Even before this year took a sharp turn towards Crazy Town Junction thanks to the coronavirus pandemic, Black Lives Matter protests, and the presidential election, I decided to do something new this year. I created an Evernote list titled “#Endof2020 Recap.” My plan was to track all of the year’s biggest paranormal news, events, and trends to share in a look back post at the end of the year.
Which is exactly what I’m doing now. I had no clue when I started collecting stories just how eventful this year would be, though. Or just how many paranormal, mysterious, and otherwise wacky stories there’d be.
And now I’m glad I kept track because there were some doozies. If I hadn’t written them down, I would have totally forgotten about some of them. Talk about an eventful year!
Some months had more stories than others, but amazingly there was at least one story each month about something wild. Let’s take a look at the 24 biggest stories that I noted, broken down by the months they took place in.
January 2020
January started off harmless enough. Basically.
1. Spiritual Medium Derek Acorah Dies
CNN was among the first to report that on January 3, Acorah’s wife, Gwen, announced on her Facebook page that Derek had died after a brief illness that put him in a coma in Intensive Care.
CNN reported it was the flu, but now looking back I can’t help but wonder if he succumbed to a bad case of the flu or if he was an early COVID-19 casualty.
2. The Haunted Frozen Elsa Doll
Remember this story about a Houston mom who allegedly threw out her daughter’s Frozen Elsa doll after it started malfunctioning? Allegedly it was turning on without batteries and speaking in both Spanish and English.
But somehow the doll found its way out of the trash can and the mom swore it wasn’t the kids playing a prank. They tried throwing it away again, went out of town for a few days, and came back to find it propped up against the side of the house. That’s when they decided their Frozen Elsa doll was haunted and ended up finding a man in Minnesota who was willing to take her on.
On January 21 the CDC released a press release that the first case of what would become a 2020-altering disease had been confirmed in Washington state.
4. A Spooky Take on the Dolly Parton Challenge
Dolly Parton started a trend when she shared an Instagram post captioned: “Get you a woman who can do it all.” It was four different profile pictures for LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. HJ hopped on the Dolly Parton Challenge bandwagon and joined other bloggers, vloggers and podcasters who put a spooky twist on Dolly’s challenge.
February 2020
February turned out to be a month for paranormal museum stories. But it was also the month Ahmaud Arbery was shot, which wouldn’t prove significant at first because his death didn’t hit the news right away.
5. An Ohio Museum Put Mythical Creatures on Display
Ohio is no stranger to cryptid sightings of all variety, including the Ohio Grassman, Dogman, and even their own kind of Nessie: the Lake Erie Monster they call Bessie. The Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library & Museums (RBHPL&M) in Fremont, Ohio, put these and other curious beasts on display when they featured the work of Dan Chudzinski, an artist of the unusual, curious and intriguing, in an Ohio: An Unnatural History exhibit.
6. Green Bay Ghost Tours Opens Paranormal Museum
WeAreGreenBay.com reported that Green Bay Ghost Tours opened the Nightshades Paranormal Museum to showcase the ghost tour owner’s “spooky possessions.”
March 2020
This was the month new words were introduced into our vocabulary, like “lockdowns” and “social distancing,” all in an effort to “flatten the curve.” It was also the month Breonna Taylor was shot and killed, which add more fuel to a fire that would ignite in earnest in a couple more months.
7. Haunted Prison from The Green Mile Damaged by Tornadoes
On March 2 and 3, EF-3 and EF-4 tornados swept through parts of Nashville and surrounding areas of Middle Tennessee. 25 people died. However, there was also another casualty of sorts: the historic Tennessee State Prison, which was not only where the movie The Green Mile was filmed but is also rumored to be haunted with paranormal activity from the restless spirits of former inmates.
8. A “ghost” in Malayasia Tries to Scare Teenagers Who Break Lockdown
The story about a sheet-clad man who thought he could scare teenagers into behaving by pretending to be a ghost was one of my favorite stories from Coast to Coast AM all year. (Along with another one of a similar theme they posted in April.)
April 2020
April was one of the quieter months. Maybe because everybody was adhering to the lockdown restrictions?
9. Haunted House Quarantine Punishment in Indonesia
The story about Indonesia punishing those who defied lockdown by putting them in a haunted house was my other favorite story from Coast to Coast AM. Especially this part: “the three men imprisoned in the haunted house reportedly begged authorities to free them after only three days because they were having terrifying dreams.” Oh yeah. That had to go on the #Endof2020 recap list.
May 2020
May was the start of a volatile Summer 2020. Lockdown restrictions started easing. George Floyd was murdered, which sparked the “I Can’t Breathe” cry that would fuel the summer’s Black Lives Matter protests and riots in response to not only his death but also those of Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor.
10. Murder Hornets
Of course 2020 was the year for a killer insect invasion. The Asian giant hornet arrived in North America. Scientific American explained its “supervillain nickname” comes from the vicious way it invades honeybee hives and rips their heads off. Their sting is no fun for humans either. However, the real threat to humans is what they do to the bees that are vital to our agriculture.
June 2020
This was the month Black Lives Matter marches exploded across the country. It was social upheaval and calls for equality like the U.S. hasn’t seen since the 1960s.
11. Saharan Dust Clouds
Again, leave it to 2020 to turn a normal annual meteorological event into something nuts. In this case, it was the massive Saharan dust cloud nicknamed “Godzilla” because it was twice as large as normal, and, as Vox put it, “was one of the most intense on record.”
#Endof2020 Halfway Mark
Phew. We’ve reached the halfway mark. The recap continues with July through December. The skeleton finger points the way.
Courtney Mroch is a globe-trotting restless spirit who’s both possessed by wanderlust and the spirit of adventure, as well as obsessed with true crime, horror, the paranormal, and weird days. Perhaps it has something to do with her genes? She is related to occult royalty, after all. Marie Laveau, the famous Voodoo practitioner of New Orleans, is one of her ancestors. That could also explain her infatuation with skeletons.
Speaking of healing, to learn how she channeled her battle with cancer to conjure up this site, check out HJ’s Origin Story.
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A giant gingerbread monolith! That’s awesome. Nah, our area didn’t have any surprising, weird stuff like that.
I thought the gingerbread monolith was the best one yet! lol