Spooky Season Reads

Bucolic Door County has a rich haunted history of spooky shipwrecks, bizarre tales and ghost stories.

Because Door County received its name from ""Death's Door,"" the perilous strait with more freshwater shipwrecks than anywhere else in the world, it should be no surprise that the idyllic county has plenty of ghostly history. In the company of storyteller Gayle Soucek, meet lighthouse keepers whose sense of duty extends beyond the grave. Catch a glimpse of the phantom ship Le Griffon, never seen for more than a moment since it sailed through a crack in the ice in 1679. And it is not just the waters of Door County that carry the freight of haunted tales--Country Road T has its share of spooks, bizarre beasts have caused disturbances in the woods and there are whispered rumors that infamous gangster Al Capone added to the county's stock of ghosts through a handful of brutal murders, including an ex-girlfriend and two unacknowledged children.

U.S. Route 44 stretches across New England from Massachusetts to Connecticut before completing its circuit in New York State, 237 miles later. Along the way, travelers may encounter the infamous Bridgewater Triangle, take a haunted tour of Plymouth, or see the ghosts of Chepachet.

Follow in the footsteps of famous science fiction horror writer Howard Phillips Lovecraft from Providence to Glocester, Rhode Island. Follow the road through small towns and dark forests where sightings of UFOs and cryptids have surprised travelers for years.

Join authors Tom D’Agostino and Arlene Nicholson as they explore the dark corners of New England’s most haunted highway.

Across the state of Michigan, uneasy spirits stir in what should be their final resting places.

At Reynolds Cemetery in Jackson, the ghost of Eunice White, traveling from nearby Woodlawn Cemetery, can be seen visiting her father's grave. A mysterious lady in white roams the center of Lovejoy Cemetery in Durand. An apparition of the pacing man appears at Mount Joy in St. Johns. And only the bravest dare visit the Upper Peninsula's Mission Hill Cemetery, where a Native American spirit might appear to point them in the right direction.

Author and paranormal investigator Bradley P. Mikulka leads a tour of some of the Wolverine State's many haunted cemeteries.

More than four decades after the great aircraft carrier U.S.S. Yorktown last served her country, the ghosts of battle are still heard and felt onboard.

Staff members and visitors claim to have experienced disembodied voices, uniformed apparitions, shadowy masses and other unexplainable occurrences since the ""Fighting Lady"" first docked at Patriots Point. Join local author, investigator and "ghostorian'? Bruce Orr as he examines the history, haunting and heritage of the National Historic Landmark and home of Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum.

Discover the dark corners of Norton, Ohio, history

For such a small city, Norton's past is rife with bloody deeds, tragic accidents, and destructive disasters. This community on the edge of Akron had its share of train wrecks, plane crashes, and devastating fires, but other events were decidedly more sinister in nature. In 1931, a young robber allowed his twelve-year-old brother to ride along on a bank heist--to little brother's great delight. A labor dispute in 1950 resulted in two bombings of a local farm in a single year. In the 1970s and 80s, serial killers Robert Buell and Edward Wayne Edwards left their evil mark on the city. Digging through two centuries of news coverage, local author Lisa Merrick uncovers Norton's most loathsome crimes and heartbreaking calamities.

Authors Joseph Bilby and Harry Ziegler chart the brief rise of the Ku Klux Klan and how New Jersey collectively stood up to bigotry.

The state, though, was not immune to the reemergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the first half of the twentieth century. Former vaudevillians Arthur H. Bell and his wife used the tactics of public theater to advertise and recruit for the organization. At a massive riot in Perth Amboy, thousands of immigrants besieged a few hundred Klansmen, tossed them out of building windows, burned their cars and ran them out of town. The allying of pro-Nazi German Bund groups and the Klan in the lead-up to World War II marked the end of the Klan's foothold. Authors Joseph Bilby and Harry Ziegler chart the brief rise of the Ku Klux Klan and how New Jersey collectively stood up to bigotry.

