Buckland Museum of Witchcraft and Magick

It all started in a Bay Shore basement. It was the mid-1960s, and Raymond Buckland, leader of what became known as the Long Island Coven, had been collecting historical witchcraft objects, oddities, and occult paraphernalia for years. He amassed hundreds of pieces, and with shelves bursting he eventually moved into larger quarters, opening the Buckland Museum of Witchcraft and Magick.

Buckland was inspired by his mentor Gerald Gardner, and the museum has many objects originally owned by the father of “Gardnerian” Wicca. Alongside are Egyptian funerary figurines called “ushabtis,” and artifacts owned by magicians, astrologers, fortune tellers, and pagan community elders. There is even an Alruan, a carved mandrake root.

In addition to being a coven leader, Buckland was a busy writer and lecturer on the move, and his collection came along with him. Over the years it lived in New Hampshire, came through some legal disputes in New Orleans, and eventually ended up in storage in Columbus, Ohio. Now, with a new curator and small museum to show it off, it has been risen again as the Buckland Museum of Witchcraft and Magick.

Although space is limited, a large portion of the collection is on display. There's even room for the Demon in a Box, captured by Buckland in the 1970s with the help of a ceremonial magician.