More on Urban Legends Did you ever wonder about some of the strange urban legends that have been making the rounds for years? There are so many of them one has to wonder how something gets to be an urban legend. Could it be some have a glimmer of truth in them? One urban legend which might have started because it was true is the one where two cars are coming down the road at opposite ends. It is nighttime and one car doesn’t have its lights on so the other driver flashes it with his lights. According to the story the car which was flashed turns around and chases that car and catches it and the occupants get out and kill the driver. Some gangs require a killing to become a member so there could be some truth to this legend. There is an urban legend about a girl who was a heavy studier. She used to spend a lot of time at the college library at night researching data for college papers and such. One night, while at the library she realized she forgot something and decided to go back to her room. When she got there the light was out, but she thought her roommate must have left and got the item she needed and went back to the library. She stayed at the library for a couple of hours and decided to call it a night and returned to her room. To her horror when she got there she found her roommate dead on the floor with her throat cut. There was a message written in blood on the wall which read, “Aren’t you glad you didn’t turn on the light?” One of my favorite urban legends is about a woman who was taking a trip in her old car. The car was a gas hog and eventually even though it was late at night she felt she had to get fuel or the car would run out. She noticed a decrepit gas station along the road and the lights were still on. She pulled in and the attendant came out and seemed very nervous. He asked her how much gas she wanted and she told him. After gassing up the car he told her it would be twenty dollars and when she handed him the money she could see he was visibly disturbed and told her she had given him a counterfeit bill and she needed to come into the office with him. She was scared but did it. Once in the office he told her the bill was not counterfeit but he wanted to get her out of the car because there was a man with a hatchet in the back. There is a Japanese urban legend which talks about a fierce fire in a department store which was had blocked the way out for the workers who were Japanese women who wore kimonos. They had all gone to the roof to get away from the flames and fire fighters waited with nets and wanted the women to jump from the roof but the story goes the women refused because women who wore kimonos in the day of the fire which was in 1932 didn’t wear underwear and they were afraid they would be exposed and embarrassed. It is said many of them died and after that the management of the store ordered all women to wear undergarments with their kimonos and the trend caught on and today it is the usual practice. There is an urban legend about a person who hails a cab. It is late at night and the driver pulls the cab over and picks up a man who orders the cab to take him to a place the driver doesn’t know. The driver tells the passenger that, but the man gives the driver directions. As they go along the man is issuing more directions and they take the cab down tiny streets, across the countryside and to increasingly distant places. Finally, the driver has had enough and turns to the passenger to complain, but he is not in the cab. There are a lot of people who don’t like clowns and this urban legend does nothing to help them. A couple decided they wanted to go out but they had two young children who were fast asleep so they called their baby sitter and she came over and they left. The babysitter wanted to watch cable television but it was only available in the parent’s room so she called them and asked permission and they said sure. She then asked them if she could cover the large clown statue in their room because it made her nervous. At that point the father screamed, get the kids and get out of the house and we’ll call the police. We don’t have a clown statue. The baby sitter and the kids got murdered that night. The clown was a killer who escaped from prison. One of the longest urban legends is about a coin which is dropped from the empire state building. A man drops a penny from the top of the building and it travels so fast it become burning hot like the space shuttle and incinerates the person it hits. The truth is it could never achieve that much speed. There is a terminal velocity which is attained and at that point the penny won’t travel any faster. It would be very hard for a coin traveling at this speed to kill someone. I wonder how many people remember Mr. Rogers of children’s television fame. There is an urban legend about him. The legend claimed Fred Rogers had been a U.S. Navy Seal. It is said he was a sniper and had many kills in the Vietnam War. Now I have to ask you if you ever saw a more unlikely sniper? Anyway, the legend went on to say the only reason he wore sweaters was to cover up all the tattoos he had received while in the service. Some urban legends are just silly and others were created to scare people. Then there are those which have a grain of truth but it is completely bent out of shape.
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