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Writer in the Garret

~ A writer living one word at a time

Writer in the Garret

Category Archives: Haunted Denver

31 Days of Spooky Stuff, October 30: Cemeteries of Denver that give you Goosebumps…

30 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by Yvonne Montgomery in Ghosts, Hallowe'en, Haunted Denver

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Posted in Denver August 25, 2016 by Reid Phillips

8 Disturbing Cemeteries Around Denver That Will Give You Goosebumps

Who’s on the hunt for the heebie-jeebies? Call me crazy, but one of my favorite places to rove around and take photographs is most definitely at a cemetery – and the eerier the better. There are so many thought provoking structures that “grow” from the ground, including tombstones, trees, monuments, statues, mausoleums, and unidentified objects. You just never known when you may encounter an unexplained presence or phenomenon at these creepy cemeteries in Denver. They lend the phrase “dancing in the moonlight” a whole new meaning.

1. Fairmount Cemetery and Mortuary
1. Fairmount Cemetery and Mortuary
Richard H./Yelp
Founded in 1890, Fairmount Cemetery is the area’s second oldest, with 280 acres of graves that serve as the final resting place for many of Denver’s notable historical figures. Over the years, stories have been told of strange lights and shadows that appear to hover around the grounds, but everytime an investigative team of paranormal enthusiasts try to catch them on film, the tapes come back blank or blackened. But don’t take my word for it. Go see the strangeness for yourself!
2. Mount Olivet Cemetery
2. Mount Olivet Cemetery
Holly F./Yelp
Since 1892, over 120,000 bodies have been laid to rest at Mount Olivet, a Catholic cemetery operated by the Archdiocese of Denver. Like many of the cemeteries on this list, bodies from the infamous graveyard at what is now Cheesman Park were transferred here for burial, and there is no doubt that many of those unhappy spirits still haunt its sacred grounds.
3. Fort Logan National Cemetery
3. Fort Logan National Cemetery
Morgan S./Yelp
This 214 acre national cemetery was established in 1950 and includes Fort Logan’s original post cemetery and additional land from the former military post. Over 122,000 internments were buried here at last count, and the sheer amount of uniform gravestones will send shivers up your spine. Eternally grateful for your honorable service, soldiers!
4. Olinger Crown Hill Mortuary and Cemetery
4. Olinger Crown Hill Mortuary and Cemetery
Photo Courtesy of Wikipedia
Since its inception in 1907, Crown Hill Cemetery and its historic Tower of Memories have grown to be one of Denver’s most recognized landmarks and home to 240 acres of headstones, cremation gardens, cremation niches, vaults, companion crypts, and other sites for final disposal.
5. Ralston Cemetery
5. Ralston Cemetery
Photo Courtesy of Ralston Cemetery
This community cemetery in Arvada is one of the oldest in the area and has a mysteriously uncertain history. The oldest gravestone marks the burial site of triplets laid to rest in 1869, but it is presumed the burial ground existed prior to that date and serves as the final resting place of many original Mile High pioneers.
6. The Sisters of Loretto at Colorado Heights University
6. The Sisters of Loretto at Colorado Heights University
sea turtle/Flickr
On the northwest corner of the campus of Colorado Heights University, is a reminder of the Sisters of Loretto’s presence on the historic land where the women of the West were first educated. It is no longer an active cemetery, but the spirits of roughly 50 sisters still hover over the land of the highest point in Denver.
7. Denver Pet Cemetery and Crematory
7. Denver Pet Cemetery and Crematory
Denver Pet Cemetery and Crematory/Yelp
That’s right, folks, this ain’t no Stephen King novel. If you’re looking for a place to lay Fido down where he can frolic forever with his dog park cronies, look no further. (What? There’s nothing creepy about having your best furry friend frozen, fired, and put six feet under.)
8. Riverside Cemetery
8. Riverside Cemetery
Loco Steve/Flickr
Established in 1876, Riverside is Denver’s oldest operating cemetery and most certainly one of the spookiest in town. Many historic figures and their ghosts call it home, and you can expect to encounter them if visiting the boneyard at just the right time.
5724363995_967c4a21e0_b
Chris Locke/Flickr
One of the most striking sites at Riverside is the limestone replica of Lester Drake’s log cabin, which has been standing for roughly 100 years.
6783294939_d8922fe904_b
e-lame/Flickr
It’s a harrowing haunt, alright. (What does it mean!?)
o-5
Jeni G./Yelp
Take a nighttime tour and experience the strangeness, secrets, tragedies, heartbreak, and mysteries in the moonlight at the Riverside Cemetery.
To enter in the Halloween drawing, comment on the post. The winnerwill receive signed copies of the three Wisdom Court books: Edge of the Shadow; A Signal Shown; All In Bad Time.

