Ghostly settings make for Southern
discomfort
The Central United Methodist Church in Asheville, N.C., has yielded many photographs with apparations in them, a local tour guide says. (MARILYN JONES)
Live oak trees draped in Spanish moss, centuries-old plantations, and the cries of exotic birds all add to the mystery of the South and help set the scene for ghost tours available in many cities south of the Mason-Dixon Line.
It used to be if you believed in ghosts, you didn't really talk about it. Now, ghost hunting is big business. From shops selling all sorts of ghost-hunting devices to popular television shows, everyone, it seems, is talking about spirits, apparitions, and things that go bump in the night.
Whether you believe in the paranormal or not, good ghost tours can offer a lot more than terrifying stories and third-party experiences; they offer the history of a location, albeit the darker side.
Haunted Vicksburg Ghost Tours
Morgan Gates waits for the last of his charges - and for the sun to set - before beginning his tour. There are eight of us, and Gates begins the tour by reviewing what many already know: the Mississippi city was the center of one of the most significant campaigns during the Civil War, is home to the largest Civil War cemetery in the nation, and was a way station on the Trail of Tears. He adds that Vicksburg is considered one of the most haunted small towns in America.
The first stop is the Old Court House Museum, built between 1858 and 1860, and witness to the Civil War battles that took place all around the city as well as in its heart during May and June 1863.
Gates tells of a young intern working in the museum and her encounter with deceased museum founder Eva Whitaker Davis as she was locking up for the night. Gates is an excellent storyteller. Part historian, part thespian - he paints a picture so expressively that you can imagine the entire scene and the young woman's fear.
The 90-minute tour passes churches, houses, and abandoned buildings, many of which Gates uses as the backdrop for his tales of the paranormal.
In front of Anchuca, an antebellum mansion and bed-and-breakfast, he tells of an incident the current owner experienced.
A water leak in the ceiling of the dining room brought a plumber who couldn't find the source of the leak or any wet areas in the attic. What he did find were two portraits from the 1800s buried under insulation - beautifully framed and in perfect condition. As soon as the portraits were discovered, the leak stopped. Thought to be the husband and wife who once owned the house, the portraits now hang in the mansion's entry hall. Were the spirits of this couple bringing attention to their portraits, to their legacy?
The speculation, the dark streets, the mysteries of this historic city all add to the enjoyment of the ghost tour.
www.hauntedvicksburg.com601-618-6031.
Joshua P. Warren Presents Haunted Asheville
In the world of the paranormal, Joshua P. Warren is a rock star. He's also an author, television and movie consultant, radio personality, and filmmaker - and tour guide when he's not out of town pursuing one of his other enterprises.
This evening, the tour is led by Tadd McDivitt, a lanky young man who talks about his son and pregnant wife as we walk toward our first stop. I feel fortunate that, as on the Vicksburg tour, I am in the hands of a historian who knows how to tell a story.
The tour is in the heart of this North Carolina city of tall office buildings, massive churches, and, even at 10 p.m., busy streets.
At the corner of Biltmore Avenue and Eagle Street, McDivitt tells the story of Will Harris, a madman who escaped from prison and, in a drunken rampage while looking for his girlfriend, shot and killed five men, including two police officers.
The tour includes Central United Methodist Church, where, according to McDivitt, many apparitions have been captured in photographs; and the Battery Park Hotel, where a young lady was murdered in a case that remains unsolved.
At the end of the tour, in the basement of the Masonic Lodge, is the Asheville Mystery Museum, with displays that help illustrate some of the stories McDivitt talked about during the tour.
www.hauntedasheville.com828-335-6764
Sloss Furnaces, Birmingham
Sloss Furnaces, which produced pig iron from 1882 to 1971, is a designated National Historic Landmark. It also has a reputation as one of the most haunted places in Alabama and is listed as one of the top 100 places in the world for paranormal activity.
On this tour, I am alone and it's the middle of the day. Before starting, I read on the self-guided map that to make iron, iron ore, coal, and limestone are dumped into the top of the furnace while superhot air is blasted up from the bottom.
The blast of air burns the coke (coal), releasing gases that react with the iron ore. The limestone acts as a cleaning agent, removing impurities from the ore. Free of impurities, the molten iron is collected in the bottom of the furnace, where it can be drawn off. This is dangerous work. During the operation's long history, thousands of workers lost their lives in accidents.
Following the map, I walk between buildings and down into the stock tunnel where raw materials were weighed and transported to the top of the furnace. I could certainly imagine a presence lurking there even though there were several other visitors touring the tunnel when I was there.
Back up the stairway, I walk past the boilers and around the end of the complex. All at once, it is quiet. I find that odd given the number of men, women, and children I had encountered moments before.
The only sounds are my footfalls on crushed gravel paths that weave around this labyrinth of brick buildings, massive pipes and valves, stack pipes and stairways.
Past the blower building and hot blast stoves, I find myself at the No. 1 furnace and cast shed, where the molten iron came out and flowed into floor castings with a long trench called the sow and smaller trenches off the sow called piglets, which is where the term "pig iron" originated.
With the exception of taking a few more photos, this is the end of my tour. And no, I didn't encounter any spirits and I haven't found any lurking in my photographs. What I found instead was a new appreciation for the men who worked in this grueling industry; maybe that's the true spirit of Sloss.
slossfurnaces.com 205-324-1911
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