Ghost Tales from the North Carolina Piedmont

For some reason there seem to be more books in circulation that deal with ghosts and haunts from North Carolina than from any other state. I can't really explain why this is so but it could be because the Old North State has produced quite a collection of interesting and colorful spooks. Because of this glut of North Carolina ghost books it is hard sometimes to find a book about this subject that has any stories in it that I haven't come across time and again. This book is no exception and many of the stories found in these pages are stories that I have read about before. Fortunately, the writing is excellent which makes reading familiar stories quite enjoyable, no matter how many times I have read about a particular ghost. As a case in point there is the story of Lydia which is the Carolina version of the Chicago's more famous Resurrection Mary. In the story presented in this book Lydia appears along the road as usual but then the story takes a different turn and the authors' put an entirely new spin on the legend of Lydia. There are also several stories in this book that I have never run across before. That alone is an accomplishment considering that I have a shelf full of North Carolina ghost books. For example, the story of the National Cemetery at Salisbury is completely new to me, as is the story of the Bahnson House. Other stories are not only new but also just plain fun, like the ghost who has a tendency to party when he is home alone and the ghost who is kind enough to scare away unwanted sales people. Another very important thing that most of these stories contain is recent eyewitness accounts of the activity. These authors do a very good job in fact, of including eyewitness accounts along with a short history of the haunt. A little history can go a long way toward making the story interesting and the eyewitness accounts add credibility. On the other hand, too much history can bog the story down but these authors have done an excellent job of avoiding that pitfall. There are unfortunately a few rather weak stories to be found in this book, but not many. I would have left out the story of "The Root Cellar" and probably the treasure story also. One story is a little overburdened with history and lacking in spooks while the other one has no history at all. The only other drawback is a lack of information as to how one might find the haunted places in this book. I realize why there is no indication of where the private homes are but some information on the location of the public places discussed in the book would have been helpful to anyone who might want to do a little ghost hunting of their own. Despite these slight problems however I must say that I enjoyed this book a great deal and on my next trip to North Carolina I may just try to find a few of these places.

I love ghost stories, and there are some pretty darned good ones in Ghost Tales From the North Carolina Piedmont. These stories were of particular interest to me because they come from some of my old stomping grounds. My own section of the western Piedmont was not included, though, as the authors limited themselves to stories originating in the area between Charlotte and the Triangle - thus, the entire North Carolina Piedmont is not represented here. That is the only complaint I have about a wonderful collection of unnerving hauntings. Most of these stories have never been published in book form before, but there are also a few familiar classics that absolutely had to be included. In the very first story, you will meet Hershel, the ghost of a former theatre arts student who likes to pull pranks inside High Point University's Memorial Auditorium, the very building in which he hanged himself. Then of course there is Lydia. Sure, this is a story that can be found in similar form just about anywhere in the country, but Lydia is truly special to those of us in North Carolina - I doubt if there is anyone living here that has not heard about the stranded young lady dressed in white who sometimes appears to lone drivers beneath a railroad underpass in Jamestown; the driver stops to help, agrees to take her home to High Point, and then discovers that she has vanished once he arrives at her house - those drivers who went up to the house then learned that Lydia had been killed underneath that same underpass on her way home from a party many years earlier. The road no longer goes by this underpass, but still the legend of Lydia haunts our imaginations. This is, in my opinion, the quintessential ghost story, and much to my delight this book includes the story of one encounter with Lydia that differed significantly from the traditional version. What else will you find here? There's a ghost of a young lady who hanged herself to avoid an arranged marriage and returned each anniversary of her death to torment her father; wailing ghosts still inhabiting broken-down mansions; Devil's Cove, an oppressive cave where the devil is said to live; ghosts of Union soldiers who died in the thousands in a Confederate prison camp, who now seem to reside on the grounds of the National Cemetery at Salisbury; a ghost who leaves adults alone but terrifies children living in his house; ghosts who seemingly love to party hard and loud while the owners are away; a woman whose painting of a home she sees in her nightmares turns out to be a perfect image of a nearby home that burned down long ago - complete with a face of the child who lived there looking out the window; and many more juicy tales - 21 in all. Some of these stories are just a little bit creepy, and that is exactly what I want my ghost stories to be. I also feel compelled to mention the fact that one of the co-authors, Linda Duck Tanenbaum, passed away just before the book was published, and Barry McGee