I just love this story! I have always been a fan of Edgar Allan Poe, but I have never gotten a chance to visit his gravesite. The closest I got was seeing his mother’s grave in Richmond, Virginia.
Poe was and still is perhaps the premiere master of the macabre. If you cannot find a Poe story that scares you, you truly have ice water running through your veins. But it is his eerie and odd stories that drove thousands to love him. That love continues today. I myself made a pilgrimage to the Edgar Allen Poe Museum in Richmond in the early 1990s to see artifacts from his short and dreary life. Poe was immensely talented, but lived most of his life in poverty and sorrow. He lost both parents at an early age, then his adoptive mother died, he had disagreements with his adoptive father, found true love when he married his young first cousin, but then lost her to tuberculosis. He was prone to bouts with alcoholism and finally died mysteriously in 1849 at the age of 40.
Each January 19th (Poe’s birthday) for the past 58 years (since 1949), Poe’s grave has received a mysterious visitor known as the “Poe Toaster.” The visitor leaves birthday cognac and roses at Poe’s grave. Each year, fans of Poe turn out to see the Poe Toaster. The curator of the Poe House and Museum in Baltimore said 55 people quietly watched as the toaster went about his business. That was different from last year when the crowd tried to interfere with the tribute.
Now this it has not been the same Poe Toaster over the last 58 years. In 1993, the Poe Toaster left a puzzling note that said, “The torch will be passed.” The original Toaster must have been in poor health because a note was left in 1998 saying the original Toaster had died, but had handed the tradition down to his sons.
I don’t think I’ve written about it here yet, but I loved to visit the gravesites of famous people when I lived in San Diego. Any friend that came to town knew they would be dragged up to Hollywood to visit Westwood Memorial Park in Beverly Hills or Forest Lawn Memorial Park. I think it is kinda cool to pay tribute to one of your favorite celebrities, even after they are gone.