Strange Deaths, Ghosts, and Legends at the Erie Cemetery
By Erin Phillips at ErieReader.com
Tour leader, historian, and educator Anna Foll tells the stories of these two deaths of Charles and William, as well as many others, during her cemetery tour entitled “Strange Deaths.” Little William VanValkenberg rests in his family’s plot in the southern portion of the Erie Cemetery. He was just a 10-month-old baby when he died in 1858 from “drinking ice water.” Upon seeing this cause of death in the internment books, Foll immediately got to work researching how this could possibly be. Apparently, it was not an isolated occurrence.
Foll comments on her research, “Apparently in 1820 in Boston, 16 people allegedly died from drinking cold water.” The truth of the matter is much more likely that there was an underlying, undiagnosed cardiac issue with poor baby William that was exacerbated by the shock to his system from drinking very cold water. Foll continues, “Actually, in 1999, there was a case of cardiac arrest in a 12-year-old who drank a frozen slushie really fast. The cause was found to be cardiac arrhythmia, due to an undiagnosed cardiac condition. Something similar is likely what happened with William.”
Read More: Strange Deaths, Ghosts, and Legends at the Erie Cemetery
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