The stories in the haunted-houses section help the reader discern the nature of ghostly appearances. In terms of numerical frequency, eighty-five percent of these stories focus on ghostly noises—sounds that especially include footsteps, ghastly cries and screams, rattling dishes, closing of doors and windows, hammering sounds, tinkling bells, chairs rocking back and forth, activated sewing machines, musical sounds emanating from various instruments such as pianos and fiddles, and hymn singing.
The next largest category of ghostly manifestations in the haunted-houses section features ghostly entities that are usually associated with the above noises. They are seen by the recipient persons, but there is no said-to-be direct contact with the ghost. Forty-two percent of these returnees are the ghosts of deceased family members; others include headless beings; some represent spirits that return to eke out vengeance against those who did them wrong in their living years; others are spirits of individuals who simply loved the old home place and cannot move out, even after death removed them from their wonderful earthly abode. Often, ghostly entities are seen as hazy, misty figures and shadows, some of whom are former plantation slaves who were cruelly mistreated by their owners. Even animals, such as dogs, sheep, and wildcats occasionally appear as ghostly creatures. No matter how or what was experienced in these haunted houses, numerous families moved out and away from them. They couldn’t take it any longer.
Other ways in which ghosts make themselves apparent to the living is by appearing as a felt presence or as a pair of ghostly eyes; sending out cold or chilly breezes; turning electric lights and electrical devices off and on; moving pieces of furniture and miscellaneous house furnishings from place to place; opening and closing windows and doors, even in the presence of living witnesses. In one instance, a ghost appeared as a puddle of water on the floor.
In the house-ghost category, it is of interest to observe where the ghosts appeared and in what numerical order. The bedroom is the most common place where ghosts were heard, felt, and sometimes seen. Ghostly visitations throughout the house ranks second. The stairway alone is next, followed by the upstairs area in general, the parlor or living room, the hallway, basement or cellar, kitchen, attic, dining room, porch, and the roof.
The manners in which the ghosts made persons aware that they were present included, in order of numerical instances, ghostly noises of many varieties; identifiable ghostly presences seen by viewers; lights, shadows, and misty figures; felt presences; ghostly touches felt by the living; scents of various perfumes; and chilly breezes blowing across the room when all windows and doors were closed.
Regardless as to how, when, and in what form these ghostly visitations occurred, those persons who experienced or witnessed the uncanny manifestations will declare that what they saw, heard, or felt really did happen. As a matter of fact, approximately one-fourth of the house-ghost stories were told as personal experiences by the narrators.
The titles of these stories were, for the most part, assigned by the author after analytically screening a story s contents. Seldom do storytellers verbally provide a title for the story they are about to tell. They simply begin with introductions such as “Now, let me tell you a story about a real ghost. Here’s what happened….” Or, if the account is universally told, and the narrators are aware of this, they may begin with wording such as “Let me tell the story as I know it about the face in the window.”
These narrative accounts are printed here verbatim from four main kinds of sources: those spoken into a tape recorder; those taken down on notepads in shorthand version and then reworded as closely as possible to the way they were originally told; those written and submitted by the narrators, some of them by email; and those that appeared as newspaper accounts I sought to retain the original form of the story; thus I never changed the wording so as to falsify the story or change the story’s intended message to the listener. Most of these stories fit the first category—stories that were recorded as told many years ago—and category three, as many were submitted in handwritten or typewritten format.
It will be of interest to see whether these accounts will be passed along from generation to generation as customarily done during ancestral times. Thankfully, some of the stories herein were told by teenagers. Perhaps this signifies that these stories will be passed along to their children and subsequent generations. So let’s read and share these narrative accounts with no feeling of ignorance, superstition, or disrespect toward those persons who provided these wonderful stories. And as you read them, do not forget to identify and glean the historically descriptive bits of information about people and houses, as such information is not likely to be available in any other source, published or otherwise.
Notes to Introduction
1. Kathryn Tucker Windham, Jeffrey Introduces 13 More Southern Ghosts (Tuscaloosa and London: University of Alabama Press, 1971), p. 5.
2. Kentucky materials gathered by members of the Federal Writers Project are on file at the State Library and Archives, Frankfort.
3. Ruth Ann Musick, Coffin Hollow and Other Ghost Tales (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1977), p. 4.
4. Nelson Maynard II, Louisville, November 20,2000.
5. Barbara Walker, Out of the Ordinary: Folklore and the Supernatural (Logan: Utah State University Press, 1995), p. 4.
Haunted Houses
1. “Elkton’s Halcyon House”
Todd County
We call this old house Halcyon; it s where Joy and I live here in Elkton. The back part of the house was built between 1812 and 1815, and the front was built in 1837. It’s been in the family for years and years. My parents and grandparents lived in this house. Now, you talk about storytelling: boy, they could do it. I just loved to hear them tell these stories when I was a little boy.
There have been strange manifestations in this house that we’ve never been able to explain. The house has always been occupied by the owners, and they have always been interested in family matters. I remember former slaves who came back to visit my grandmother when I was a child.