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31 Days of Spooky Stuff, October 9: Denver’s Cheesman Park

09 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by Yvonne Montgomery in Ghosts, Haunted Denver

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graveyards, horror

One of my inspirations in writing the Wisdom Court books is an ongoing fascination with hauntings. I’ve long loved spooky stories about strange sounds and cold mists, about encounters with spirits who do not rest. I’ve scared myself silly with ghost movies, and I’ve been forced to look under the bed before I can go to sleep.

I live in Denver, a city with many haunted sites, one of the most notorious being Cheesman Park, not far from my home. It’s a beautiful expanse of grass and trees, and at the  top of a rise there’s a pavilion overlooking Capitol Hill and the Rocky Mountains. By the appearance of the park, and the wide array of people who enjoy it, you’d never know it was once the site of Mount Prospect Cemetery. Moreover, you’d never dream there are bodies under the grass, and, according to some, that their spirits walk.  On a cloudy evening it’s not hard to discern lower spots in the grass where bones may still lie. Several were discovered during repairs made to the sprinkler system a few years ago. Some of the homes near the park are reportedly haunted by the spirits whose graves were disturbed. Here are excerpts from the story from Wikipedia:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheesman_Park,_Denver

“[Prospect] cemetery opened in 1858 and the first burial occurred the following year. In 1872, the U.S. Government determined that the property upon which the cemetery sat was actually federal land, having been deeded to the government in 1860 by a treaty with the Arapaho. The government then offered the land to the City of Denver who purchased it for $200. Although today it is still mostly remembered as Mt. Prospect Cemetery, in 1873 the cemetery’s name was changed to the Denver City Cemetery.

The Cheesman Pavilion, dedicated 1908

Panorama of the Cheesman Park Pavilion at dusk.

As time went on different areas of the cemetery were designated for different religions, ethnic groups and fraternal organizations such as Odd Fellows, Society of Masons, Roman Catholics, Jewish, the Grand Army of the Republic, and a segregated section at the south end for the Chinese. Some sections were well maintained by family descendants or their organizations, but others were terribly neglected. In 1875, 20 acres (81,000 m2) at the northeast part of the cemetery (slightly east of where the botanic gardens are now located) were sold to the Hebrew Burial Society, who then maintained it, while much of the rest of the graveyard fell further into disrepair. By the late 1880s the cemetery was rarely used and in great disrepair, becoming an eyesore in what had become one of the most exclusive parts of the quickly growing city. Real estate developers soon began to lobby for a park to be in its place, rather than an unused cemetery. Before long, Colorado Senator Henry Moore Teller persuaded the U.S. Congress to allow the old graveyard to be converted to a park. On January 25, 1890, Congress authorized the city to vacate Mt. Prospect Cemetery and in recognition, Teller renamed the area Congress Park.

