Halloween is coming soon and I know you are just dying to learn about ghosts. Well, first off, what terrifies ME more is that I was sitting next to the patio today (recovering from an annual visit to the vet) and I suddenly hear some yelling from inside the inn. Out comes the innkeeper.... she had seen.....a medium size black bear lumbering through the garden. Good thing I sleep with one eye open.
But, if you must ask about ghosts, here's what I know or have heard, in Judy's words:
This is our story. The house was designed by an architect, built by a former Union Army officer who also served in the state legislature. The style is Shingle Style Victorian. The roof was put on Nov. 22, 1889.
Former tenants in our house told us that the back door would open and close by itself. Yes, we've heard the handle and latch turn, many times.
I've felt an energy field inside the hall and outside the original master bedroom door. That is now our Room #5 - The Wagner Bedroom, named for
Maj. Joseph Wagner, who served in the Civil War, on both sides, ending as a major in the Union Army. He then built this house in 1889.
One guest saw 'someone' in a military uniform in the Room 2 window as she arrived at the inn.. Another guest--one who says he often sees ghosts in hotels-- said he saw a man in old fashioned clothes in his room during the night. (Wagner died in 1910 of old age and the house was sold).
At various times guests have smelled peanut butter cookies or muffins baking in the middle of the night. Another got out of his bath in the first floor guest bath (once the
family room and family bath). He smelled spilled bourbon for quite awhile, long enough to dry himself off, dress and go fetch his girl friend from the front porch swing so
she, too, could smell it. It was the middle of the afternoon so I trust he was neither asleep nor drunk.
Another time, rose-flavored perfume was smelled in the same room. The second owners were Mr. and Mrs. Stacy Issac Rambo. We believe Mrs. Rambo lived in this room
in her waning years. A guest who 'feels' ghosts everywhere sensed a woman's presence in this room. Her son may have been the one who spilled the bourbon. The room was HIS bedroom in HIS last years.
The first indication I had of this sort of thing was when we were renovating. My husband, Robert, and our dog arose early and left the house to walk to the mail box for the newspaper.
While they were gone I heard the steady rhythm of a man's leather-soled dress shoes on the front stairs, coming up, walking in the hall, going back down. The thing is--due to renovation--the hallway was filled with buckets of paint and Sheetrock mud, a vacuum cleaner, extension cords and such. No mortal could walk in a straight line down that hall with such consistent footsteps!
In this digital age we sometimes capture odd things on disk (such as fire leaping out of one fireplace). I found orbs on only one of three photos I made of a couple walking down the drive after their wedding. We believe the groom died in a motorcycling accident 6 months later! Out of over 100 weddings performed here, that was the only photo to ever have anything out of the ordinary on it.
A current employee, Angela Norris, says she smells smoke in the house sometimes and wondered if we once had a fire burn the house. No, it never burned. I think it might be the remains of fires in the 10 wood burning fireplaces throughout the house or it might be, well, who knows what?! Children heard scratching and dropped items in the living room ceiling years ago. We are fairly certain that was an invasion of squirrels in winter. However, we have yet to explain away the knock on the door and the "force or pressure" which one guest says pushed her into the mattress and would not allow her to move for at least 15 seconds.
I always expected the ghost of Mr. Rambo to show up when I removed part of a wall he erected to turn the back porch into a bathroom. When we did it, all was quiet. Apparently our ghosts do not arrive on demand. Given the smells and sounds, we think they are still the happy people who very much loved living here after having their funerals conducted in our living room, which was the old rural tradition.
So, that's the story. But, if that ghost really does open the back door, why haven't I been able to slip out???
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