Don't Take The Lift: The Elevator that Dripped Blood

[dem bones]

Oliver Frey (?), Usbourne Guide to the Supernatural World, 1979
Joseph Eberle, Weird Tales, July 1953

Don't Take The lift

Andrew Lang - The House Of Strange Stories: The Bachelor Of Arts' Story. : (In the Wrong Paradise & Other Stories, 1885; Hugh Lamb [ed.], Terror by Gaslight, 1975).

Joseph Payne Brennan - On The Elevator: (Weird Tales, July 1953: Nine Horrors and a Dream, 1958: Hugh Lamb [ed.], A Tide of Terror, 1972).

Frank Gruber - The Thirteenth Floor: (Weird Tales, Jan 1949: Boris Karloff's Horror Anthology: Kurt Singer (ed.), The Day Of The Dragon & Other Tales Of Terror, 1971).

L. P. Hartley - Someone In The Lift: (Cynthia Asquith [ed.], (The Third Ghost Book, 1955).

James Wade The Elevator: (August Derleth [ed.], Dark Things, Arkham House, 1971: Such Things May Be, 2018).

Elizabeth Walter - The Lift; (Davy Jones's Tale & Other Supernatural Stories 1971: The Spirit of the Place, 2017)

Jack Oleck - Vault of Horror, 1973.

Dick Balwin - Last Respects: (Marvin Kaye [ed], Brother Theodore's Chamber of Horrors, 1975: Marvin & Saralee Kaye [eds], Masterpieces of Terror and the Supernatural, 1985).

Ramsey Campbell - Down There: (Lin Carter [ed.], Weird Tales #1, 1978: Dark Companions, 1982).

Alan W. Lear - Whoever Heard of a Haunted Lift?: (Mary Danby [ed.], Armada Ghost 15, 1983.

Phillip C. Heath - The Shaft: (Mary Danby [ed.], Nightmares 3, 1985)

Anthony Horowitz - The Lift: (More Horowitz Horror, 2000).

Would also advise against appearing in either the film or novelisation of Omen 2

Additions, corrections, etc., welcome, as ever.

[helrunar]

Great thread. "Room for one more!"

I have a vague memory of a Rosemary Timperley story with a lift theme but I think I'm confusing it with the Hartley yarn-ette.

cheers, Hel.

[dem bones]

I can think of a Timperley never-ending staircase story, not sure I've read one involving a lift.

Perils of Modern Improvements

SARAH MCDONALD, a chambermaid employed at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, New York, has lately met with a shocking death while in the performance of her duties.

It appears that after taking her breakfast she went up to the third floor and proceeded very cheerfully about her work, and while so engaged she was requested by one of the boarders to procure some coals. She went to the hatchway where the luggage-elevator operates, and called to the fireman to send up some wood and coal, and while doing so did not observe the elevator descending from above, as it moves noiselessly. Before she had time to extricate herself the elevator struck her head, crushing it in a horrible manner, breaking her neck, and causing the body to turn a complete somersault, and carrying it down to the cellar.

No one was aware of her fearful death until the elevator reached the cellar, where the fireman who answered her call was waiting to obey the order for sending up the wood and coal. He stood for a moment transfixed with horror at the shocking sight. He could not realize that the inanimate and mutilated form before him was the woman who but a moment before was full of life. Recovering from his surprise, he gave the alarm, and some of the servants removed the remains to await the coroner's inquest.

— The Day's Doings, 13 January 1872

[dem bones]

Gary Kilworth - The Elevator: (Nicholas Royle [ed.], Darklands 2, 1992: Stefan Dziemianowicz, Robert Weinberg & Martin H. Greenberg [eds], 100 Twisted Little Tales of Torment, 1998). Forty-five and fading, Julia can hardly believe her luck in hooking an old, dying, fantastically wealthy Hindu Prince for a husband. Theirs is hardly a case of inflamed passions, so what is he getting out of the deal? Her brother tries to warn her off, but .... all that money. It is only after his death that Julia discovers the terrible truth. Sabash was an advocate of the ancient custom of Sati.