Families were given 90 days to remove the bodies of their loved ones to other locations. Those who could afford this began to transfer bodies to other cemeteries throughout the city and elsewhere. Due to the large number of graves in the Roman Catholic section off to the east, Mayor Joseph E. Bates sold the 40-acre (160,000 m2) area to the archdiocese, which was then named Mount Calvary Cemetery. The Chinese section of the graveyard was given over to the large population of Chinese who lived in the “Hop Alley” district of Denver. Most of these bodies were then removed and shipped to their homeland of China.

Several years went by while the city waited for citizens to remove the remains of their families, but few did. Most of the people buried in the cemetery were vagrants, criminals, and paupers, which probably had a lot do to with why the majority of bodies, more than 5,000, remained unclaimed. In 1893 The City of Denver then awarded a contract to undertaker E.P. McGovern to remove the remains. McGovern was to provide a “fresh” coffin for each body and then transfer it to the Riverside Cemetery at a cost of $1.90 each. The macabre work began on March 14, 1893, while an assorted audience of curiosity-seekers and reporters came and went. For the first few days, the transfer was orderly. However, the unscrupulous McGovern soon found a way to make an even larger profit on the contract. Rather than utilizing full-size coffins for adults, he used child-sized caskets that were just one foot by 3½ feet long. One source claims this was done at least partially because of a coffin shortage caused by a mining accident in Utah.[4] Hacking the bodies up, McGovern sometimes used as many as three caskets for just one body. In their haste, body parts and bones were literally strewn everywhere in a disorganized mess. Their haste also allowed souvenir hunters and onlookers to help themselves to items from the caskets.

The Denver Republican newspaper ran a story breaking the news, its March 19, 1893 headline read: “The Work of Ghouls!” The article described, in detail, McGovern’s practice of hacking up what were sometimes intact remains of the dead and stuffing them into children’s-size coffins. The article partly described the scene:

“The line of desecrated graves at the southern boundary of the cemetery sickened and horrified everybody by the appearance they presented. Around their edges were piled broken coffins, rent and tattered shrouds and fragments of clothing that had been torn from the dead bodies…All were trampled into the ground by the footsteps of the gravediggers like rejected junk.”

Mayor Rogers canceled the contract and the city Health Commissioner began an investigation. Although numerous graves had not yet been reached and others sat exposed, a new contract for moving the bodies was never awarded.”

It’s no wonder people still talk of ghosts walking through the park. Sometimes you can see in the grass the barest outlines of sunken areas where graves once were.

Comment to enter the 10/31 drawing to win a signed copy of each of the books in the Wisdom Court Trilogy. Edge of the Shadow; A Signal Shown; All In Bad Time.

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31 Days of Spooky Stuff, October 8: Croke Patterson Mansion

08 Saturday Oct 2016

Posted by Yvonne Montgomery in Ghosts, Haunted Denver

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mansions

crokepatterson1892-280

Not far from my home in Denver’s Capitol Hill is the Croke Patterson Mansion. When the lovely old house was vacant, I often stopped to stare at the upper-story windows, hoping to see a face looking down at me. Alas, I never did, and now the place is known as the Patterson Inn, a 4-star hotel.

Croke Patterson Mansion – Built in 1890 by Thomas B. Croke, this sandstone residence was one of the country’s most elegant homes. Now serving as a [hotel], it is also said to be one of the most haunted.

According to the legend Thomas B. Croke only entered the palatial mansion one time and was so emotionally shaken by “whatever” was there, that he never returned. Just two years later it was sold to Thomas M. Patterson, who’s family kept the home for several decades. Over the next several years, the building served many purposes, including a dance studio, a radio station, and a boarding house before it was converted to an office building.  During the renovation to office space in the 1970’s, construction crews began to experience a number of strange occurrences.

After a long days work, they would often return the next day to find that the tasks they had completed the day before had been “undone.” After this had occurred several times, guard dogs were left to protect the property from what the workmen thought might be intruders. However, the next day they found the two Doberman Pinschers dead on the sidewalk after having apparently jumped from a third-story window. Once the renovation to office building was complete, employees almost immediately began to notice equipment, such as typewriters, copy machines, and telephone that mysteriously began to operate by themselves.

