Elmer’s Funhouse Of Death
by Dean Terry
Things get spooky when a mysterious old-time criminal is found hanging around a creepy amusement park.
The year was 1976, and a production company was using the funhouse at the Nu-Pike Amusement park in Long Beach, California to film scenes for the (then) popular television show The Six Million Dollar Man.
While arranging items for one of the sequences, a technician adjusted a dummy, which hung from a noose, and accidently broke it’s lower arm off. After crew members got some glue to stick it back on, they saw that there was what looked like a real bone and joint sticking out of it.
The coroner was called, and an examination of the mysterious hanging corpse was done. It was found to be the mummified remains of a male between 30-40 years old. The coroner also determined the remains had been embalmed using an arsenic technique, which wasn’t really used after the 1920’s.
Scars indicated an autopsy had been done somewhere along the way. A bullet wound was found, the trajectory still visible through all the bones and organs inside. Although the bullet had been removed, the half-copper jacket was still in the body; a type made from in the early 1900’s.
A 1924 penny and some old tickets stubs were found, lodged in the throat of the mysterious corpse. These were to provide clues which helped to identify the dead man.
Image: Elmer - as he was found in the funhouse
One of the ticket stubs read Louis Sonney’s Museum of Crime, 521 S. Main street, Los Angeles. The museum was long gone, but the police found the former owner’s son who told them that his dad bought the embalmed body of Elmer McCurdy, who had been an outlaw in Oklahoma and charged folks a quarter to see it.
Research confirmed there was indeed an Elmer. He had been a safecracker, killer, thief and escapee from the Oklahoma Territorial Penitentiary. He was killed in a gun battle with deputies after an unsuccessful train robbery in Kansas.
Elmer’s body had been taken to a funeral home, where it was embalmed. After that, it had laid around for years, unclaimed.
Some enterprising people must have had the idea to exhibit him and so showed up claiming to be relatives. They took the body and it was shown as an oddity in all over the West and South, ending up the property of Louis Sonney.
Image: Elmer - in life - and in death
When he died, his son sold the exhibits in 1971 to the Hollywood wax museum, who said Ol’ Elmer wasn’t life-like enough to keep around. They sold it to the Nu-Pike Amusement Park. And so there hung Elmer.
If it wasn’t for his arm being broken off - his lucky break - Elmer would still be hanging around, somewhere, today.
When authorities in Oklahoma were told of the find, they sent someone out with Elmer’s old records. Mug shots confirmed his identity. Sure enough, it was Elmer.
Elmer McCurdy is now buried at the Summit View Cemetery in Guthie, Oklahoma - along with his arm.
Copyright © 2008 Our Strange World
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