Hunting Lawrence’s ghosts / LJWorld.com

Archive for Friday, October 30, 2009

Company offers tours of reportedly haunted sites in city and area

The spirit of Col. Shalor Eldridge is reported to haunt the hallways and basement of the Eldridge Hotel, one of Lawrence’s ghost tour destinations visited by Beth Cooper, co-owner of Ghost Tours of Kansas, a Topeka-based company. She’ll be conducting tours in Lawrence today and on Halloween. Behind Cooper is a photo of Col. Eldridge and his family from 1854 that hangs in the lobby of the hotel, 701 Mass.

By Lindsey Slater

October 30, 2009

Ghost Tour of Lawrence

Ghost tours of haunted Lawrence locations are available in time for the haunted Halloween holiday. The tours highlight some of the stories behind the eerie locations.

Lawrence is a town with a lot of history, and to Beth Cooper that means one thing — plenty of places are haunted.

“There are historians and paranormal researchers who believe that Quantrill’s Raid had a huge impact on the energy of the community,” said Cooper, co-owner of Ghost Tours of Kansas, a Topeka-based company.

Maybe that’s one reason that Cooper believes the Eldridge Hotel — which was built by Col. Shalor Eldridge and burned down by William Quantrill — is one of the most haunted buildings in town. Cooper kicks off her Lawrence tours at the downtown landmark, where tour members might dine with Eldridge himself.

“Staff have seen his ghostly figure in a chair,” Cooper said. “The ghostly colonel has been seen smoking a cigar there, and once in a while, you can actually catch a waft of a cigar smoke.”

The spooky stories at the hotel continue up in Room 506. Recent guests had their door opened during the night and a set of golf clubs started shaking the next day. The couple asked for another room.

Why Room 506? Before the latest remodel of the hotel, the cornerstone of the original building, which survived a few fires, was placed in the room.

“There’s that theory that that creates a gateway for spirit activity to move back and forth,” Cooper said. The hotel keeps a list of eerie stories from guests and staff members.

Other haunts on Cooper’s ghostly tour include Pioneer Cemetery on Kansas University’s West Campus. Many killed during Quantrill’s Raid were laid to rest in a mass grave after the attack. While it originally was on the tour for historical purposes, an experience by a psychic on the tour gave the site its first ghost story.

“She started talking to one of these soldiers that was buried here,” Cooper said. “He had the same last name that she did. They actually carried on a conversation.”

Underneath the Massachusetts Street bridge is an original pylon from the first bridge over the Kansas River from more than 100 years ago. It was at this site that Pete Vinegar, his son and nephew were lynched. The story goes that Vinegar’s 14-year-old daughter, Sis, was meeting a wealthy white man under the bridge. Her brother and cousin decided to rob him, but they ended up killing him and throwing his body into the river.

“The boys weren’t very smart. They’d been back home, bragging about what they’d done. They ended up going to jail,” Cooper said.

Vinegar also was arrested. A mob broke into the jail, took the three to the Kaw and lynched them on the bridge. Children would walk by years later asking Pete what he’d done to deserve his punishment. A voice would answer, “Nothing. I didn’t do a thing to be hung.”

But that’s not the only haunt along the “hanging bridge,” as Cooper calls it. A ghost that people believed to be Lizzie Madden walks along where an old railroad bridge once ran. Sightings were even reported in the Lawrence Daily World more than 100 years ago.

“They believed she was murdered because of the distraught nature (of the ghost),” Cooper said.

Other stops on the haunted Lawrence tour include the Sigma Nu fraternity house and Haskell Indian Nations University. Tours are given all year, not just around Halloween.

“A lot of people believe that ghosts only come out at midnight on Halloween,” Cooper said. “That’s not true.”

To book a tour, log on to ghosttourkansas.com.

Discussion

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30 October 2009
at 9:45 a.m.

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Take_a_letter_Maria (Anonymous) says…

They need to include Kennedy School on that tour. Spooky crap happens at that place all of the time.
30 October 2009
at 2:24 p.m.

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consumer1 (Anonymous) says…

What about Oak hill cemetery, I hear there are dead people burried there. Ewwwwwwwweeeeeeespooky……
30 October 2009
at 4:18 p.m.

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flux (Anonymous) says…

plEASE
30 October 2009
at 4:25 p.m.

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cschott (Anonymous) says…

Okay, my sister and I wrote the book, “Boys, Let Me Down Easy” describing the incident at the river and Pete Vinegar. Pete was not involved in the crime. The two young men who mugged and killed the rather wealthy David Bausman were not related to Pete Vinegar, nor his daughter, Sis. One was the boyfriend of Sis Vinegar. The other man was just a friend of the boyfriend. I am glad to see poor Pete getting some media attention though!
30 October 2009
at 5:35 p.m.

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Seamus (Anonymous) says…

It's simply incredible that adults— in this day and age— still believe in the paranormal.
30 October 2009
at 9:06 p.m.

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George_Braziller (Anonymous) says…

Seamus — Don't poo poo what you haven't personally experienced. It's real. I've seen it, heard it, and encountered it in my own house. Activity isn't contained to “Halloween” — there are things that happen all year long.
30 October 2009
at 9:07 p.m.

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Marion (Marion Lynn) says…

“Seamus (Anonymous) says…

It's simply incredible that adults— in this day and age— still believe in the paranormal.”

Marion writes:

“There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy”

William Shakespeare, “Hamlet”, Act 1 scene 5

Marion writes further:

I'm just sayin………………………..

Discount nothing until any given thing is proven to not exist.