Vampire Obituaries

(The following have been excerpted with permission from Undead Quarterly, Jan-Feb 2021)

Lil’ Corny (1749-2020)

Popular Soundcloud rapper and Instagram personality Lil’ Corny perished on Nov. 23, 2020, in a tragic open drapery incident in Budapest, Hungary. While on tour with his protégé and familiar Papreeka, his non-English speaking maid opened the blackout curtains in his suite at noon. He is survived by Papreeka and approx. 120 spawn.

Corny’s birth name was Cornelius Beauregard, and he was serving as a colonel in the U.S. Army when he was made a vampire by Madame Sarah Billingstone in 1762. Through the years, his various adopted personas included Cornel Beauregard, the first mayor of Indianapolis; Corn Bow the Night Hunter, a legendary nocturnal stalker who terrorized Midwestern native and settler communities throughout the 1800s (also known as the Corn Demon); Cornel Buckley, inventor of the belt loop; Beau Cornelius, radio crooner best known for his hit “Sangria”; and magician Cornelius Spectre. He re-emerged in the mid-2010s as Lil’ Corny, a Southern rapper known for his bawdy humor and detailed descriptions of historical events. His final album, Folk Traditions of 19^th Century Indiana, was released in early 2020.

Meredith Francis (1527-2020)

Buffalo, New York realtor Meredith Francis passed away on Dec. 12, 2020, impaled by a tree branch when a wood chipper backfired as she was doing yardwork. She is survived by her husband Humberto, familiar Bill, and approx. 1,400 spawn.

Meredith was born under the name Beatrijs Hoornbeeck in 1527, the daughter of Dutch Puritans from Rotterdam. She was 24 years old when she was turned vampire by an unknown member of her sewing circle. Over the next 45 decades, she lived her immortal existence under a variety of personas, including Elizabeth Bock, popularizer of the thimble; Lady Mildred Lipscomb, mistress of Charles Somerset, 4^th Duke of Beaufort; Lizzie Milton, the second woman in Massachusetts to wear pants; and Greta Garbo, iconic film star who famously withdrew from public life when it became obvious she wasn’t aging. She had been living as suburban realtor Meredith Francis with her husband of 300 years, Humberto, for several decades at the time of her unfortunate accident.

Sam Cranston (1814-2020)

Right-wing radio personality Sam Cranston died on Dec. 25, 2020, due to accidental holy water ingestion. Cranston is survived by approx. 400 spawn.

Born as Samuel Crann in 1814, he was the third son of noted Boston cobbler Wilhelm Crann. Samuel was delivering boots to Worchester in 1830 when he was waylaid en route and turned into a vampire by an unknown undead highwayman. Crann’s pseudonyms over the next 200 years included Bobert Crann, a popular Boston brewer; Sam Crank, sheriff of Kansas City, Kansas; vaudeville comic Sammy Cramble; and Omaha city council member Fred Cranston. He emerged as popular talk show host Sam Cranston in the mid-1980s, winning large audiences with his incendiary diatribes against Democrats, minorities, women, and vampire hunters. At the peak of his popularity, Cranston could be heard on over 200 ClearChannel radio stations throughout the Midwest. He was in his home studio recording a MyPillow advertisement when he drank a bottle of Evian water that had been unknowingly blessed by a local Methodist minister. Cranston died instantly.