The Weight of Haunted History

Walk through Old Tonopah Cemetery in Tonopah, Nevada and the first thing you notice is the ground itself. The graves look weather-beaten, a little off-balance, as if the desert has been nudging them for a century and has no plan to stop.

That mood is why this place sticks with people who chase haunted history, ghost lore, and odd corners of the American West. Old Tonopah Cemetery in Tonopah, Nevada, began in 1901, closed in 1911, and gathered its reputation from two things that rarely stay apart for long, real grief and the stories that rise around it.

How a silver boomtown created Old Tonopah Cemetery

Tonopah grew fast after Jim Butler’s silver strike in 1900. One day it was rough Nevada country, and the next it was a boomtown with miners, merchants, drifters, families, and all the risk that follows quick money. A cemetery became necessary almost at once, because mining camps did not wait for tidy civic planning.

The first burial was John Randel Weeks on May 7, 1901. After that, the graves multiplied in the plain, hard way frontier graves often did. Men died underground. Children and adults died from illness. Some met violent ends in a town that was still making its own rules by trial, error, and gun smoke.

Old Tonopah Cemetery is therefore part of the town’s origin story, not a grim footnote. It grew beside the silver rush because death did, too. If you want a clear snapshot of early Tonopah, the cemetery tells it without polish.

Why the graves ended up on unstable mining tailings

The oddest detail is also the one that explains the place’s uneasy look. The cemetery sat on mine tailings, which are the loose waste piles left from ore processing. That ground shifted, washed out, and settled badly over time.

So the cemetery never had a firm foundation. Rain and runoff moved dirt. Tailings drifted over graves and markers. Some headstones tilted, sank, or vanished under debris, which made the whole site feel frail long before ghost stories took hold. A good visual overview appears in this photo-rich cemetery guide from Southwest Explorers.

That unstable base matters because it changes the feel of the place. Plenty of old cemeteries are solemn. This one seems unsettled, almost as if the land itself never agreed to hold still.

Why the cemetery closed after only a decade

Old Tonopah Cemetery stayed in use until April 1911. By then, around 300 people had been buried there, and the town turned to a new cemetery for future burials.

It did not close because it ran out of room. The problem was the tailings. They kept covering, shifting, and damaging graves, so keeping the cemetery intact became harder with every season. That short life, only about a decade, gives the place a strange compression. Tonopah rose fast, suffered fast, and buried its dead on ground that could not protect them.

The deaths and graves that shape the cemetery’s legend

Old Tonopah Cemetery feels haunted because so many of its stories begin with sudden loss. That sounds dramatic, but the record is dramatic enough on its own. Mining towns often wore danger like a second coat of dust, and Tonopah wore it openly.

Many visitors come for the eerie mood, yet the deeper pull is human. These are not vague legends pinned to anonymous stones. Many graves connect to named people, known disasters, and short, hard lives.

Big Bill Murphy, the Belmont Mine Fire, and other hard mining stories

One of the best-known names is Big Bill Murphy, a 28-year-old miner remembered for trying to save others during the Belmont Mine Fire of 1911. The fire killed 17 miners, and 14 of them are buried in Old Tonopah Cemetery. That single event stamped itself onto the town’s memory and, by extension, onto the cemetery’s mood.

When people speak of spirits near the miners’ graves, they are usually circling back to that disaster. The facts alone carry enough weight. Men were trapped, rescue efforts failed, and the dead returned to the surface only to be carried here.

Other graves tell the same rough tale. The Marojevich brothers, for example, are tied to another mining accident, and their story adds a family ache to the cemetery’s already heavy air. For a current walking-tour summary of notable graves, the official Old Tonopah Cemetery page is useful and direct.

Sheriff Tom Logan, the Tonopah Plague, and graves with lasting mystery

Then there is Sheriff Tom Logan, killed in a shootout outside a brothel in Manhattan, Nevada. His grave gives the cemetery a frontier sharpness that no ghost tour script could improve. Tonopah was a mining town, yes, but it was also a place of lawmen, gambling rooms, quick tempers, and violent endings.

The 1902 “Tonopah Plague” adds another layer. Some local accounts use that name, though later sources question whether it was truly a plague in the medical sense. Even with that caution, the outbreak clearly frightened the town and left bodies behind. Disease in a young boomtown often moved with ugly speed, and fear traveled even faster.

The Merten brothers deepen that sorrow. Three siblings died within about two years of one another, and repeated family loss like that gives the cemetery its emotional pull. You don’t need to believe in ghosts to feel the pressure of those stories. History can be enough.

Is Old Tonopah Cemetery really haunted, or is the past doing the work

This is where Old Tonopah Cemetery becomes catnip for paranormal visitors. Reports mention apparitions, odd sounds, cold spots, and a heavy sensation near certain graves, especially around the Belmont Mine victims. Those stories are part of the site’s identity now, though they remain anecdotal.

A place can gather ghost lore for honest reasons. Isolation helps. Broken or crooked markers help. Harsh desert silence helps more than any soundtrack ever could. And when you add a century of mining deaths, illness, and frontier violence, the imagination hardly needs a push.

