- Scary children's stories, we were all told them as kids.
But as we grew up, we realized that we were just kids
telling fictional stories.
They couldn't possibly have any truth to them, right?
Some of the creepiest stories that we were told as kids
were actually based on real events.
Prepare to lose some sleep.
Here are 10 scary childhood stories
that turned out to be real.
Number 10 is Faceless Charlie.
Where children live, stories will sprout about
haunted locations, terrifying creatures,
and dangerous stalkers prowling creepy local spots.
One such story is that of Faceless Charlie.
The story has been told repeatedly to children
in the Pittsburgh area.
There's an abandoned railroad tunnel where it's said
a terrifying creature of the night lives.
His name is Faceless Charlie because it's as though
his skin has been torn from his skull.
Though this story is still told to children,
historians have discovered that Faceless Charlie
was a very real man.
His real name was Raymond Robinson,
and in 1918 he had a terrible accident with a power line
which removed most of his face.
He would walk at night to avoid
the cruel insults of his peers.
So therefore who is the real monster?
Number nine is the Bunny Man.
In Fairfax County, there's a story which has been told
time and time again to young children
in order to give them a good scare.
It involves a bus full of violent psychiatric patients
crashing one day.
The patients escaped and all but one of them
was eventually caught by local law enforcement.
To this day, kids are told about the Bunny Man,
the surviving patient who kills rabbits
and hangs them from local bridges.
Disturbingly, the truth is that the Bunny Man
is a real person.
The Bunny Man was an unknown male who dressed up
in a bunny suit in the '70s and threw an ax at young people
who were driving past him at night.
Other incidents occurred, but the man was never caught.
And so his creepy story became legend.
But the question is, is he still out there?
Number eight is Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.
Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
is one of the most famous children stories of all time.
It's been told and retold for hundreds of years,
and it was most famously made into a film by Walt Disney.
The original story had some frightening elements,
including making the evil stepmother dance
while wearing red-hot iron slippers until she dies.
However, the original story was based on a real event,
one which ends badly for Snow White herself.
Her real name was Margaretha von Waldeck, and she lived
in what's now modern day Germany in the 16th century.
Margaretha fell in love with the heir to the Spanish throne.
At the age of just 21, she died mysteriously
with many believing that she was murdered
by those who objected to the relationship.
Suspects even included her own father and step-mother
as well as the king of Spain himself.
Number seven are the Puebla Tunnels.
In the Mexican city of Puebla, children would
exchange stories to scare each other as much as possible.
This is common of children everywhere, but one story which
was specific to the area surrounding the Puebla Tunnels
has many people shook.
The story says that deep beneath the city
lay a vast labyrinth of winding tunnels.
Anyone who found them would never be seen
or heard from again.
Some rumors suggested that these missing people
encountered something inside the tunnels
which was less than human.
Most considered this an urban legend,
but in 2015 a large system of tunnels at least 500 years old
was found just where the story suggested.
It's thought the memory of the tunnels was kept alive
by the children passing the legend
from generation to generation.
Whether something hideous lives down there,
however, is another story.
Number six is the Man in the Attic.
The Man in the Attic has a number of names,
but it's essentially the same tale told to and by kids
in several countries.
In the story, a family lives in their home,
believing it to be a safe environment.
However, strange things start happening.
Objects go missing,
other belongings appear in unusual places,
and all the while an occasional creaking noise
can be heard from the attic.
Something the family believe is caused by bats
or the house being old.
But the truth is is that there's a man hiding in the attic.
And when he finally decides to,
he kills the family in their beds at night.
This terrifying childhood story is based on
the infamous Hinterkaifeck murders.
No one ever identified the killer.
And who knows if there are any copycats out there.
Number five are killer clowns.
Clowns were originally envisaged as figures of fun,
covered in face paint and wearing wacky clothing.
But over the last few decades,
the clown has become more dangerous.
As a clown is predominantly a character created
to entertain children, it's interesting then
how that same character has slowly become a predator
of children in fiction and stories shared among kids.
From Pennywise the clown to Sideshow Bob,
clowns have become vengeful against the children
that they are supposed to entertain.
But murderous clowns are not just the domain
of fiction or urban legend.
Serial killer John Wayne Gacy dressed up as a clown.
And in recent years the craze where strange individuals
have been dressing as clowns and frightening people at night
continues to spread.
So perhaps our distrust of clowns
has become more than justified.
Number four is the Pied Piper.
The Pied Piper is one of the most enduring children's tales
of all time.
A talented piper was hired to play a tune on his instrument
which attracted all the rats from a town.
He then led them away.
When the mayor of the town decided not to pay the piper,
the song was played again.
But this time it was the children of the town
who were led away.
In some versions of the story,
the piper murdered those children.
In the town of Hamelin, there were memorials created
to the tragic event going back to the 14th century.
Stained glass windows showed the piper
leading the children away from the town.
And in a written document, a town chronicle wrote in 1384,
it is 100 years since our children left.
Various theories about who the piper was
and what actually happened exist, but historians agree
that it was a real event now obscured by time.
Number three is the Dog Boy.
The Dog Boy story isn't just a legend told to kids.
It's real, and children were very much in real danger
from him for a time.
The Dog Boy legend is told in Arkansas to frighten children.
In it, a werewolf-like dog man preys on those living
in the town of Quitman.
He tortures and eats animals
as well as anyone who crosses his path.
Bizarrely, this story is based in actual fact.
During the 1950s and '60s,
a boy named Gerald Bettis would catch animals
and perform horrific experiments on them.
He had an unkempt appearance.
And after his father died under suspicious circumstances,
Gerald held his mother captive.
After he was finally caught,
Gerald went to prison and died there.
And slowly the real evils of Gerald Bettis morphed into
the tale of the Dog Bog stalking the countryside at night.
Number two are the Alice Killings.
Kids and teenagers in Japan often tell the story
of the Alice Killings.
The story is that there have been a large number of murders
across Japan between '99 and 2005.
In the story, the victims bear no relation to each other
and are seemingly killed at random.
This puts everyone at risk.
Furthermore, a playing card is left at each death scene,
and the name Alice is left written in blood.
The legend was largely immortalized
in the Creepypasta story a few years ago.
Through internet urban legend,
the story has become extremely popular in Japan
as a way for kids to terrify each other.
What's most creepy about it, however,
is that this is based on a real case.
Serial killer Alfredo Galan Sotillo murdered six people
in Spain in 2003.
He would wish each victim good morning before shooting them
and then leave a playing card with the body.
And number one is Hansel and Gretel.
One of the most famous children's stories of any time
is Hansel and Gretel.
The story is still told to children to this day.
It follows a brother and sister who were abandoned
by their father and step-mother in a forest because a famine
has struck and they cannot feed their children.
The children then stumble upon a cottage made of gingerbread
and are kidnapped by a cannibal witch.
The story ends up with the children trapping the witch
in her oven and burning her alive.
Unfortunately, Hansel and Gretel is based on a real event.
During the great famine which struck Europe
between 1315 and 1317, there are historical accounts
of parents abandoning their children in forests
because they could not feed them.
Worst still, cannibalism did occur, and so many believed
the witch in Hansel and Gretel
was a very real eater of children at that time.