[MUSIC: Halloween Music by SoundGalleryByDmitryTaras]
With Halloween just around the corner, now is as good a time as any to ask: Is Evanston haunted?
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Evanston has centuries of history and plenty of eerie cemeteries in the area — the perfect conditions for a haunting.
And the city has actually had some ghost sightings in the past.
Supposedly, a ghost lives between the shores of Lake Michigan and Evanston’s expansive Cavalry Cemetery. In 1943, a naval aviator crashed his plane into the lake and his body was never recovered. A 2007 Chicago Tribune article wrote that there have been hundreds of reported sightings of “Seaweed Charlie” since. If you happen to see him as you drive down Sheridan, he will likely be in his flight suit, crawling across the road and in through the cemetery gates.
Further north, a shipwreck from 1860 haunts the suburbs. According to the Winnetka Historical Society, the Lady Elgin was carrying passengers to Milwaukee when it collided with another boat, the Augusta. The Lady Elgin’s side was pierced open and the boat sank within half an hour of the crash. Around 300 people died. Northwestern students even travelled north to Winnetka to help pull survivors from the water. This became one of the largest marine tragedies in history. The wreck inspired a song by Henry Clay Work: “Lost on the ‘Lady Elgin’.”
[SOUNDBITE OF “Lost on the ‘Lady Elgin’” by Henry Clay Work, sung by Lee Murdock]
It also added to Evanston’s collection of ghost stories. Over the years, several students reported seeing ghostly survivors asking them for help.
But what do current students have to say about local haunts?
First-year Jack Kartel isn’t sure.
JACK KARTEL: I think that maybe they’re real, but I don’t know if I’m all that convinced.
He thinks Taco Bell may be haunted.
JK: They’re always taking so long to make my tacos, so maybe there’s something going on there.
Sophomore Weinberg student Ashley Ortiz is a little more sure.
ASHLEY ORTIZ: I do believe in ghosts.
I’m not sure if I’ve seen a ghost, but when I was about maybe 2 to 3 years old, my parents told me that I would stare at the ceiling and see red splotches and say it was a man in the ceiling, and that went on for a couple months. Then my mother got a priest to bless our house, and I never saw those splotches again.
She’s wary of one building in particular.
AO: I would say that the most haunted place in Evanston is probably the Charles Dawes House. I went to visit it with a couple of my friends and we had a small tour. There were lots of historical paintings and artifacts that just screamed other-worldly presences.
Weinberg freshman Maya Dev also believes in ghosts.
MAYA DEV: My mom and her family have a lot of ghost stories from the house they grew up in. And, just being in that house, I can feel how scary it is.
Daria Chernyshova, a freshman majoring in biology, doesn’t.
DARIA CHERNYSHOVA: Growing up, all the ghost stories that my family ever told me were made up. I don’t think ghosts actually exist. I think it’s just people trying to scare their younger siblings.
So if you think you’ve seen a ghost, don’t be too shocked. This Halloween, maybe you’ll get a face-to-face introduction to some more of Evanston’s haunts.
For WNUR, I’m Supriya Akella.
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Spooky music from Pixabay
Soundbite of “Lost on the ‘Lady Elgin,’” sung by Lee Murdock