The ghost stories visitors share most often

Most stories fall into a familiar set. Visitors mention shadowy figures between graves, murmurs with no speaker, or the sense that someone is standing a pace behind them. Some describe changes in temperature or a sudden pressure in the chest. Others say certain plots feel heavier than the rest.

None of that proves haunting. It does, however, show how strongly place and story can work together. A cemetery built on damaged ground, full of short lives and public tragedies, invites people to read feeling as evidence. A paranormal travel account at Paranormal Traveler captures that mood well, even if the claims stay in the realm of personal experience.

Old Tonopah Cemetery feels eerie because the history is eerie, and the ground never lets you forget it.

How the Clown Motel and Tonopah’s wider ghost culture add to the mood

The cemetery sits next to the Clown Motel, which almost sounds like a joke the desert told itself and then decided to keep. That pairing has turned this patch of Tonopah into a pilgrimage stop for ghost hunters, roadside oddity fans, and people who enjoy sleeping near places that might object.

Tonopah also has a larger haunted identity. The Mizpah Hotel often enters the conversation, and local tourism has learned that old mining towns and ghost stories are natural companions. That doesn’t make every tale false, but it does shape how visitors arrive. Many show up ready for signs, sounds, and stories. A brief modern take from Ghost Hunt TV shows how firmly the cemetery now lives in that wider ghost culture.

What to know before you visit Old Tonopah Cemetery

Old Tonopah Cemetery is free to enter and generally open day or night. Many visitors park by the Clown Motel, then walk straight over. The site remains accessible as of April 2026, and donations help support grave repair, preservation, and labeling.

Walking tour maps may be available at the entrance, and you can also find them online through town tourism resources. If your interest leans more toward history than scares, daytime is the better choice. The details on markers are easier to read, the ground is safer to judge, and the place feels less like a dare.

Best ways to explore the cemetery with respect and purpose

Start with a few named graves tied to the town’s best-known stories, Big Bill Murphy, Tom Logan, the Belmont fire victims, and the Merten brothers. Take notes or photos of names and dates for later research, because that turns a spooky stop into something more useful and honest.

Afterward, visit the Central Nevada Museum for a fuller local context. That extra step often changes the cemetery from a mood piece into a human record. Also, tread carefully. The ground can be uneven, markers are fragile, and this is still a burial place, not a stage set for pranks.

Old Tonopah Cemetery lingers in the mind because its short life still feels unfinished. The damaged graves, the mining losses, and the ghost lore all press in at once, and none of them cancel the others out.

That is the strange grace of haunted history. You can arrive looking for spirits and leave thinking about workers, families, epidemics, and a town that buried its dead on shifting waste. Curiosity belongs here, but respect belongs first.

Creepy Lodging in Tonopah: Haunted, Odd, Unforgettable

A lot of roadside motels blur together. The Clown Motel does the opposite. In Tonopah’s high desert quiet, it pulls you in as part fun stop, part paranormal legend, and part sleep-with-the-lights-on dare. Not far from the Extraterrestrial Highway, located next to the Old Tonopah Cemetery, in Tonopah, Nevada.

That mix is why people remember it. You can book a basic economy clown room, browse a clown-packed museum space, shop in the gift area, walk the grounds, and end the night next to one of Nevada’s eeriest old cemeteries. For fans of haunted motels, ghost hunting, and weird Americana, few places leave a stranger aftertaste.

What makes The Clown Motel so famous, and so unsettling

The Clown Motel opened in 1985, and its fame grew from something both simple and bizarre, a family clown collection that turned into a full roadside identity. Over time, that idea expanded far beyond a novelty stop. Today, the motel is known for dozens of rooms, a clown-filled lobby, and a reputation that keeps it on short lists of Nevada’s most talked-about paranormal stays.

The draw is easy to explain, even if the feeling is harder to shake. Clowns already sit in an odd place in American culture. They can read as playful, sad, theatrical, or threatening, sometimes all at once. Put thousands of them in one motel, then place that motel beside an old cemetery in a near-empty desert town, and the result feels less like branding and more like folklore you can book by the night.

Recent public descriptions place the collection at more than 6,500 clown figures and objects, which gives the property a scale that few first-time visitors expect. The official Clown Motel site leans into that identity, and so do travelers who arrive for both kitsch and fear.

The story behind the clown collection and the motel’s unusual beginning

At the heart of the story is Clarence David, the clown collector most often tied to the motel’s origins. His collection, which reportedly began at around 150 pieces, gave the place its first personality. What might have stayed a private family tribute instead became the seed of a destination.

That origin matters because it explains why the motel doesn’t feel like a theme slapped onto a generic building. The clown collection came first, then the legend followed. Visitors also added to the pile over the years, which helped transform the property into a kind of unofficial clown museum with glass cases, shelves, wall art, dolls, masks, and figurines filling shared spaces.

Why the desert setting in Tonopah adds to the creepy mood

Tonopah does a lot of the atmospheric work. This is a former mining town in central Nevada, with wide roads, sparse traffic, and long stretches of silence after dark. By day, the motel looks like a strange roadside stop. By night, the desert emptiness changes the whole mood.

Street noise fades early. The sky goes black fast. The old mining history around town hangs in the background, and that context gives the motel more weight than a novelty attraction in a busy city ever could. If you’re mapping a bigger trip, it fits naturally into Nevada road trips packed with ghost towns and roadside oddities.

