Haunted Cemeteries Page 2

  Almost immediately, there were debunkers of the cemetery’s account. How could a truck have damaged two bars in the middle of a row without disturbing any of the others? Even with fire-retardant gloves, who could have withstood touching—much less grabbing hold of—a glowing, white-hot iron bar? The surface temperature would have been almost five hundred degrees!

  No, something very unusual had happened at Resurrection Cemetery: an honest-to-goodness supernatural occurrence.

  The debate went on for weeks. Then the cemetery association, anxious to get the controversy behind them, made the absolute worst decision possible: Without warning, they removed the mangled bars and put two new ones in their place.

  And so the conspiracy theories began. What was the cemetery board hiding? Why was it afraid to let people see the bars for themselves?

  The answer was obvious: Otherworldly hands had warped them, but the cemetery didn’t want anyone to know.

  After enough people protested, the bowed bars were reinstalled. Over the years, hundreds of photos of them have been taken. Many have been posted on the Internet, and a quick web search will turn up enough pictures to pique anyone’s interest.

  But were Resurrection Mary and the spirit who showed up inside the graveyard gates back in 1986 one and the same? Perhaps some night a solitary motorist will pick up a stranded traveler on that lonely stretch of Archer Avenue and ask.

  Chicago folklore is filled with stories about ghosts on the roadways, and Resurrection Mary is not the only one to set up camp outside a cemetery. An unidentified, bloody apparition has startled motorists by rushing frantically out into traffic on the streets surrounding Bethania Cemetery. Three roads, one of which is Archer, border the graveyard; its eastern boundary is Resurrection Cemetery.

  Another spirit can be found inside Bethania Cemetery: an elderly maintenance man who’s usually spotted burning a pile of leaves. If the spectator turns away briefly, then looks back, both the groundskeeper and the fire are gone.

  The street that passes by Evergreen Cemetery, nine miles away in Evergreen Park, is also haunted by a ghost hitchhiker. Appearances by the young female phantom (who looks to be about fourteen years old) began in the 1980s. The weirdest part of the tale is that she doesn’t always wait for a car to offer her a ride. On at least one occasion she hopped aboard a Chicago Transit Authority (CTA) bus headed toward downtown. But she must not carry a lot of pocket change. When the driver asked for the fare, the girl evaporated right before his eyes.

  There’s yet another female hitchhiking ghost, and she predates Mary. The apparition manifests on Desplaines Avenue about seven miles outside the Windy City. She’s a young brunette with bobbed hair and 1920s flapper attire. She usually materializes between the 2400 block in North Riverside, where the Melody Mill Ballroom operated from 1930 to 1984, and the 1400 block in Forest Park, where the Waldheim Jewish Cemetery is located. If the spectre is given a lift, she vanishes from the car as it nears or passes the graveyard. In some versions of the story, the woman tells the driver that she lives at the cemetery caretaker’s house. When she’s dropped off, she walks toward the fence and then disappears as she reaches the locked gates.

  The Waldheim hitchhiker ghost story started in 1933 or 1934, but it really took off after Tiny Hall, the Melody Mill’s bandleader, told it on WGN radio in 1938. In his version, the spirit appeared as a woman dressed in white, and she was given a ride to a cemetery by three men she had danced with earlier that night. (Hall didn’t mention Waldheim by name, but listeners made the connection.) Once out of the vehicle, the woman ran into the cemetery, and two of the men chased after her. The next morning, one man was found dead at the wheel of the car. The two men who had pursued the woman were found inside the graveyard, alive but having gone insane overnight. There was no trace of the hitchhiker, but police found a pocketbook. They went to an address they found inside, and a different woman answered the door. She told the detectives the mysterious woman was her daughter but that she’d been dead for three years.

  Sightings of the Waldheim Cemetery ghost petered out in the 1940s, but for some reason they perked up again for a while in 1973. She hasn’t been reported recently, but it’s believed she’s still roaming Desplaines Avenue, waiting for someone to offer her a lift.

