Traumafessions :: Reader Greg V. on Homey the Clown

Hey Kindertrauma team–

I came across your website in a search for the Rag Man of the NUTCRACKER FANTASY movie, and I loved your reader's treatment of it. Thought I'd contribute a snippet:

As kids growing up on the North Side of Chicago in the early ‘90s, my friends and I were enthralled (that child's mix of abject terror and insatiable fascination) by stories of a child abductor dressed as Homey the Clown, DAMON WAYANS' character from IN LIVING COLOR. This was a bona fide news story on local Chicago networks, not just a product of our own twisted imaginations.

The guy apparently drove around in a van and attracted kids to the van, upon which he would abduct them and molest them. This was in the heyday of child abduction scares, STEPHEN KING's IT, and only a few decades after John Wayne Gacy in the Chicago area.

Anyway, Homey was reportedly at large in the neighborhood of my grammar school, and so for the better part of a school year (maybe third grade), whenever we'd see a yellow van (I think that was the alleged color of Homey's ride), we would all rush to the school fence, sometimes with rocks or baseball bats in hand, and start to yell, "Homey, it's Homey." Again, who knows the veracity or the extent of the original news item, but it certainly caught our imagination!

NOTE: Last Supper clown painting courtesy of HERE.