The haunted history starts next door at the Old Tonopah Cemetery

The cemetery next door is not decorative scenery. It is the core of the motel’s haunted reputation. Old Tonopah Cemetery opened in 1901 and closed in 1911, and it holds roughly 300 burials tied to the town’s rough early years. That includes miners, victims of disease, and people caught in the violent uncertainty of a boomtown built on silver.

Tonopah’s history was hard from the start. Mining accidents killed workers. Illness moved fast through close quarters. Local history also remembers the Tonopah Plague, which adds another dark layer to the cemetery’s place in town memory. In a setting like this, the motel’s clown imagery doesn’t create fear by itself. The cemetery gives the fear a local anchor.

The cemetery is the emotional center of the Clown Motel story, because it ties every strange tale to real deaths in Tonopah’s past.

The miners, plague victims, and early graves that shaped the legend

The dates matter because they match Tonopah’s roughest growth years. This was a mining town moving fast, and fast-growing towns often carried hard costs. Fires, cave-ins, disease, and poor living conditions left marks that still shape the cemetery’s identity.

Visitors often focus on the 1911 mine fire and other fatal accidents when they talk about the grounds. Even without a ghost story, the site feels heavy. Weathered markers, desert dust, and the short distance between graves and motel rooms create an unusual overlap between memorial ground and tourist stop. The Haunted Rooms profile of the Clown Motel captures why that mix unsettles so many people.

Why do so many visitors connect the cemetery to paranormal activity at the motel

Most reports follow a familiar pattern. Guests describe footsteps outside rooms, voices in the night, cold spots, flickering lights, and the sense that someone is moving through the grounds. Some claim to see full apparitions or shadow figures. Others talk about hearing miners or feeling watched near the cemetery fence.

None of that proves a haunting, and serious paranormal readers know the difference between testimony and evidence. Still, place matters in ghost lore, and this place has strong ingredients. The motel and cemetery sit so close together that many visitors feel the two sites work as one field of activity. For ghost hunting groups and parapsychology-minded travelers, that proximity is the whole appeal.

What it is like to stay there, from the basic clown rooms to the museum and gift shop

A stay at The Clown Motel isn’t about luxury. The comfort is basic, and that is part of the charm. Even a standard economy room can feel like one of the property’s haunted hot spots, because the strange charge comes from the whole setting, not only the themed suites.

The official room setup is straightforward, with heating and cooling, a TV, fridge, microwave, and coffee maker. That ordinary layout creates a sharp contrast with the decor. You might be in a room that otherwise feels familiar, yet clown art on the wall keeps nudging the brain in the wrong direction.

Inside a basic room, simple comfort with a very strange twist

The basic clown room works because it plays against expectation. The bed is normal. The furniture is normal. Then your eye lands on a painted clown face, a figurine on the nightstand, or a grin in a frame across the room. That small shift changes the air.

For first-time ghost hunting visitors, that matters more than polished design. A plain room can feel creepier than a heavily themed one because it leaves more space for imagination. When the motel is quiet, and the cemetery sits just outside, every hallway sound feels amplified. The room doesn’t have to perform. The setting already does.

The clown museum, themed spaces, and gift shop that visitors feel complete

The lobby and display areas are a major part of the experience. They feel half museum, half roadside oddity house, with clown cases and themed touches that make you want to look longer than comfort suggests. That museum feel gives the motel more staying power than a quick selfie stop.

Then there is the playful side. The gift shop keeps the visit from becoming too grim, and the themed horror rooms push the motel into a more self-aware kind of camp. That balance is why the place works for more than die-hard believers. It can feel creepy, funny, nostalgic, and tacky in the best sense, all within the same hour.

The nightly ghost tour and why it is a top-rated part of the experience

For many visitors, the after-dark ghost tour is the main reason to book. A room gives you the setting, but the tour gives you a story map. It connects the cemetery, the motel grounds, and the reported activity into one shared experience, which makes the stay feel active rather than passive.

Public descriptions in 2026 still point to regular ghost walks, paranormal packages, and overnight investigations tied to the property. The motel’s paranormal experiences and ghost hunting packages build directly on that demand.

What happens on the nightly tour of the motel and cemetery grounds

The flow is usually simple, and that helps. After dark, guests walk the haunted areas of the motel and then move through the cemetery side with stories attached to certain rooms, parts of the grounds, and deaths from Tonopah’s mining era. The darkness does more than the script ever could.

More involved experiences can include longer vigils and ghost hunting tools such as EMF meters, based on current public listings and paranormal promotions. The Clown Motel ghost hunt and sleepover listing shows how far that side of the experience now goes for serious fans.

Why ghost hunters and paranormal fans rate the tour so highly

People rate the tour well because it layers several kinds of interest at once. You get local history, a live sense of place, the tension of nighttime walking, and the chance to test your own nerves. That mix appeals to believers, skeptics, and researchers for different reasons.

For paranormal travelers, the motel has a useful quality. It gives you a controlled setting with a strong legend attached. For skeptics, the same tour still works as storytelling grounded in a real cemetery and a harsh mining past. Either way, the walk turns the Clown Motel from a weird stop on Highway 95 into a shared event that stays with you after checkout.