  Chapter 2

  The Ghosts of

  Bachelor’s Grove

  Some graveyards are more haunted than others. If you count the sheer number of sightings at Bachelor’s Grove Cemetery, it is one of the busiest in the Heartland. It’s abandoned now, set back off the highway in a dense forest preserve. But that hasn’t stopped the spooks from returning to pay their respects.

  Ben didn’t think he’d ever get there. It was only about twenty miles from Chicago, but till he got past the traffic on Interstate 294 it seemed much farther. He got off on Cicero Avenue, turned onto the Midlothian Turnpike, passed through Midlothian itself, then kept a sharp lookout for the exit to the Rubio Woods Forest Preserve.

  The timbered park is one of more than a hundred such walking, biking, and picnicking areas set aside for public use by Cook County, and Ben had been hearing for years that the one known as Bachelor’s Grove was haunted.

  Within it, there was also a one-acre graveyard that dated back more than 170 years. And the place had been accumulating ghosts all that time.

  The first settlers to the area arrived in the 1820s and 1830s, with most of them coming from England, followed in the 1840s by a wave of immigrants from Germany and elsewhere in northern Europe. Many of the wooded parcels outside the Windy City became identified with people who lived near them, so it’s very likely the grove Ben sought got its name from the Batchelder clan, who were known to be in the area by 1845. Over time, the family name may have been simplified to “Batchelor” and, finally, “Bachelor.”

  But there was another possibility Ben found just as intriguing. According to a man named Stephen H. Rexford, he and three other men—bachelors all—were the first settlers to build their homesteads in the immediate vicinity. Some locals started calling the tract Bachelor’s Grove, and the nickname stuck.

  One explanation was as provable as another, Ben thought as he turned into the Rubio Woods parking lot. Likewise, the correct spellings for the name of the wayside and the cemetery were uncertain. They’ve been seen as Bachelor, Bachelors, Bachellor, Batchelor, Batchelder, Bachelder, Berzel, Batchel, and Petzel, along with all their various possessive forms. It was all the more confusing to Ben because the large sign at the entrance to the woods labeled it “Bachelors Grove,” but the placard over the gates of the graveyard itself read “Bachelor’s Grove.”

  It really didn’t matter, Ben mused. He didn’t think the ghosts cared one way or the other.

  The first legal record of the cemetery was on the deed when Edward M. Everden sold the property in 1864. The agreement specified that the new owner had to maintain one acre as a cemetery, an area in which burials had been taking place for a quarter of a century. The last regular interment was in 1965, although cremated ashes were added to an existing plot in 1989. The graveyard is no longer active, and the Cook County Forest Preserve District has handled its maintenance since around 1976.

  Through the middle of the twentieth century, Bachelor’s Grove was a popular weekend getaway. Families would picnic under the trees, relatives would visit their ancestors’ graves, and children would swim or fish in a small, deep pond located between the edge of the cemetery and the highway.

  In the 1960s and 1970s, however, the spot became a hangout for teenagers and, at night, a lovers’ lane. Vandals defaced many of the headstones, spray-painting or knocking them over. Looters took some of the markers home or threw them into the lake. In the process, many graves became unmarked and were lost and forgotten.

  In the late 1960s, parts of the Midlothian Turnpike were rerouted, and the stretch that passed by the entrance to the cemetery was closed to traffic. Cars on the new multi-lane highway now whiz by the hidden graveyard, completely unaware of its e
xistence.

  But the burial ground’s seclusion doesn’t stop the place from being haunted. And that’s what Ben was there to see.

  Leaving his car in the Rubio Woods visitor parking, Ben walked the 350 feet along the former turnpike until it crossed the new highway. Soon he was ambling down the old thoroughfare toward Bachelor’s Grove, a tall row of trees pressing in from either side.

  A narrow path turned off to the right. As he stepped off the macadam, Ben paused to take a look at a lonely farmhouse sitting to one side. He thought it odd that anyone was allowed to live way back there on public land, but maybe it had been grandfathered in when the county took control of the property.

