PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — If you’re in the mood for a spooky story around Halloween, you can never go wrong with Edgar Allan Poe.
His dark tales stand the test of time and continue to spark new retellings, like the latest Netflix series by Mike Flanagan, “The Fall of the House of Usher.”
Poe wrote several of his most famous stories in Philadelphia, including “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Black Cat.”
Poe lived in five different homes over the six years he spent here, and the last place he lived before he moved to New York — the only one of his Philadelphia homes still standing — is now the Edgar Allan Poe National Historic Site at 7th and Spring Garden.
“Poe, for most of his life, had financial difficulties, and a lot of his friends described this house as a bit impoverished,” says Luke Hopely, a national park ranger who leads tours of the Poe House which is run by the National Park Service.
“[It’s] a bit small and cramped, but maybe Poe had some of the happiest days of his life here in this house.”
Hopely says this because it was a prolific and successful time for Poe in his career. He published 31 stories while living in Philadelphia between 1838 and 1844, and some historians think he might have started writing his most well-known poem, “The Raven,” in that house.
The house itself is mostly empty now with bare walls and creaky wood floors.
“Poe furnished this place with his imagination,” Hopely says. “That's how he put food on the table in this house. So, in a way, you, as the visitor … are supposed to use your imagination to try and visualize what it could have looked like.”
There are some drawings to assist your imagination — a table with food in the kitchen and Poe sitting at a desk in his writing room.
The goal of the Poe House is not just to teach about Poe’s life, but to encourage visitors — many of whom are children — to think creatively in the spirit of Poe. Writing prompts are offered in the reading room, where visitors can leave behind their own verses.
“We very much encourage people to use [the writing prompts] as they walk through the space and try and create their own works alongside the same places that Poe lived.”
You can hear more about the Poe House and the stories he wrote there on The Jawncast. Listen in the player below or on any podcast player.