The Clown Motel fits people who want haunted motels with personality, not polished luxury. Its pull comes from contrast, a basic overnight stay set inside clown decor, next to graves, under desert skies.

That is why Tonopah’s strangest motel lingers in memory. It blends Nevada mining history, oddity culture, and paranormal atmosphere into one weird, creepy, and surprisingly fun place to spend the night.

Multnomah County Poor Farm (Now McMenamins Edgefield) Troutdale, OR

photo by Ian Poellet – via Wikipedia.
The Multnomah County Poor Farm (built 1911) in Troutdale, Oregon,

Deep in the heart of Troutdale was an early 1900’s farm that housed the homeless, sick, poor, and unfortunate. It was a place for those desperate to come and stay in exchange for work.  Legend has it, many died while working the farm, and the place had a continual flow of people.  In 1990, the Portland chain McMenamins built a hotel, brewery, and venue atop the property and have had claims of strange happenings ever since. Room 215 is claimed to be the most haunted room on the property. The front desk has a log of strange happenings at the property.    www.mcmenamins.com

Bibliography:

• Tindrick, Ryan 2014 “11 Scariest Haunted Places in Oregon”. Website referenced 10/10/15 at http://articlecats.com/index.php/11-scariest-haunted-places-in-oregon/

The kids of Crosian Creek Road

Salem, OR

There exists an urban legend or ghost story of a little girl and boy apparitions walking along the road outside of Salem, Oregon. Legend has it the little girl was killed while walking across the road and ever since she’s haunted the roadway with her brother. Some say they see a ball rolling across the street with a girl chasing it, and a little boy waving them to slow down.

Bibliography:

• Tindrick, Ryan 2014 “11 Scariest Haunted Places in Oregon”. Website referenced 10/10/15 at http://articlecats.com/index.php/11-scariest-haunted-places-in-oregon/

The Bandaged Man

Hwy 101 near Cannon Beach, Oregon

There is a mysterious legend along with the coastal highway 101 on the Oregon coast – that of an apparition of a man walking along the highway covered in bandages. He is often seen on the side of the road or in one’s rear-view mirror. Some have claimed to see him in their backseat through their rear-view mirror. When they turn to look in person, he’s not there. The reports of this apparition go back to the early 1960s.

Most claim that the best way to see him is to go down the older highway 101 that runs parallel to the main highway through the forest. This is now an abandoned road not in use, and it is said to travel at night, as very few reports seeing him in the daylight. Some call this “The Bandage Man Road”. Most notably where Highway 26 intersects with Coastal 101. He is said to vanish just before reaching the town. His name is “The Bandage Man” because he’s a man with a bandaged face.

Almost a ghastly mummy, he’s wrapped in bandages and apparently haunts the Cannon Beach community, based on urban lore. He’s described as a bloody figure of a man, covered in bandages drenched in blood, and the stench of rotting flesh follows him. He’s been said to jump into vehicles passing on the road out of Cannon Beach, especially into pickup trucks and open-topped vehicles, sedans, station wagons, and sports cars. He’s been claimed to have broken windows and leaving behind bloody bandages in his aftermath.

Some claim he is the unrestful spirit of a lumberjack who was sliced and diced in a sawmill accident nearby. He is said to have killed people along the highway and to have eaten the dogs of neighboring communities.

One of the original tales is about teenage kids “Parking and sparking” along the Bandage Man road. The boy had an old Chevy pickup and they were kissing when they felt the truck bounce with something moving in the back bed. They looked out the window to see a man in a bloody bandaged face with weird eyes. He began banging on the glass and top of the cab. The kid revved his engine, put it in gear, and raced away in terror to Cannon Beach to the safety of their parent’s service station in the greenhouse. He was gone.

The bandaged man has also been reported to be seen along the route from Lincoln City to Seaside. Some tag on that Bandage Man was a criminal shot by the police along the highway – he was transferred from the hospital to the jail, escaped, ran into the woods, and never seen again.

In the area are also tales about flying pots in Seaside, a haunted hotel in Nehalem Bay, and many mysterious apparitions in Astoria giving a great backdrop for films like Goonies, The Ring 2,  and The Fog as well as inspirations for Lovecraft film Cthulhu.

Bibliography:

• Alexander, Stephen 2014 “Haunted Oregon – Interesting before scary” Portland Tribune. Website http://portlandtribune.com/pt/11-features/229134-92235-haunted-oregon-interesting-before-scary referenced 10/12/15.
• Hagestedt, Andre 2006 “Oregon Coast Ghosts, and Other Paranormal Legends” Website http://www.beachconnection.net/news/ghost1006_0174.htm referenced 10/12/15.
• Shadowlands 2015 “Haunted Places in Oregon” Website http://www.theshadowlands.net/places/oregon.htm referenced 10/12/15.
• Tindrick, Ryan 2014 “11 Scariest Haunted Places in Oregon”. Website referenced 10/10/15 at http://articlecats.com/index.php/11-scariest-haunted-places-in-oregon/
• Sluggo 2009 “The Bandage Man of Cannon Beach” website referenced http://sluggosghoststories.blogspot.com/2009/10/bandage-man-of-cannon-beach.html on 10/12/15.
• Unexplained Mysteries 2015 “” website http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=81120 referenced on 10/12/15.