When a séance was held to determine who was haunting the building, they found it to be the spirit of a little girl whose body was supposedly entombed in the cellar. However, when the basement was excavated, they found a hidden chamber was found, filled with sea sand, but no remains of a little girl.

A ghostly image has often been sighted gliding up and down the main floor stairway and otherworldly voices have been heard here as well. Thomas Patterson, former owner of the home, is said to have been spied numerous times in the courtyard between the mansion and the carriage house.

When the building still served as an apartment building, occupants on the lower levels were known to complain about wild parties taking place on the third level. But, when these parties were investigated, they would be met with only silent emptiness.

Legends of America   http://www.legendsofamerica.com/co-denverghosts.html

Comment on this post and you’ll be entered in the drawing at the end of the month. The prize: a copy of the Wisdom Court Trilogy: Edge of the Shadow; A Signal Shown; All In Bad Time. Good luck!

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Halloween is coming…

25 Saturday Oct 2014

Posted by Yvonne Montgomery in Ghosts, Hallowe'en, Haunted Denver, Wisdom Court, Writing

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autumn, deep blue sky, inspiration, shadows, writing process

and I’m working on Book Three of the Wisdom Court chronicles, All In Bad Time. At times I get jittery while listening to the creaks and sighs of our old house as I tap away on my keyboard, sitting in my third floor garret. The weather has been summer-hot the last few days, and the deep blue sky heightens the yellows and reds of the autumn leaves. But when the sun goes down, and that’s early these days, the air changes as the shadows venture out from the corners. The bustle of the day gives way to the uneasy quiet of the dark. DCIM100SPORT

Not far away from my garret is a former graveyard. This time of year people again recount the tales of how the bodies were dug out of the cemetery to allow for the park it became. How the contractors grew impatient, not bothering to find all of the remains, moving out headstones but leaving body parts behind. Just a couple of years ago, a sprinkler repair project turned up bones buried beneath the grassy area.

Is it any wonder that some people–those sensitive to the emanations of the past in this old neighborhood–sometimes see things from the corners of their eyes? Feel a chill brush by them as they head home when the light falls behind the mountains?

Alone in my garret, it’s not hard to imagine ghostly figures behind me, intent upon catching the attention of my wandering mind, wanting their stories to be told. I like to think that what I write is the product of only my imaginings, but there’s no way to know whose wispy thoughts break through to shape the narrative. And I see things, too, from the corners of my eyes, sometimes feel a breath of cold air move past my cheek.  And I wonder.

 

 

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Wisdom Court and Halloween

09 Wednesday Oct 2013

Posted by Yvonne Montgomery in Ghosts, Hallowe'en, Haunted Denver, Hauntings

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from the El Paso County website

One of my inspirations in writing the Wisdom Court books is an ongoing fascination with hauntings. I’ve long loved spooky stories about strange sounds and cold mists, about encounters with spirits who do not rest. I’ve scared myself silly with ghost movies, and I’ve been forced to look under the bed before I can go to sleep.

I live in Denver, a city with many haunted sites, one of the most notorious being Cheesman Park, not far from my home. It’s a beautiful expanse of grass and trees, and at the  top of a rise there’s a pavilion overlooking Capitol Hill and the Rocky Mountains. By the appearance of the park, and the wide array of people who enjoy it, you’d never know it was once the site of Mount Prospect Cemetery. Moreover, you’d never dream there are bodies under the grass, and, according to some, their spirits walk.  On a cloudy evening it’s not hard to discern lower spots in the grass where bones may still lie. Several were discovered during repairs made to the sprinkler system a few years ago. Some of the homes near the park are reportedly haunted by the spirits whose graves were disturbed. Below is a link to the history of Cheesman Park and its sad history.

Happy Halloween.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheesman_Park,_Denver

Picture credit: cheesmanpark.net

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