The Angell Box

"Much of the material which I correlated will be later published by the American Archaeological Society, but there was one box which I found exceedingly puzzling, and which I felt much averse from shewing to other eyes. It had been locked, and I did not find the key till it occurred to me to examine the personal ring which the professor carried always in his pocket. Then indeed I succeeded in opening it, but when I did so seemed only to be confronted by a greater and more closely locked barrier. For what could be the meaning of the queer clay bas-relief and the disjointed jottings, ramblings, and cuttings which I found? Had my uncle, in his latter years, become credulous of the most superficial impostures?"

Jason McKittrick brings us this recreation of the late Prof. Angell's mysterious box from "The Call of Cthulhu". This is one of those projects that successfully uses a collection of props to tell a story. Each little bit, from a journal entry to a notation on a photograph, helps build up the narrative. That kind of narrative by accretion requires both quality and quantity to have an impact. I can just imagine the hours of work that went into pulling this off.

This shot illustrates one of the difficulties in putting together a set like this. You not only have to create items like the bas-relief and idol that are included with it, but all of the supplementary props pictured in the photographs. It's a huge effort, whether you do it physically or via Photoshop.







You can see more pictures of the complete set in it's listing on Ebay. Given the time it took to put it together I expect it will go for a goodly sum.