My mother was born in a house across the street. Christine Carouthers, my mother s close relative, was the last to live in this house. She died in this room—the library. They didn’t want the house to go out of the family. My mother and daddy moved here in my childhood.
We had brought much of the furniture across the street that belonged to my mother’s grandparents and other relatives. We were sitting here one night on the sofa, very quiet. Suddenly, we heard a great crash in the parlor. We went in there and looked. Grandma’s portrait had fallen off the wall.
I helped put Grandmas framed portrait back up on the wall. But about three months later, “Crash.” Grandma had fallen again. Not Grandpa! His portrait was perfectly secured there on the wall. But Grandma had fallen again. When we came back out of the room, Mother said, “I’m not sure that Grandma is happy here in this house.” I started trying to find out why Grandma would not be happy here. So I asked this lady, an old cousin, who was serving as circuit court clerk, if she could give me a reason as to why Grandma wouldn’t be happy in our house.
She couldn’t think of any reason at first, but two weeks later she told me that this couple that lived here, Lucy and her husband, got into some personal family trouble and Lucy made him leave sometime in the 1850s. But she loved him so very much that she didn’t want to be there when he left. So she went back up to her old home place here in Elkton, a frame house built in 1856. When her husband was leaving her and was passing by her house on his way out of town, Lucy was staring out through this narrow windowpane. My grandmother was watching Lucy as Lucy’s husband drove by for the last time.
As already said, Grandmother and Grandfather moved into this house later on. So the reason that my grandmother’s portrait fell from the wall is the fact that she wasn’t happy living in this house that Lucy and her husband had lived in before Lucy ran him off for the last time.
Having found out what this spirit was all about, I got some
large blocks of wood and some large steel nails. I drove about six of those deep into those old bricks, then hung Grandma’s portrait up again. She has not fallen since I fixed the frame, but when I walk into that room, she is staring right at me. I feel that she is not happy, even yet.
2. “Mary Lou’s Story”
Lewis County
Mary Lou and her family moved into a house in Lewis County that everybody said was haunted. The house had belonged to a couple who were having marital problems. Because of their trouble, the wife banned her husband from the house. Having no other place to go, he took up residence in a building which was only a few feet from the main dwelling and was connected to it by a walkway.
That summer was very hot, and the temperature must have made the building unbearable for him. On a very hot day, he was found dead in the little hot building. Clearly, he had died of a heat stroke. After his death, people reported seeing his spirit roaming the grounds on hot nights.
Mary Lou’s family moved into the big house in the spring, and everything seemed to go well except they couldn’t keep the door to the small building closed. Finally, in desperation the husband locked it.
One morning, Mary Lou sat in the kitchen alone drinking a second cup of coffee after getting her husband off to work. She heard heavy footsteps on the stairs and then heard the backdoor slam. Funny, she thought, anyone entering the house or leaving would have to pass her first. The footsteps had sounded too heavy for the kids to make, but she checked just to make sure. All were in their beds still asleep. She looked around, and the backdoor was standing open.
The weather turned ghastly hot. She sort of just ignored the noises she heard. Later on that day, she went out into the yard and toiled, then took a cigarette break by sitting down under a tree. Again, the familiar sounds of the door commanded her attention. She looked up at the house and saw the curtains of the kitchen window part as if two hands had lifted them back in order to peer out through them. She again looked, but there was no one there. The window was empty. Then the curtains fell back across the window. As she continued around the house telling herself that she had just imagined all of this, she came upon the open basement door. She was sure that she had locked it. Still thinking it was the heat making her crazy, she locked the door and went back to work. Later, passing by the door, she found it open again. By this time she was really shook up, so she poured out her story to her husband when he got home. He just scolded her for being so silly as to believe that.
Over the next few weeks the weather got hotter, and the unusual occurrences became more frequent. The building in which the old man had died was padlocked, but to her surprise she often found it standing open. She would lock it, only to find it open again. Her husband kept telling her there was a simple explanation for it all, but she continued to witness things.
One morning she heard noises coming from the kitchen. When she got there, she felt the whole room vibrating as if a giant hand was angrily shaking it. Also, there were sounds coming from inside the walls as if someone were tearing at the boards, trying to rip them away.
That night as she lay sleeping, her son came running into the room saying that he heard noises coming from the attic above his room. “It sounds as if someone is up there trying to get out,” the scared child exclaimed. She put him in her bed and lay down beside him to calm his fears. Just as she was about to drop off to sleep, the house was again seized by another fit of shaking. The windows vibrated with such intense tremors that she was sure they would be wrenched from their frames. Her husband, who this time had been witness to what had happened, could no longer deny that some supernatural force was at work here, and that vacating the house was the only answer.
Looking back now, Mary realizes that each occurrence was on extremely hot days or nights. It was as if the poor, tortured soul of the old man kept opening the doors to get air. Mary Lou wonders if someone had locked the door of the building, keeping the old man in there until the hot temperature took its toll on his body, causing him to die and leaving his soul to wander airlessly tearing at the windows and opening doors seeking relief from the devastating heat.
