You unlock this door with the key of imagination.

Beyond it is another dimension, a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind.

You're moving into a land of both shadow and substance of things and ideas

you've just crossed over into the Twilight Zone.

Tonight we walk the halls of our little After Hours Club here to a room filled with some very old exhibits,

a room where we can ponder a peculiar fascination,

the practice of making human effigies in wax.

In Europe in the Middle Ages when a monarch died, they would be placed fully dressed upon

the top of their coffin and carried to their final resting place. But all it would take is a stumbling pallbearer or a particularly hot day

to make this act of respect a far more gruesome and horrific affair

when the deceased royal either toppled into the crowd or baked in the sun.

So to guard against these disasters, wax copies of the deceased royal were made for these processions.

But why make a whole body when you can just stuff their clothing with padding

and insert a pair of wax hands and a

wax head to complete the illusion. And even after the practice of placing this substitute body

atop the coffin was ended, the wax mannequins were still made for people to come and view and pay their respects and for a time the act of making these wax effigies was very much the domain of the royals of various countries I guess you could say they were the celebrities of their day.

In 1711, Fleet Street and London hosted the moving waxworks of the Royal Court of England,

and in 1770 Philippe Curtis, waxwork modeler to the French court and teacher to Madame

Toussaud, presented his Cabin des Cé, or Wax cabinet, to the people of France.

But in an act of incredible foresight, he opened a special section of his museum that veered away

from royal effigies to a more sinister subject, and this wing was christened the cave of the

great thieves. And in the end, while we might like wandering the wax museums of today

...