Inklings: Meet The Candy Lady

When I decided to take part in this year’s Spooky Showcase hosted by my friend, Jolene, I knew I wanted to look for inspiration in stories that might not necessarily be that well-known.

We’ve all heard the one about Bloody Mary or The Killer In The Backseat, but I wanted to find an idea that was new to me, and hopefully to readers, too.

At first, I toyed with the idea of making it a more Canadian-focused legend. But when I started researching and I came upon The Candy Lady, I knew it was the perfect source of inspiration, especially for the Spooky Showcase.

MEET THE CANDY LADY

Clara Crane lived in a small town in Texas in the early 1900’s. 

Married and with one child named Marcella, Clara had left her daughter under the care of her husband, Leonard. But one day, when he’d been drinking, he wasn’t paying attention to Marcella, and she was killed in a farming accident.

Clara is said to have been so irrevocably despondent after Marcella’s death that she decided to take her revenge out on Leonard a few years later by poisoning caramels and feeding them to him.

Tried and convicted of his murder, Clara was sent to the North Texas Lunatic Asylum after being found to be suffering from “mania”.

While in the asylum, Clara made a doll from torn bedsheets and it is said that she may have believed the doll was her daughter. Even after writing letters to her sister, Clara still seemed to believe Marcy was alive. 

After spending her time in the facility, Clara was released due to overcrowding, only to virtually vanish. No one seemed to know what happened to her. 

A few years after her release, children near her hometown started to go missing, and they did so for almost 10 years.

Reports say local children would wake up to find candy waiting for them on their windowsills, later receiving notes that enticed them to come play. The notes were signed from “The Candy Lady”. 

After some of the children had gone missing, others who had been receiving these sweet treats confessed about the candy to their parents. Not long after, a farmer was tending to his field and found a candy wrapper, inside of which there was a black, rotten, bloody tooth of a child. After alerting police, they were said to have found the missing boy, his pockets filled with candy and his eyes gouged out.

The candy and attacks were believed by locals to be the work of Clara Crane.

MY QUESTIONS

So, when I read this story, I had some questions. If Clara felt so inconsolable about her daughter being killed, why would she retaliate by luring and murdering kids?

Was she trying to show the parents they should be more attentive to their children and if they were not, these were the consequences?

MY STORY

I’m not sure whether I believe the urban legend of The Candy Lady is real, but that’s kind of the point of an urban legend, isn’t it? A story repeated so many times that you eventually start to believe it. 

I’m not sure the kids in my story believe it, either. Why else would they decide to host a Halloween party at what was once The Candy Lady’s house? Even when Marcy tries to warn them, they don’t seem to believe her. And did Marcy really see all those things she did in the story? Or was it just a matter of her mind playing tricks on her, on that night, in that place, where something terrible happened not that long ago?

Do you think the story is real? Or is it just the combination of real events mixed up with what our imaginations conjure at this spookiest time of the year?

Either way, if you haven’t read my story yet, head to the Spooky Showcase to read it online or you can download a PDF from the Sickly Sweet page on my website.

Enjoy!

And beware of any candy left mysteriously on your windowsill in the middle of the night…

Clara Crane photo:  https://crberryauthor.wordpress.com