“Shadow Hills” – Haunted South Ridge and Fontana area, California

According to the Inside the Inland Empire web site and various other ghost hunting blogs, the South Ridge area of Fontana is quite haunted. It has been nicknamed “Shadow Hills”. One family off of Jurupa street claim much paranormal activity in their home. Foot steps up the stairs with no one around, doors slamming on their own, microwave fan turning itself on, lights flickering, a little girl spirit on the stairs, spirits demanding the family to “Get Out”, apparitions of blood in the shower, zombies, and shadow creatures in the yard. Shadow creatures are commonly reported around the Inland Empire, especially at Mt. Rubidoux. Several of their neighbors off Jurupa street also claim a lot of activity. Rumor has it, there occurs a lot of moving in and out of the Jurupa street neighborhood. Stories and reports extend off Jurupa into the houses along Cypress, Coleen st, oleander ave, corner of Woodcrest drive, and Citrus. Some of the hauntings were reported in brand new homes without former residents. Apparitions of a little boy wearing a striped shirt, plumes of smoking rising up from the closet floor, feelings of being touched, jiggling door knobs, and chairs moving on their own. Some conclude that these houses are built atop an ancient Indian burial ground, although the reportings and activities don’t necessarily support such a theory. A house on the corner of Oak Park Elementary reports seeing a 1800’s dated apparition of a woman wearing a bonnet, lights turning on and off, voices, shadows, stuff moving around, etc. Another resident nearby also claims seeing women with white bonnets and powder blue dresses in their homes in the South Park district at 17203 Avenue Del Sol. A South ridge resident claimed poltergeist activity – reflections of people standing behind the sofa when the tv was off, doors opening and closing, banging in the walls, etc. Also reports on Heritage by various neighbors one claiming a mirror in their house on the east wall was a portal for entry as dictated by a psychic investigating the activity. A haunted house report on 14774 Mountain High Drive off Canyon Crest with apparitions of a silhouette atop the stairs, shadow beings, voices, etc. Another house below baseline near Beech Avenue reports of shadow beings, a little boy made of rock in the fire place, a little girl running about. Again more legends of houses built over a Indian Burial Ground. One claims their house was built above John Redcorn’s burial ground and had a apparition of a woman. Others report sightings and activity off Argentine by Oakwood Drive and behind the Pancho Villas.

Sightings of a chariot drawn by horses coming down the street, a figure in a trench coat with glasses, off Green Vista drive behind Southridge middle school. Reports of an area with creepy trees and bomb shelters with a ghost of a girl wearing a hospital gown also declared. Off of Woodcrest drive there was a family sighting a gnome in one of the bedrooms. This gnome was spying on the resident while he was sleeping, was no taller than the electrical socket, wearing weird dirty sport coat and a evil Leprechaun smile. There is the fabled Victorian style manor at 4701 Sierra Avenue in Hesperia (can be seen from the 15) reportedly haunted. Some say the house was relocated from where it was originally built atop a ancient burial mound. Some say the ghosts moved with it (house originally was in Redlands built in 1888 for Judge George E. Otis by D.M. Donald). One report of a spirit of a giant angry man who hurled a trespasser onto stones causing severe injuries to the man reporting it. Some say the owner confirms the hauntings.

Along highway 66 originally, the foothill boulevard is believed to be haunted by a young man in a striped shirt carrying a long stick or buggy whip, he is reported to cross the street when cars approach then disappears. Sometimes he is accompanied by a black dog. (GPS 34.10648057912253, -117.47255516122095)

Green Acres cemetery has reported occurrences of blood appearing on the table between the three marble chairs in the southeastern part of the cemetery every Halloween. East end of 7th street (GPS 34.039240814445115, -117.39045982811149) Also at the Agua Mansa Pioneer Cemetery there are rumors of a mother that haunts the bend around this cemetery and is the spirit of the mother who drowned her 6 children. According to Hispanic legend she is known as La Llorona or the Weeping Woman searching for the children she murdered. The spirits of two people who were executed here also reportedly haunt the cemetery and have been known to be the cause of fatal car accidents on this bend (2001 Agua Mansa Road – GPS 34.0420097, -117.36421819999998)

On Valley between Fontana and Colton there are reports of a man covered in black often walking the roadside. Reports of decayed children walking about at night. Multiple ghost sightings reportedly around Jurupa Park or Martin Tudor Park.
The Big Lots store (formerly Pic n Save) at the corner of Foothill Boulevard and Sierra is reportedly haunted with reports of several ghosts flickering lights, making noises, voices, knocking things off shelves, pulling of employee’s hair, etc. Some say the Ghost of a former Pic n Save employee named Manny haunts the store.

Along the Thompson Creek Trail, some report shadow beings following them when hiking this trail, and that skulls appear in the clouds above. Also that trees and bushes bleed on occasion. Some say they have had visions of levitating boulders, invisible walls blocking the path, and violent images. GPS 34.1290555, -117.7222145. Also the old boy scout’s cabin that burnt down up there is reportedly haunted.

