The Salem Witch trials made this Massachusetts city notorious – but it has now embraced all things spooky.
Cry Innocent in Salem, Massachusetts
On the stand, Bridget Bishop is doing herself no favours. She’s failing to hide her contempt for all concerned, and her claims not to know anyone testifying against her don’t ring true.
Colonel John Hathorne, presiding over proceedings, continually presses home that it’s not about deciding guilt – it’s about deciding whether there’s enough evidence to go to trial. Men of the church and women who have already confessed gang up to implicate Bishop, the barrage of individually spurious evidence somehow combining to make a compelling whole.
Cry Innocent: The People vs Bridget Bishop is half theatre, half interactive experience – the audience plays jury and can ask questions of the in-character actors. And it aims to give an idea of how the hysteria of the Salem Witch Trials was whipped up.
The Salem Witch Trials
In 1692, Salem, Massachusetts was a hotbed of squabbling families and prissy puritans. When children started acting disturbingly – speaking in strange voices, contorting themselves and generally seeming a bit possessed – witchcraft was quickly diagnosed as the source of the problem. From there, people were accused of being witches left, right and centre. Scores were settled, distrust of outsiders turned into blame and those already accused or convicted quickly worked out that dragging out implications of others could keep them from the gallows for a bit longer.
In all, 20 people were executed – one crushed to death, the others hanged. The hysteria only came to an abrupt end once the colonial Governor’s wife was accused of being a witch, and the trial were stopped.
It was a dark period that has become a microcosm of how witch hunts kick off. Arthur Miller used it as a metaphor for the McCarthyite witchhunts in The Crucible.
The Salem Witch Museum
But what’s fascinating about Salem itself is how the small coastal city has owned its past and, in many ways, embraced it. There is a memorial, where the victims are commemorated simply and effectively as stone benches. But there are also seemingly dozens of attractions and museums with “witch” in the name.
The Salem Witch Museum is the best of these, with the first part going in for dramatic narration and atmospherics, while the second part goes into the history of witchcraft and witch hunts.
How Salem embraced Halloween
These attractions, however, are joined by several others clutching onto any vague scary theme. There are ghost walks, there are waxwork museums, there’s a gallery devoted to creatures from horror movies. In many places, Salem is an all-out, unashamed spooky take Disneyland.
This is particularly the case during the build-up to Halloween in October, when the American enthusiasm for pumpkins, plastic spiders and black cats gets turned up to 11. Salem happily becomes the Halloween dress-up capital of the world.
The real witches of Salem, Massachusetts
But in amongst this witch kitsch is something rather unexpected. In the city where people were falsely called witches and put to death for it, real witches have moved in. Shops supplying self-styled witches have set up, and there’s a sizable Wiccan community. Luckily, the other residents aren’t quite as puritan as they once were.
More Massachusetts travel ideas
For a wealth of Salem tours and activities – some historical, some silly and spooky – check from the options here.
Other Massachusetts travel articles on Planet Whitley include an attempt to understand baseball at Fenway Park and learning the legends of Harvard.
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