Inventions in Everything: Creepy Dolls to Hold Cremated Remains

The pages of the calendar have turned forward to October once more. In the northern hemisphere, the days are getting shorter, their warmth becoming more and more fleeting. Increasingly bare branches on trees reach out like the fingers of skeletons that move as chilled winds blast through them. Nights are getting longer and seemingly darker.

In short, the conditions and circumstances of “spooky season” have returned. The growing sense of the season’s eerie dread will only end after October 31, when Halloween has come and gone and we can turn our full attention to the coming winter.

The Inventions in Everything team likes to celebrate the arrival of the spooky season by exploring the patents whose inventors see opportunity in the celebration of the macabre. Which naturally leads to our latest featured innovation, given unending life in the form of U.S. Patent 7,627,935: the Doll Urn.

It’s inventor, Deborah R. Ostrum, was awarded a patent for her invention that stores the cremated remains of loved ones inside dolls on 8 December 2009. Figures 1 and 2 of the patent illustrate her vision, depicting how the ashes of the dead might be kept within what we would describe as “creepy” dolls:

Inventor Ostrum makes plain the purpose of her innovation in the Background of the Invention portion of the patent:

The present invention features doll urn for storing a human’s or a pet’s ashes. The doll urn comprises a doll body, a doll head, a doll top, and a voice recorder for recording or playing a message. Disposed in the doll head is an internal compartment, wherein a secure container for holding the ashes may be inserted into the internal compartment via an aperture on the doll head. The doll top comprises a stopper for fitting into the aperture so as to prevent ashes from spilling out of the internal compartment.

Having a secure container for holding cremated remains within the body of a doll is important, less an unsuspecting, innocent child unleashes the deceased’s remains while playing with what they might think to be a simple toy.

But the creepiness factor of Ostrum’s invention cranks up to unnatural levels when you consider the full range of customization she envisions:

The doll urn may be constructed in a variety of shapes, sizes, colors, and/or designs to shape and look like the deceased. For example, in the doll urn is a female doll or a male doll. In some embodiments, the doll urn is a dog, a cat, a bird, or the like. in some embodiments, the doll urn features brown yes, blue eyes, green eyes, or the like. In some embodiments, the doll urn features short hair, long hair curly hair, straight hair, shoulder-length hair, brown hair, blonde hair, red hair, black hair, white hair, gray hair, the like, or a combination thereof. In some embodiments, the doll urn features dark skin, light skin, medium-toned skin, or the like. in some embodiments, the doll urn features a dress, a skirt, a shirt, a pair of pants, a pair of shorts, a hair ribbon, a headband, a bracelet, a necklace, a watch, the like, or a combination thereof.

Dolls holding the remains of the dead, intended to closely resemble them while alive, that you can keep on display in your home.

But wait, that’s not all!

Her patent adds features to allow the doll to play a pre-recorded message from the deceased. If you weren’t already unsettled by imagining a figure that looks like the dearly departed whose purpose is to hold their remains, imagine your unease when it plays their pre-recorded message to you from beyond the grave.

Are you properly scared yet? Because if you’re not, we have other inventions we’ve previously featured that might finish the job….

From the Inventions in Everything Archives

The IIE team has previously covered the following “scary season” inventions:

• Outside the Box Thinking: The Ghost Chair
• Inventions in Everything: Life Support for Severed Heads
• Inventions in Everything: Pure Nightmare Fuel
• Inventions in Everything: Carvable Artificial Pumpkin
• Inventions in Everything: The COVID Candy Chute
• Inventions in Everything: Opening Doors in a Virus Filled World
• Chairs to Haunt Your Dreams This Hallow’s Eve
• Happy Holographic Halloween!
• Self-Carving Pumpkins