Tonight I was saddened to find out that the Freakatorium – Manhattan’s freak museum – or as it was also referred to, El Museo Loco, closed its doors.
Ok, so I am a little late to the party here. It closed in January ’05. I told you I don’t get out of the basement much!
I was preparing to write this post, looking back fondly on the day spent there with the best of friends (hi Ron, checking to see if you are reading). I googled it to get a link for this post and there it was. This sad announcement of its closing.
What a loss. This place rocked. It is the place where Gary bought one of his favorite T-shirts, Zoma the Canibal. Yes, they misspelled it on the shirt. See.
I am pretty sure that I had to ask him to take that shirt off at least once. Maybe we were going to a kid’s birthday party, or worse, Open House at the kid’s school. It is a great shirt though, don’t you think?
Back to the merits of the Freakatorium. It was a tiny little storefront shop really. Squeezed in between a tragically hip eatery and a corner Bodega on the then gentrifying Clinton Street. This place had it all.
Here is a list of the few amazing items of oddity that were housed within its frankly creepy walls:
Pictures of Jo Jo the dog-faced boy
An authentic living, breathing 2-headed turtle (no joke, I saw it move around)
Sammy Davis Jr.’s glass eye
A conjoined twin pig fetus (ew, ew, ew)
See for yourself. This vid is a tad long but Johnny Fox is so weird and wild in a John Waters sort of way. I could not help but watch it to the end. Must admit that parts of it were a little bit liking staring at the accident.
Too much free time?
Maybe.
i could cry but i don't have time 