Properties:
• Aqua Mansa Pioneer Cemetery
• Aqua Mansa Road (2001 Aqua Mansa)
• Argentine
• Avenue del Sol (17203)
• Beech Avenue
• Big Lots store (Foot Hill boulevard and Sierra)
• Citrus Street
• Coleen Street
• Cypress Street
• Foot Hill Boulevard and Citrus Ave
• Green Acres Cemetery
• Heritage
• Jurupa Street
• Mountain High Drive (14774)
• Oak Park Elementary
• Oakwood Drive
• Oleander Ave
• Sierra Ave (4701)
• Southridge Middle School
• Thompson creek trail
• Valley between Fontana and Colton
• Woodcrest Drive

References:
• Ghosts of America unknown “Fontana, California ghost sightings” http://www.ghostsofamerica.com/9/California_Fontana_ghost_sightings.html website referenced 5/22/2015.
• Haunted Hovel unknown “Fontana, Ca. / Renne / Sierra Ave off the 15 fwy.” http://www.hauntedhovel.com/fontana-ca-renne-sierra-ave-off-the-15-fwy.html. website referenced 5/22/2015.
• Haunted Places unknown “Haunted Places in Fontana, California” http://www.hauntedplaces.org/fontana-ca/ Website refrenced 5/22/2015.
• Inside the IE.com unknown “Haunted House in South Ridge Fontana”. http://www.insidetheie.com/haunted-house-fontana. Website referenced 5/22/2015.
• Palmer, Chuck 1982 “Old House has new home”. The Sun Feb 15, 1982. DM Donald built the home in 1888 in Redlands for Judge George E. Otis.
• Wikipedia unknown “Shadow Hills California” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_Hills,_Los_Angeles website referenced 5/22/2015.

If you’ve experienced sightings in this area, please share here.

Cross-posted from http://www.irishcentral.com/roots/history/Irelands-top-ten-haunted-destinations-PHOTOS.html?page=1
Kayla Hertz @irishcentral August 15,2014 12:45 PM

With his last breaths, Puck the jester swore he would forever haunt Malahide Castle in Malahide, Co. Dublin.Photo by: Wikimedia Commons

With a long, long history rife with wars and massacres, Irish land is bound to have a few ghosts here and there. That is, assuming you’re a believer in the paranormal.

From castles to beaches, here’s a list of our top 10 supernatural destinations in Ireland. Spanning the country, these destinations are supposedly haunted by ghosts of all sorts – soldiers, brides, court jesters and more.
1. Ross Castle

On the edge of Lough Lane in Killarney, Co. Kerry, this five bedroom stone castle built in 1536 is currently run as a B&B. Visitors have reported supernatural activity both in and out of the castle: apparently every May Day for hundreds of years, a Medieval knight named O’Donoghue rides along Lough Lane past the castle, accompanied by a group of spirits who play music behind him. Inside the castle, visitors have reported waking up in the middle of the night to sounds of screams or doors repeatedly opening and slamming shut. One of the spirits is believed to be Myles ‘the Slasher’ O’Reilly, an Irish folk hero who spend his last night in Ross Castle before dying in battle in 1644.
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The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

Based in the town of “Sleepy Hollow”, New York formerly known as “North Tarrytown” experiencing the name change to honor this story in 1996. The tale is not documented as an actual legend, but rather a tale by the American author Washington Irving while he was traveling abroad in Birmingham, England. He was a resident of North Tarrytown, New York and used the area as a setting for his short story. Irving included it in a collection of short stories and essays he wrote in 1820 called the “Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.” “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” is a classic example of American fiction, alongside his masterpiece “Rip Van Winkle” which made Washington Irving become a legend in the literary world. As of an “actual” headless horsemen, there exists no evidence of a prior legend or reporting in the means of how Washington Irving told the tale, though there does exist a headless corpse buried in a unmarked grave in the Old Dutch Burying Ground (Sleepy Hollow Cemetery) that matches the “Headless Horseman’s” lack of a head and being a Hessian soldier. (The Full legend and short story can be read here: http://www.sleepyhollowcemetery.org/sleepy-hollow-country/the-legend/. )

