Granny's House: Summer Diversions

With gas prices up the wazoo, and busy, busy schedules, (not to mention the added expense of extra family members living here - and don't forget the "billion dollar dog")...there won't be much vacationing going on in our household, so we are doing our best to find relaxing diversions here at home.

We have finally started filling up the back yard pool, we attend the local celebrations (see "Men in Skirts" below), we read, and rent videos - but if we want to go somewhere and see the sights - it's the Travel Channel all the way! My armchair will be as far as I'm going this Summer...

I love ghost stories - and I love lighthouses, but put them both together and I am one giddy, giddy girl!

So, Friday night when my daughters turned on "Most Haunted", and it was an episode on haunted lighthouses, I joined them.

It reminded me of earlier this Spring, when we had our "Sister's Tea" - and we had to find Victorian ghost stories to share. I had looked and looked, and had the hardest time finding anything, but then I remembered looking up some lighthouses on the internet and reading that some of them were haunted, so I did a search on "haunted lighthouses". I was amazed at how many I found! Lighthouses for some reason are especially hauntable. Apparently, lighthouse keepers are such dedicated and meticulous folk, that they continue to do their work - even after they're dead!

Here are a few of my favorite stories that I found:

Owl's Head light:

The story is told that the ghost of the lighthouse keeper here returns and not only keeps the brass polished, but frugally turns down the thermostat. (If I'm ever haunted, I want a ghost like him - one who cleans!) It is also told that he appeared as an "imaginary friend" to a young girl of a more recent lighthouse keeper and told her to wake her parents and tell them to sound the fog horn. There are a few other great stories about this light - less ghostly, but cool. You can find them here.

Tillamook Light:

Or, "Terrible Tilly" as some call it, is a pretty creepy place. It is no longer in use because it isn't up high enough to be safe from the crashing waves, and it was rendered unusable by one nasty one several years ago.
It was built on a rock that the native Indians considered to be inhabited by evil spirits. Only weeks before the cornerstone was laid, a terrible storm sank several small ships, and 25 people lost their lives. Witnesses to the tragic event, reported spotting a ghostly ship making it's way among the wreckage, as if picking up the souls of the dead. Keepers at the light often reported hearing bone-chilling groans on the stairwell leading up to the light. A Coast Guard vessel once reported seeing a ghostly ship breaking through a dense fog.
Tillamook Rock is currently being used as a depository for cremated human remains!
Creepy, creepy place!

Seguin Island Light:

Seguin Island Light was the scene of the most gruesome story I found, so if you are prone to goosebumps, skim over this one!
Seguin Light sits on an island 10 miles from Boothbay Harbor. Although it's fairly close to the mainland (3 miles to the nearest shore), in the winter it would get very isolated. One keeper, newly married, brought his young wife out with him to tend the light. Becoming very bored, the wife complained about not having anything to do. Thinking it would occupy her, and keep her mind off the boredom, the keeper ordered a piano to be brought to the island before the next winter set in. Winching it up the side of the rocky ledge that is Seguin, he proudly presented it to her. The wife was delighted, but could not play without sheet music. Fortunately, one song had come with the piano, so she set to playing it. By this time, the island was icebound, no other deliveries could come in. She played her piano, though. The same song, over and over and over again, driving her husband insane. Even when he had had new sheet music brought out to the island, she kept playing the original tune. Finally he'd had enough, took an axe and chopped the piano to bits. When she complained, he turned to her and chopped her up with the axe. Then he killed himself. It's said, on a quiet night, you can hear the tinkling of the piano floating up the Kennebec River. The keeper has also been seen, still tending to his duties.

Haceta Head:

My favorite haunted lighthouse of all is Haceta Head in Oregon.
The ghost here haunts not the light itself, but the lighthouse keepers cottage.
It is supposedly haunted by "the grey lady" who they have lovingly dubbed "Rue." They suppose that she is the mother of a baby who had drowned, and is buried in an unmarked grave on the property. It is said that she wanders still, searching for her baby. She has been attributed to moving objects around, and has even been seen on few occasions. One such occasion was when a workman was doing some work in the attic, and turned around to see her watching him. He fled the attic and refused to go back.
Later, when he was working on the upstairs windows, he broke a pane of glass. He then repaired it from the outside, but refused to go in and clean up the mess he had made. That night, scraping noises were heard in the attic, and the next morning, when someone else checked out the attic, they found that the glass had been swept into a nice neat little pile.
This lighthouse keeper's house is now a bed and breakfast, is on the top ten list of "most haunted" lighthouses, and is on my top ten list of places I want to visit before I die.