Who is into ghost stories/towns?

[Utah]

I love this kind of stuff. History, the afterlife, revenge…it’s great. Any good ghost stories/towns around Utah? 

[Uterider]

Provo springs quickly to mind…

[PlainsUte]

You mean like the Hunty during the Boylen era?

[Anonymous]

Canyon outside of Price west side of Highway 6 old abandoned mine. Genuinely creepy and unsettling feeling from accidents that have happened. Locals tell you some myth about a woman and her infant. She went looking for her husband lost in the mine and was never seen again. Some claim to have seen her wailing with the child looking for her husband.

Third floor of the Governor’s mansion. Creepy museum smell and weird puppet feet noises and stuff. Don’t ask me how I know but after dark this place is spooky.

Also the Daughters of the Utah Pioneer building when it is dark. Weird noises and creepy 19th century photos all over. Makes your skin crawl.

Ute tribal gold up at Low Pass Creek area. Currant creek is known for lost Spanish Mines. Utes consider these mines sacred from the amount of their ancestors who died mining the gold for the evil Spanish. Stories abound of people who find this gold and are hunted and killed by Ute tribe protectors.  There is a cabin up in the area that has Hyrum carved on the top Well this has connections to Brigham Young who negotiated with the Ute tribes to take some of this gold.  A man named Hyrum something forget the last name would take this gold by himself from that area.  Some say it is on the east side of currant creek because it was near an exposed Red Cliff in the area.

I have a million of them.

[Utah]

Nice. Love this. I will have to start checking these places out. I grew up in Ohio, and I swear, it’s like the gateway to hell there. All sorts of shady stuff going on. 

[utahpunk]

Utah has a lot of old mining cities, ghost towns, and a lot of interesting legends.

Beehive mentioned the Spanish Mines and the Lost Rhoades (sp) mines. There are dozens of claims to have found these mines over the years, and they are scattered all over the Uinta Basin and surrounding areas. Nothing has ever panned out.

There are a lot interesting tales and legends associated with these mines. There are some who believe that they are connected to gold that was originally hidden from Cortez when he invaded the Aztecs. Some think that they could be associated with El Dorado/Cibola. Others believe that the sacred cave or caves that the Aztec and Mayan people’s ancestors emerged from in their creation legend,  is in fact Timpanogos cave.

Why would the Escalante/Dominguez party come so far north from Santa Fe when they were trying to reach Califonia, witch lies West? Seems like some pretty bad navigating if you ask me. I can’t help but think they were actually looking for those lost gold mines that Spain had records of from Cortez and company.

Weather or not any of these things are actually true, and if you even believe the stories is not relevant. What is neat are the stories and legends themselves. After I read books about these subjects, the state of Utah just got a lot more interesting and mysterious.

Take all this for what it’s worth.

[Anonymous]

Not even bringing up Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid who had thousands of Hideouts all over the state.  One in Flaming Gorge where it is still called Hideout canyon.  

I have been in an isolated canyon down near the southern part of Canyonlands.  Seen Pueblo ruins that gave me a creepy feeling and my dog wouldnt go near them.  

 

[rbmw263]

Skinwalker ranch

[Tony (admin)]

My dad used to take the family on trips to southern Utah to find ghostowns. It was actually fun.  We also found many old wester movie sets that were abandoned.  

One time we were in a ghost town and there were a bunch of cows milling around.  My dad let out a big burp and this cow rushed my dad, chased him into the car where we sped off.  She fell in love.  haha.

[jamarcus24]

This one’s a Utah oldie. I first heard from my grandpa.

Back in the day there was a grave digger named Jean Baptiste who used to dig up graves and take the clothing and possessions of the deceased.  The family of one of the deceased came to exhume the body so they could bury it in a family cemetary, but when they dug up the grave they found the corpse completely naked.  The police went to Jean Baptise’s house and found the clothes of that particular individual as well as hundreds of other articles of clothing and jewelry from men, women, and children all stored away.

The townsfolk were obviously pretty p**sed off and the police didn’t think it was a good idea to hold him in a cell because they feared the jailhouse wouldn’t prevent any harm coming to him from the townspeople, so at night they put him on a raft and they sailed him out to Fremont Island (just west of Ogden, north of Antelope Island) and they banished him out there because Baptiste couldn’t swim.  A few weeks later some men went out to survey their cattle and they found no sign of Baptiste anywhere, but they did find the remains of one of the cattle that looked like it had had its hide tanned as well as some wood fencing that had been pulled up.  Presumably, Baptiste crafted a raft out of the fencing and hightailed it off the island.

A search was conducted and eventually all that was found was a skeleton that had a ball and chain connected to the leg and most people were satisfied that these were the remains of Jean Baptiste, but law enforcement said that they never stranded Baptiste on the island with a ball and chain.  People used to say that Jean Baptiste still wanders the shores of the Great Salt Lake dragging wet burial clothes in his cold, dead, clammy hands.

[Riot West]

I know this is true because…I AM JEAN BAPTISTE!

[jamarcus24]

Can you please return my great aunt Margaret’s pearl studed corset?  My great uncle Marlon always told me that was a treasured heirloom that went to ground too soon.

[Tony (admin)]

Reminds me of a story my dad wrote years ago about Alta, which was eventually turned into a Twilight Zone episode, Mr. Garrity and the Graves.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734594/

 

[Ebom]

I worked at lagoon for quite a few years. Pioneer village definitely haunted. I’ve seen a mattress move like someone was sitting on it and a very close friend of mine was scratched on his back in one of the houses. I was a semi skeptic before all that, but I’m an absolute believer now.

[Utahute72]

There are a number of them in the West Desert, old mining claims and towns from the late 1800s.  Gold Hill is one that I’ve been to.