The story details Sleepy Hollow and its inhabitants living there in 1790 around the historical Tarrytown as it existed in that day. The area was inhabited by all Dutch settler descendants who moved to this sleepy little glen called “Sleepy Hollow” by Irving’s story which was already basked in myths and legends making it a dreamy and drowsy place even before this tale came to be. Full of ghost stories and the paranormal, Sleepy Hollow was the perfect place for the existence of the spirit of a Headless Horseman. He was seen by some as the most popular curse upon the village, as he was apparently a ghost of a angry Hessian trooper who lost his head by a stray cannonball during the American Revolution and “rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head” eager to victimize those of ego and arrogance. The tale involves the local superstitious ego-centric school master named Ichabod Crane who was after the hand in marriage of 18 year old farmer’s daughter Katrina Van Tassel. He was in competition for the proposal with the town mischief maker named Abraham “Brom Bones” Van Brunt. Crane was after the farmer’s wealth, Van Tassel estate, and saw marriage to Katrina as a way to obtain that status. “Brom Bones” however, also interested in Katrina, was interested in her for love. In his fight for the bride, he tries to mishap and veer Ichabod away from Katrina by performing numerous pranks on Crane, based around Crane’s paranoia and superstitions. Tensions become high, and during the annual Van Tassel harvest party, Crane is told ghostly legends of the area by Brom Bones and the locals. Crane is made so jumpy and nervous on that night that his intended proposal to Katrina was interrupted. He rides home “heavy-hearten and crest fallen” through the ghostly woods that the locals and Brom Bones told the tales of … edgy and spooked traveling from the Van Tassel farm to the Sleepy Hollow settlement. He passes by the tulip tree that had been struck by lightning and was reputedly haunted by Major André, the British spy. Instead of seeing that specter, he sees a cloaked rider at an intersection to the menacing swamp. This cloaked rider approaches him and rides alongside Crane. The man, large stature and size, appears to Crane not to have a head on his shoulders, but rather a decapitated cranium sitting on his saddle. Crane becomes spooked and races off to the bridge next to the Old Dutch cemetery. Upon reaching the bridge, the Headless Horseman vanished “in a flash of fire and brimstone” upon crossing the bridge. Ichabod crosses the bridge, but not before the specter re-appears on the bridge and hurls his head into Crane’s face. The next day, Ichabod could not be found except for his wandering horse, trampled saddle, discarded hat, and a mysterious shattered pumpkin. With Ichabod Crane nowhere in sight, the match with “Brom Bones” for Katrina’s hand in marriage was forfeited. Brom and Katrina married. Suspicion amongst the villagers bounced between believing the legend and “Brom Bones” being the villain who had the stature and size of the Headless Horseman. Many believe it was Brom in disguise, playing on Ichabod’s fears, and as a prank used to scare off Crane. However the Old Wives tales prevailed, stating that Crane indeed was “spirited away by supernatural means” and thereby increasing stories (mainly fabricated) of numerous sightings of the Headless Horseman to this very day.

Folklorists compare the American short story to the German folktale of “the Wild Huntsman” when a phantom races through the woods atop a horse scaring trespassers out of the forest. This tale most probably was the one that inspired Irving during this travels through Germany to concoct the tale of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow.

The German folklorist Karl Musäus states that the Headless horsemen was a staple of Northern European storytelling especially in Germany (“The Wild Huntsman”), Ireland (“Dullahan”), Scandinavia (“the Wild Hunt”), and English legends. These “headless” horsemen would race through the countryside with their decapitated heads tucked under their arms, often followed by hordes of coal-black hounds with fiery tongues (demon dogs). Folklore would talk of these as being omens of ill-fortune for those who chose to disregard their apparitions. These ghosts would mainly focus on individuals who had egos and arrogance, were overly proud, and/or scheming persons with misguided intentions such as the likes of Ichabod Crane. There are other folk tales and poems of a supernatural wild chase including Robert Burns’ 1790 “Tam o’ Shanter” and Bürger’s Der wilde Jäger, translated as the 1796 “The Wild Huntsman”.

The legend of Sleepy Hollow is classified as a fictional tale. It was set on a local bridge in Sleepy Hollow that crossed the Pocantico River into the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. Irving most likely incorporated local residents as characters in the tale, whereas Katrina’s character has been matched by folklorists to local resident Elanor Van Tassel Brush. However, there is ample evidence to make it an actual legend based on place names, characters, and history leading to the fabricated tale by Washington Irving. There was a farm owned by Cornelius and Elizabeth Van Tassel that was raided by English and Hessian soldiers in November 1777. They tried to fight off the invaders which led to their farmhouse being burnt down and their family being held hostage. While they watched in horror as their farmhouse was burning, Elizabeth could not find their baby Leah anywhere, and upon trying to run into the flames to search for her baby, was interrupted by a Hessian soldier who led her to a shed where Leah was safely wrapped up in a blanket safe and sound. The family was so grateful to this soldier for the safety of their baby. After the event, when a Hessian soldier was found in Tarrytown (around the area now called Sleepy Hollow) dead missing his head, they gave him a proper Christian burial and buried him in the Old Dutch Burial Ground (now Sleepy Hollow Cemetery) in case he was the soldier who saved their baby.

Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow was one of the historical sites where many battles and events of the American Revolutionary War took place, and was a great backdrop for this invented myth as many matching actual reports of hauntings and ghostly sightings that pervade the area. After these battles were done, a 30 mile stretch of scorched desolated lands were left to outlaws, raiders, and the corpses of the dead. One of those corpses was indeed a headless corpse of a Hessian soldier nicknamed Mr. Jäger found in Sleepy Hollow after a violent skirmish took place there. He corpse was buried by the Van Tassel family in a unmarked grave at the Old Dutch Burying Ground. While Washington Irving served New York Governor Daniel D. Tompkins, he had met an army captain named Ichabod Crane during an inspection tour of the fortifications in 1814. This meeting took place in Sackets Harbor, New York and not Sleepy Hollow. This meeting most likely inspired him to name the character as the schoolmaster for the name, and the schoolmaster image as Jesse Merwin, a local teacher in Kinderhook, New York he also inspired Irving.

