Trivia

While the origin of the term 'Graveyard Shift' is said to have started in old English coal mines (named for those who worked the midnight to 8 AM shift), that seems hardly plausible. What does working in a coal mine have to do with graveyards, anyway?

Nay, I say, to that. It seems much more reasonable that the term originated when people in the late 1700s and early 1800s began to become concerned about being buried alive. After all, medicine was not quite cutting edge in those days. 'Doctors' (called Leeches, as the main form of therapy back then was 'Bleeding' the patient to remove evil vapors) were often also the local Barber! So mistakes were sometimes made and people were occasionally buried before their time.

To calm the growing fear of such an occurrence happening to anyone, bodies were buried with a cord tied around their wrist and the cord went up through the dirt and was attached to a bell which hung from a stick near the grave. Should anyone thus awake within the confines of a buried coffin, they had only to pull the cord (rather frantically, no doubt) to ring the above ground bell and hopefully someone would come dig them up before they suffocated, or simply died of fright.

This theory worked well enough during the daylight hours, as graveyards were originally located near the church and people were always about the church grounds during the day. At night, however, a watchman was hired to patrol the graveyard (possibly by relatives of some recently buried person) to listen for the sound of a bell ringing, and if such were heard he would summon assistance and (hopefully) dig the person up before it was too late.

This then is a more sensible explanation for the origin of the term 'Graveyard Shift,' as the watchman spent his entire shift in the Graveyard. This is also quite possibly where the phrase, 'Saved by the Bell' originated, since the person was (again, hopefully) Saved by (ringing) the Bell.

Horrotica Trivia 2008












Graveyard Shift
By: Zed Holt

1994—A hospital in Oregon

Allen leaned back and put his feet up on the desk, then let out a long sigh. His specific duties for the night were finished and if he was lucky he could now spend an hour or so catching up on his reading. As he reached for his book the desk phone rang; the sound was overly loud in the otherwise quiet room and it startled him. He dropped his feet to the floor and quickly snatched up the receiver before it could ring again.

“101, Allen,” he said, while trying to keep the resentment from his voice.

“This is Seven,” a detached sounding female stated. “We have a pickup for you.”

“Right,” Allen grumbled into the phone. “Ten minutes.” He waited until he heard a click on the other end and then dropped the receiver back onto its cradle from a height of about a foot and a half. Allen looked up to the wall clock. “Shit,” he said and pushed himself up from his chair. “Why do they always wait until Three O’clock in the fucking morning?”

He got a couple of clean sheets from a cupboard and tossed them onto a gurney, then pushed it through the swinging double doors and into a hallway. The freight elevator was near the morgue, so he pushed the UP button and then waited.

The Seventh Floor was dimly lit and quiet as he pushed his gurney up to the nurse’s station. A patient’s bell was pinging softly from the call board on the rear wall. Other than that, the only noise came from the quick scratching of a pen on paper as a middle-aged nurse with graying hair wrote in a chart. Tony stood at the counter for a moment and when she didn’t acknowledge his presence, he cleared his throat.

The nurse looked up at him with a quizzical look, but didn’t say anything.

“Pick up for 101,” Allen finally said.

“Oh, yes.” From a hidden shelf beneath the counter the nurse pulled a clipboard with several forms attached and handed it to Allen. “Room 739,” she said, and then immediately returned to her charting.

“Thanks,” Allen muttered and pushed on down the hall.

The corridor was fairly dark and except for an occasional snore or soft moan coming from the patient rooms, silent. The door to room 739 was closed, so Allen left his gurney in the hall and pushed the door open. He saw the privacy curtains were pulled around a bed by the window and the room was illuminated by a single, overhead light. Allen pulled the gurney into the room and closed the door, then went over and pulled back the curtains. The body of an elderly man was on the bed, a sheet pulled up to his chin. The old guy looked as if he were merely asleep, if you didn’t count the grey, waxy pallor of his skin and his blue-tinged lips. He was sleeping the ‘Big Sleep.’

“Crap,” Allen muttered. “The least they could have done was shroud the poor guy.” He then noticed the packaged shroud on a bedside table. “Great.” Now he would have to shroud the body before getting it onto the gurney—apparently all by himself.

Allen pulled the top sheet down, exposing the body. The old man was fairly small and his body showed no sign of damage. Allen picked up the clipboard and flipped through the papers, looking for a cause of death.

The man was 68 years old. “Hmmm,” Allen said. “The ol’ ticker gave out, huh? Too bad, dude.” He replaced the clipboard on the bedside table and reached for the shroud, but then had an idea. After checking his watch, Allen quickly pushed the bed against the far wall and slid his gurney up next to the bed.

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About the Author

Zed Holt lives in the American Northwest with a number of animals, after leaving the hectic and spiritually frustrating Rat Race behind him. There he writes occasionally, but is at Great Peace.
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