Robert the Doll

In June 2015, I was driving into work listening to Coast to Coast AM, and I caught most of a conversation about Robert the Doll, a haunted doll in Key West, Florida. This was exciting to me, because in July, the family and I would be in south Florida on vacation. I listened intently to the conversation and made a mental note of the museum in which the doll was housed. Then and there I planned to see the haunted doll for myself when I reached Key West.

Robert the Doll is a handmade doll about forty inches tall. The Steiff Company of Germany made the doll around the turn of the twentieth century. According to legend, Robert giggles, moves on his own, changes facial expressions, and more. Gene Otto, a young boy from a prominent Key West family, owned Robert and had a lifelong friendship with the doll. Growing up, Gene often blamed Robert for his misbehaving, claiming “Robert did it.” Some have speculated that this constant and powerful energy from Gene may have animated the doll, causing it to take on its so-called supernatural abilities.

As an adult, Gene kept his friendship with Robert the Doll. Gene married in 1930, but never let go of his beloved doll. Gene died in 1974 and his wife died a couple of years later. According to the website Robertthedoll.org:

“Myrtle Reuter purchased the Otto home in 1974. She became Robert’s companion and kept him when she moved to Von Phister Street six years later. In 1994 she donated Robert to the Fort East Martello Museum claiming, ‘he moved around her house on his own and was haunted.’ Myrtle died a few months later, but Robert remained active.”

http://robertthedoll.org/

A couple of weeks after the aforementioned Coast to Coast AM episode, the family and I visited Key West. I set my sights on the East Martello Museum where Robert is housed. I had heard and read stories of folks who had taken a picture of Robert the Doll "without his permission" and running into a string of bad luck. So, I told all the kids not to photograph him when we visited the museum.

When we walked inside, we bought our tickets and signed a guest book. My wife pointed out all of the Robert souvenirs and memorabilia and there were signed copies of Robert the Doll, by David L. Sloan.

The lady behind the counter asked, “Are you guys here to see Robert?”

“Yes,” I said. “I was listening to Coast to Coast AM in June and the guy that wrote that book was on. After that, I was determined to see Robert when we got to Key West.”

She smiled. “You’re not alone. Folks from all over visit us. People love Robert.”

“I bet.”

“Just be careful about pictures. You’re free to take as many pictures as you want in the museum, but Robert doesn’t like for anyone to take his picture without permission.”

“So I’ve heard! Nah, I’m good just seeing him. No point taking a chance on making him mad.”

By the time I reached the glass box that held Robert, my kids were already there. They moved on to another part of the museum shortly after I reached the display.

So this is Robert the Doll.

He looked innocent enough sitting behind the glass in his sailor outfit and teddy bear. Nothing about him seemed creepy. I’ve been around dolls much scarier. My sister had a large Raggedy Ann doll growing up and I hated that damned thing. It always gave me the creeps. But I didn’t get the same vibe, or any vibe, really, from Robert.

My grandfather bought me a thirty-inch Bozo ventriloquist dummy for Christmas when I was seven or eight years old. I liked it at first, but grew to hate that stupid clown and became terrified of it. Bozo eventually found his way to the landfill.

I studied Robert. He was no Chucky from Child’s Play, or was he? Did Robert only seem benign because there was a plexiglass box separating us?  Having come from a Pentecostal background, even though I do not practice religion these days, the old teachings die hard. And I believe that evil spirits, or demons, can inhabit dolls and other inanimate objects as well of taking possession of people. I am not sure how this works, but it seems to me that it does occur from time to time and is the best explanation for the Robert the Doll mystery.

Eventually I left Robert and moved on through the rest of the museum. When I was outside in a courtyard area, my son walked up to me and told me that my youngest daughter had photographed Robert.

Great.

After a bunch of arguing with her, she deleted the photographs and stormed off. Par for the course for a fifteen-year-old girl. And honestly, maybe she was right. I guess I was being superstitious, but why take chances?

I walked over to the case and made sure no one was around or within earshot. “Robert,” I whispered, “look man, I’m really sorry about my daughter. She’s just a hardheaded kid trying to be cool. I know she didn’t mean anything and I made her delete the pics. I hope you can look past it.” With that, and feeling rather silly, I walked away and met up with the rest of the family.

Fast forward several days and we’re on our way home. We landed in Baltimore around 10:45 p.m. and it took about an hour to get our luggage and make our way to our car. From Baltimore it would take a little over two hours to get to our home in Frederick County, Virginia. But that wasn’t the case. Just after we got onto Interstate 66 in Virginia, we hit a massive traffic jam.

As we sat and sat and sat, I glanced at the instrument panel. The temperature gauge was heading in the wrong direction. Dammit! How is that possible? I couldn’t understand. We were in my wife’s car, a fairly new Buick Enclave with low mileage. And I checked all of the fluids before we left—I always do that, but I take extra care before a trip. What the hell?

We were stuck in a center lane miles from an exit, and there was nothing open at that hour, anyway. I had to do something, so I turned off the air conditioner which helped slow the temperature climb, but not enough. So, I had everyone roll the windows down and I turn the heater on full blast. That pulled the temperature gauge down to about the 5/8 mark—much hotter than you want, but in the safe zone.

Here we were on a muggy July night sitting on I-66 with the heater blasting. It was miserable.

I thought of all the bad luck folks have had after pissing off Robert the Doll. Was that what was going on here? I thought it probably was, but there was no way to know. Fortunately, as long as I kept the heat cranking, the engine didn’t get any hotter. The traffic jam lasted about an hour and a half, and once we cleared it, we were home in about an hour. I kept the heat on during the drive, but I was able to turn it down a little.

The following morning, I spent an hour or so checking the engine. There was plenty of coolant and nothing jumped out at me as to why the engine tried to overheat. And here’s the kicker—it never did it again for as long as I owned the car. So, yes, I think it was Robert. I think he let me off easy because I apologized on my daughter’s behalf. At the same time, he did enough to remind me of her misstep.

Laugh if you want. Call me superstitious if you want. But I don't care—Robert did it!

Read all about Robert the Doll in the sixth book of my Detours Into the Paranormal travel series. Titled Adventures as a Florida Man: Searching for Skunk Apes, Water Monsters, Lost Treasure and More, the book covers all sorts of strange happenings in the Sunshine State.

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