for the numerous "terrible smash-ups" that occurred as a result of ten lanes of traffic (and two trolley lines) that at that time converged around the statue's island. (The "accident problem" was later solved by converting some of the streets to "one-way" traffic.)

UPDATE 5/13/09

The "miner of misfortune" has once again been attacked. This time he may have been the target of a hate crime. The word "Jew" was spray-painted across his mining pan.