This short story has been one the most well studied and examined of tales of its time and of Washington Irving’s works. Numerous re-tellings and re-writings have come about through the ages. Numerous plays, films, and television shows were done to memorialize the legend such as Edward Venturini’s silent 1922 silent film “The Headless Horseman” playing Will Rogers as Ichabod Crane; 1948 Broadway Musical “Sleepy Hollow”; Walt Disney’s “The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad” in 1949; Disney’s 1958 “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”; the 1980 Henning Schellerup “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” television classic; 1988 PBS adaption; The one-act stage adaptation by Kathryn Schultz Miller in 1989 called “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”; Nickelodeon’s 1992 “Are You Afraid of the Dark?” episode “The Tale of the Midnight Ride”; Rocko’s Modern Life “Sugar-Frosted Frights” parodie; Canadian television’s 1999 “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”; The 1999 Speaker and Orchestra 15-minute composition by Robert Lichtenberger called “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”; and the most famous 1999 Tim Burton’s “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” starring Johnny Depp, Christina Ricci, Casper Van Dien, and Christopher Walken. The Legend continued through film and audio tellings with the 1999 computer animated classic “The Night of the Headless Horseman” by Fox; Porchlight Entertainments 2002 “The Haunted Pumpkin of Sleepy Hollow”; Steven J. Smith, Jr.’s 2004 “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in Concert”; the television movie by ABC Family Channel in 2004 called “The Hollow”; 2004 “Charmed” episode of “The Legend of Sleepy Halliwell”; PBS “Wishbone” series “Halloween Hound: The Legend of Creepy Collars”; The 2009 Opera “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by Robert Milne; William Withem and Melanie Helton’s 2009 Legend of Sleepy Hollow Opera; the Jim Christian and Tom Edward Clark 2009 Musical “Sleepy Hollow”; The 2011 Hunter Foster book and play called “The Hollow”; Darkstuff Productions 2012 adapted Legend of Sleepy Hollow; and in 2013 a Fox TV series pilot called “Sleepy Hollow” is in production as a modern tale.

North Tarrytown in 1996 changed their name to “Sleepy Hollow” as a memorial to Washington Irving, and its local high school team are called “The Horsemen”, by 2006 a large statue of the Headless Horseman chasing Ichabod Crane was erected, and since 1996 at the Philipsburg Manor holds a Legend Weekend where the story is retold and played out just before Halloween.

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Icelandic Wonders Museum, Iceland

The Brennivin Ghost of Iceland

While visiting the Icelandic wonders museum, we learned about the infamous Brennivín Ghost, haunting the region where the original Icelandic Schnapps is named. Haunting the halls at Kolviðarhóll, who is the apparition of the Danish “Assistant” who worked in the Sunchenberg Store in Reykjavik. His job was to keep count of liquor in the store, and as a avid lover of the spirits, would travel by horse back to Kolvidarhóll and Marardalur to drink. He passed away in his bed while in Reykjavik. He apparently haunts the stores, halls, and the meadows on Kolviðarhóll.
The first recording of his apparition was two men the following winter from Suarnes travelling over the heath and stopping to sleep at the refuge hut in Kolviaarholl. As they entered the hut, heard chanting in the loft, and were greeted with a vision of a man sitting alone, striking, and elegant with a large top hat and wig, drinking a big container of brennivin. Other reports were as similar. The Icelandic Wonders Museum claims the ghost watches over them.

“The Brennivin Ghost: One of many acquaintances Kolviaarholl was the Brennivin Ghost. He was believed to be the ghost of the Danish ‘Assistant’ Sunchenberg store in Reykjavik. He had the responsibility of counting the beverages in the store, but he was very keen on the beverages. It was his custom, summer after summer on holy days, to ride his horse up to Kolviaarholl and into Marardalur to consume a substantial amount of the libation. He thought that those trips were his greatest pleasure in life … Now, this man passed away in his sickbed in Reykjavik, but the following winter two men from Suaurnes went over the heath and were planning to sleep at the refuge hut at Kolviaarholl. When they opened the hut, they were shocked when they heard a chant up in the loft. The two men weren’t expecting anyone to be there, because they didn’t see anything outside that indicated that someone was there. When the two men went inside the house and up to the loft, the most surreal vision awaited them when they opened the hatch. On the floor, just by the window, there was a man sitting alone who seemed to be very mellow. He was striking to see and very elegant, with a large top hat and a wig, and was wearing clothes with silver buttons on both lapels. Between his feet on the floor, he had a biggish container full of brennivin, from which a sweet smell emanated. In one hand the man had a tin mug that he used to take brennivin from the container, and then he drank from the mug and tipped the rest of the brennivin back into the container. He looked roguishly at what he was doing. The two men greeted the strange man and made his see how surprised they were about his behavior and how well stocked he seemed to be with beverages. He didn’t respond to their greetings, but instead he extended one of his feet, on which there was a Danish shoe, and said a little verse with his dark voice. Then he stood up and swung out his hand with the bennivin mug. With that he disappeared in an instant with a bright glow, and the loft became dark. The two men felt uncomfortable and a little shaken, and ran down the stairs and out into the bright spring night, after whch they started to feel better. Needless to say, the two men continued over the heath until they reached Reykir in Olfus early next morning.” ~ museum sign in Icelandic Wonders Museum.

Icelandic Wonders Museum, Iceland