3. “The Blue Lady Ghost in the Keen Johnson Building”
Madison County
College campuses everywhere have a sizable number of ghosts, according to those persons who have reported their sightings. One of EKU’s ghosts is that of the Blue Lady of the Keen Johnson Building. Different explanations exist as to who the ghost is and how she died. One version holds that she was a student actress who didn’t get the part she tried out for, thus decided to quit school. It is said that the train she took derailed, killing several people. Her body was never found, however.
Another version of the legend claims that this student had the lead part in a play but died in a car accident on her way to opening night.
Still another explanation claims that the Blue Lady ghost is that of an actress who played the part of a person who committed suicide in the play. A few nights before the play opened, the actress was up in the bell tower practicing and was so into character that she hanged herself just like the character in the play that she was personifying.
Several people on campus claim to have seen a hazy blue mist hovering around the bell tower late at night. Others say they have heard her voice in the theater when no one else was there.
4. “The Tan Man”
Pike County
These events occurred at Harmons Branch, Pike County, Kentucky. Three houses were built on an old strip mine fill-in back during the 1950s by Rhonda C. Rustin (Clark). Our family was the second family to live there as a whole until 1985. Our youngest son still lives there. He was the only one not to be affected or “sense” what the rest of us saw or felt, with the exception of smelling the roses. Later in the 1980s, this hollow became more prominent. It was then that an FBI agent hid the body of [name withheld] there after he killed her. He was the first FBI agent ever to be convicted of such a crime. Her body had decomposed to just bones when he confessed to the crime. I like to think our “Tan Man” has something else to work with.
We never knew who the Tan Man was but the Ouija board said he had been murdered by two men who were still alive, and he would tell us after they had died and he could rest in peace. We quit asking the board anything because of the obscene language it began to spell out; I threw it away.
I don’t recall when the Tan Mans presence came. It was a gradual awareness by members of our family. Our oldest daughter would often tell us she didn’t like to go into our bedroom or the hallway leading to it; something eerie and strange about it. She had always been afraid of her shadow, so we had never thought much of her remarks.
We had a beagle dog, Sam. He was a grouchy, lazy sort of hound; made his rounds and slept a lot. One day he went nuts. He cried, he cowered, he shook and moaned. The dog was terrified. We called the farm handyman who was good with dogs. He thought Sam had gone mad, and we tried to get ready to put him down. We were all crying and trying to calm the dog, and believe me, it took hours. Thank goodness we didn’t put him down; he was just scared, but by what? This never happened again.
Another event happened during a spring month. As the years passed we would notice April was a busy time for Tan Man. Our eldest son had a souped-up car and had been to Bristol, Virginia, where he attended the auto races. It was 2:30-3:00 A.M. when he arrived home.
As most mothers, I was still awake but in bed and had heard him open the door and start down the hall. He called out to me, “Mother,” then “Mother? then “MOTHER.” By then he was fighting something, grunting and punching all the while, yelling “MOTHER.” I jumped up and went to him. He was pale, scared silly and shaking from head to foot. I took him to the kitchen to calm him down. He said that he saw a figure in the hall and thought it was me, thus the first “Mother.” When he realized it wasn’t me but the outline of a man, he began to fight it.
We sat up for an hour or longer talking it out. I told him that he was exhausted from the long tr
ip and that his car exhaust system must be leaking fumes from the souped-up car. This was my belief at the time. I don’t know if I convinced him, but I was pleased with my idea in my own mind.
I began to notice a really cool icy waft of air playing around my head and upper body as I would sit and read in my lounge chair. So did others. Sometimes it was so heavy my newspaper would move of its own accord. This occurred regularly. I decided I had a bad draft. I lit a candle to try and track the draft down, but no luck. I moved the chair a few feet but still had the icy draft. I accepted that I had a drafty spot in the house. Then things began to happen that made no sense at all. Many times a smoke-like blob would appear in the hall. The odor of the roses filled the doorway between the living room and kitchen. This happened several times, and did after I left the house. My son and daughter have both smelled them. The commode would fully flush and then the bathroom lights would turn on of their own accord. We checked the commode’s “innards” thinking it was leaking water but all was fine and the commode flushed on. The lights have come on as many as 5-6 times in one evening. We’d get up and turn them off, and within a few minutes they were back on and the commode would flush.
I heard my daughter’s flute from her room once. Only thing was, she wasn’t in there! I accused her of going out the window, but she hadn’t.
Since we didn’t want to appear to have lost our minds, we kept everything to ourselves. I had been raised in a funeral home that my parents owned. I was always taught there was no such thing as ghosts. Neither my husband nor I believed in such things. If a ghost was a ghost, wouldn’t a funeral home be the ideal place to show up? I never heard or saw or felt a presence in my parents’ funeral home.
Haunted Houses and Family Ghosts of Kentucky Page 2