  The place was in good condition, all things considered. Its white exterior was newly painted, and a cozy swing hung on the front porch. It appeared to be deserted—it was so quiet in the woods Ben could have heard the proverbial pin drop— but a dim light was burning in one of the upstairs windows.

  Ah, well. That wasn’t what Ben had come to see. He passed by the residence without another thought and started down the gravel trail to the entrance of the graveyard.

  He came upon it sooner than he expected. He knew he was in the right place: A high wire fence had been erected all the way around its perimeter, and a large sign bearing the cemetery’s name hung over the front gates.

  Ben didn’t know whether the barrier had been put up to separate the graveyard from the rest of the grove or whether it was there so officials could close off the grounds if they needed to. But it was obvious that no one had done any maintenance on the plot for some time: Thick vines and ivy had worked their way through the loose mesh of the fence, completely covering it, and the gate was wide open, sagging on its hinges.

  He stepped inside. The grass and weeds were so high that it was impossible at first glance to see any of the tomb-stones. But soon Ben realized they were everywhere, some in rows, some by themselves off to one side, and all of them beneath the sheltering boughs of the towering trees that had been there for generations. Most of the headstones were low, flat granite blocks, about two by three feet, with names chiseled on top of the people resting below. But some of the markers were short columns, though the tops of almost all of them had been broken off years ago.

  Ben strolled to the far end of the cemetery. Trespassers had torn down a portion of the back fence, so he could walk right up to the edge of the foul, brackish pond. Nothing to see there.

  In fact, there was nothing unusual to be seen anywhere. Ben didn’t try to conceal his disappointment. He had heard that during Prohibition, the tiny lake had been a favorite place for Chicago mobsters to dump their murder victims. Supposedly people had seen some of the dead rise out of the murky depths, zombielike creatures from a green lagoon. Couldn’t one or two have waved at Ben from their watery graves?

  Of course it was daylight, and most of the phantoms in the cemetery had been seen at night—which was par for the course with spirits.

  There was the hooded monk and a woman wearing a white dress—possibly a wedding gown—carrying a baby in her arms. She usually appeared out on the trail and always seemed so peaceful that she acquired a sobriquet—the Madonna of Bachelor’s Grove.

  Two other apparitions had been recognized: George Harwell Federman and Janet Lorraine Logan. When people spotted them, they usually didn’t realize at first that they were seeing ghosts. The phantoms looked like normal, living, breathing human beings. But then the spectres would abruptly evaporate, without leaving a trace. At some point, the pair’s tombstones were deliberately removed in the hopes that the spirits couldn’t find their way back to the burial ground. It didn’t work.

  Even the modern turnpike on the other side of the pond was haunted. There have been claims that a phantom car slowly drives along that piece of highway, only to disappear if anyone gets too close.

  Ben had hoped that, at the very least, he might catch sight of one of the shimmering orbs of blue light that were supposed to appear in the treetops inside the cemetery. Or the bright red light that was said to dart among the leaves. They had both been known to occasionally manifest in the middle of the day.

  Ben knew from his reading about ghosts that paranormal experts think ignis fatuus (“foolish fire”), as such balls of light are known, may be the wandering souls of the dead. In Sweden and Finland, the glowing globes are believed to be the spirits of lost babies. In other cultures, the will-o’-the-wisps, as such lights are also called, are thought to be the ghosts of sinners who are doomed to walk the earth forever. Others believe that they’re mischievous spirits trying to lure unsuspecting people into the darkness. Regardless of who or what the peculiar phosphorescent lights are, superstition says their appearance foretells an impending death or other tragedy.

  Maybe, Ben considered, it’s just as well they don’t show up.

  It was getting late. Ben headed back toward the entrance, hoping upon hope that before he left he might catch the dulcet sound of the disembodied voice said to softly call “Minna, Minna,” always within five or six feet of the front gates.

  But no luck.

  Neither did he hear the agitated wail of the unseen baby, another one of the entities said to haunt the forest.

  Discouraged, Ben shuffled down the pathway back toward his car. As he neared the end of the trail, he started to wonder who lived in the clapboard farmhouse he had passed on the way in. He gazed off to the little clearing to the left where it sat, and—it was gone!

