Every girl dreams of putting on a wedding dress someday and wearing it down the aisle with her loved one. Unfortunately, not every young woman can do it. Especially in the old days, when a father could easily forbid his daughter to marry this or that young man, many bright relationships were extremely darkened or even destroyed by such prohibitions.
We will tell you about the American Anna Woods Baker, who also suffered such an unenviable fate, and about her damned wedding dress, which, according to urban legend, still lives its own life, even many decades after the death of the hostess.
Anna Baker's story
Anna was born in 1836 in Altoona, Pennsylvania. Her father was a wealthy metallurgist Elias Baker, who made a good fortune by buying and operating blast furnaces. In 1849, he approached the famous Baltimore architect Robert Carey Long Jr., who built a huge Greek Revival mansion for his client. The cost of building the house was 15 thousand dollars, which at that time was a fabulous sum. The structure was named Baker Mansion.
Elias was a proud and domineering man who kept his family tight-knit. Relatives behaved exclusively as required by the head of the family, and could not contradict him in anything. Therefore, when the second daughter of an industrialist wished to marry a handsome steelworker who worked for her father, Elias said that this would not happen if Anna wanted to continue to be called his daughter. The man considered that a simple laborer was not worthy of his daughter's hand, that this marriage would be a shame for the family.
The girl was also capricious and for many months argued with her father, trying to convince her parent that she had no reason to live without her lover. An angry Elias eventually told his daughter that she was free to do as she pleased, but in the event of such a marriage, Anna would not receive a penny from him and would certainly be struck off the list of heirs. At the same time, the businessman promised to fire the chosen one of his daughter right on the wedding day. “Live with this rabble in poverty, if you so want,” concluded the stern father. Even the wife of Elias Hetty could not convince her husband to give her daughter a blessing for marriage and not to deprive her of her home and inheritance.
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As a result, the girl-bride, accustomed to living from the cradle in the luxury and comfort of her father's house, could not give up her fortune in favor of love. Stalevar soon married the daughter of a farmer. Anna became angry with her father and fell into a deep depression. The unhappy American woman remained an old maid for life. She died in 1914 at the age of 78 and was buried in the same grave with her brother Sylvester.
Cursed wedding dress
The puffy wedding dress that Anna had picked up at a local store for her failed marriage was never bought. It was later acquired by Elizabeth Bell, another girl from high society, after whose father even a neighboring city was named. Elizabeth made fun of Anna, knowing full well the misfortune of her countrywoman.
From these mockery, our heroine plunged into even greater melancholy and in her hearts cursed that wedding dress, wishing that everyone who touched it would not have, like Anna, happiness in her personal life. And indeed: Elizabeth's marriage lasted only a couple of years, after which Bell, angry with her tongue, was no longer able to tie the knot with anyone. The wedding dress went to the daughter of Elizabeth Margaret, who herself did not want to become anyone's wife and all her life had only numerous lovers who did not bring her the slightest happiness.
The Baker family degenerated, and their luxurious family mansion turned into a museum in 1941. Since then, the ill-fated dress has been on display in Anna's former bedroom. Over time, the outfit, which brought a lot of grief to various women, was overgrown with mystical rumors. Many visitors to the museum claim that sometimes the wedding dress moves spontaneously and even slightly hits the sleeves against the glass of the wardrobe in which it is kept. This happens most often on full moon nights.
Eyewitnesses, including some employees of the institution, are convinced that the restless spirit of the old maid periodically infiltrates the outfit, to which he has a strong emotional attachment, trying to leave the closet in order to go in search of his beloved, with whom Anna exchanged for family wealth. It is believed that if a mirror is brought to the cabinet on a full moon, not only the dress itself will be reflected in it, but also the pale female silhouette dressed in it.
Skeptics are sure that the dress is moving because drafts are blowing from under the old floorboards from below. The museum staff tested this theory experimentally and concluded that there are no such drafts here and cannot be.
By the way, it is forbidden to touch unkind clothes for safety reasons, and visitors of both sexes: after all, no one knows how the curse will affect men …