  Impossible! It had been there less than an hour before, as solid as could be. Ben was sure of it. Yet now, there was nothing there at all.

  Ben walked over to the empty patch of ground. As he stood there, suddenly shaking uncontrollably, he went over all the ghost stories he had ever heard about Bachelor’s Grove. But no one had ever mentioned the one he had just experienced: the tale of a phantom house that turns up, day or night, at different locations all over the woods. Sometimes witnesses also spy the spectre of a farmer along with his horse and plow. Perhaps the strangest part of the old wives’ tale was that no such farmhouse had ever been built on that particular piece of property.

  Sometimes it’s hard to believe in ghosts, even when you’ve seen them with your own eyes. But in that shaded cemetery outside Chicago, Ben had had proof positive. The spirits had come calling down that shady lane; as a result, for him, there would never again be such a thing as a simple walk in the woods.

  Chapter 3

  The Legend of

  Inez Clarke

  Does the statue of a little girl really escape from its glass case and roam the grounds of Graceland Cemetery? And how about that other monument, the one said to symbolize the figure of Death? Is it true that the mysterious figure won’t show up in photographs?

  Some job! He’d signed up with Pinkerton, the best in the business, so he could fight bad guys. He could see himself now: taking down some robber during a bank heist. Or infiltrating the mob. The “Pinks” were sent out to capture Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And Jesse James. In the 1870s they spied on the Molly Maguires. Why couldn’t he have been assigned to something like that?

  But no. Here Joe was, protecting—can you believe it?—a graveyard! What kind of job was that? he wondered. Why do you even need a night watchman at a cemetery?

  Okay, sure. Now and then trespassers might sneak in after closing time and mark up one of the tombstones or topple over a statue. But you don’t need someone on the job all the time for that. You waited until the hooligans started acting up, then patrolled for a few months until the problem was taken care of.

  Besides the lack of adventure, tonight it was raining cats and dogs. Chicago had its share of nasty weather—cloudbursts in the summer and feet of snow in the winter—but this was one of the worst August thunderstorms he could remember. His clothing was soaked, and water had seeped into parts of his body he didn’t know he had. He just wanted the night to be over.

  Lightning lit up the cemetery in a series of continuous bursts, almost makin
g Joe’s flashlight unnecessary. The sky barely had time to settle back into darkness before another crack illuminated everything within several hundred feet, brighter than the single small beam of his torch could ever manage. And as each electrical spark streaked across the sky, it was instantly followed by a massive boom of thunder. The storm had to be directly overhead.

  Joe wasn’t a superstitious man, but apocalyptic nights like this one made him wonder whether the rumors he had heard were true: Was this graveyard really haunted?

  Graceland Cemetery was founded by Thomas Bryan in 1860 on eight acres a few miles north of Chicago. Eventually the Windy City would expand and annex Lake View, the district in which the graveyard was located, and the burial grounds, dotted with magnificent tombs and monuments, would grow to encompass 119 acres. Among the luminaries who would be buried there were two Illinois governors, a chief justice of the Supreme Court, several Chicago mayors (including the city’s first, William Butler Ogden), other prominent civic leaders, and at least a dozen architects. Among the most famous entrepreneurs interred at Graceland were Marshall Field and the man who founded the company Joe now worked for: Allan Pinkerton.

  An astute businessman, Bryan had realized that as Chicago got bigger, it would need more space to bury its residents. Until the town’s Common Council opened two cemeteries in 1835, one on the south side of town, the other on the north, Chicago had no official city graveyard. Residents tended to bury relatives wherever there was open space along the Chicago River.

  Almost as soon as the Chicago City Cemetery was established “downtown” in 1843 at what is today Lincoln Park, people voiced public health concerns about the number of graves that were being concentrated in one small area. They were worried that the graveyard was too close to Lake Michigan and might be washed away; also, contamination might seep into the underground water supply, a fear that only increased after a major cholera outbreak in 1849.