St. Louis was at the center of several key Civil War events from the Dred Scott decision through the Mississippi Campaign that cut the Confederate States in two. Visit the site from which enslaved people tried to cross the Mississippi River to the free state of Illinois. Discover how hundreds of lawsuits by enslaved people set the stage for the Dred Scott decision that lit the fuse to the Civil War. See the military base that produced over 200 Civil War generals and the arsenal that secessionists and unionists fought to control. Author Peter Downs goes behind the monuments and historic sites to explore the people, relationships and events that influenced the course of civil war in St. Louis and the nation.

The Epicenter of Steel City Sports

From Forbes Field to Pitt Stadium, Pittsburgh's Oakland neighborhood has been home to some of the most iconic moments in sports history. Including the Fitzgerald Field House and the Duquesne Gardens, Oakland has drawn in both professional and college sports fans alike.

Local authors and sports historians David Finoli, Tom Rooney, Robert Healy III, Douglas Cavanaugh and Chris Fletcher celebrate the glorious victories and heartbreaking losses throughout the history of Pittsburgh's Oakland section, the epicenter of Steel City Sports.

"Show me your cemeteries, and I will tell you what kind of people you have.'?- Benjamin Franklin

Discover the historic haunts and frightful specters that make the city of brotherly love a haven for unexplained phenomena.

Author Josh Hitchens details the spooky stories of Philadelphia's past and present.

Wandering spirits, vengeful ghosts, and unexplained sightings in Tucson, Arizona.

The benign, candle-carrying ghost of Mayor Levi Manning is reported to roam the halls of Manning House, while a frightening presence is said to lurk in the projectionist room at the Fox Theatre. In Room 242 of the Hotel Congress, guests have described a woman in white sitting at the end of the bed, while other spirits have been spotted in the halls. From the Mission San Xavier del Bac, built in 1700, to the grounds of the University of Arizona, stories of paranormal encounters abound. 

Join author Daryl F. Mallett and discover the thrilling and bone-chilling history of the Old Pueblo.

Stretching from Victorville to Carson City, Highway 395 offers a snapshot of California's diverse landscapes - and oddities.

Tales of skinwalkers and sasquatch sightings flourish among the bones of ghost towns, and stories of the elusive Lone Pine Mountain Devil ignite the curiosity. Far from fiction, the Sierra Phantom lived among the hills for fifty years, and Mountaineer Norman Clyde used his skills to find lost hikers and climbers. Rumors of the Lost Cement Mine, with a rich vein of gold, lures people in, and the Tuttle Creek Ashram, built high above Lone Pine, offers peace.

Author Brian Clune explores the strange and fascinating side of the majestic mountains and lonely deserts along the El Camino Sierra.

Underneath a façade of sunshine and beaches lies a darker side of Southern California.

From the Vallecito Stage Stop deep in the desert where a phantom bride eternally seeks her lost love to the town of Lone Pine where the shades of US Cavalry and Paiute natives still battle for land rights, Southern California is haunted by its sordid past. Ghosts relive their days of fun at Universal Studios and Disneyland and remember their days sailing on the majestic RMS Queen Mary in Long Beach. Even her Missions host the spirits of the long-departed.

Join author Brian Clune as he uncovers the spooky side of Southern California.

Pry into the secrets of the stunning mountains of Virginia.

A nineteenth century cache of gold is buried in the hills. Nine-foot giants once walked the ridges of the Shenandoah, pre-Columbian explorers built homes on isolated mountaintops and a ghost town lies deep in the Jefferson National Forest. Virginia’s mountains conceal canines that walk upright, black panthers and a resurgent mountain lion population. The hide-and-seek champion of the world, Bigfoot, lurks in the dark hollows, phantom dogs pace the backroads and aggressive monkeys swing through the trees. UFOs crisscross the skies and ghosts haunt the caverns below.

Join Denver Michaels, local author and expert in the unexplained, as he explores these mysteries and many more.

Enigmatic mediums, murders, monsters, and more are all part of Michigan's mysterious and sometimes supernatural history.

The will of Detroit's first millionaire, Eber B. Ward, was hotly contested because he took the financial advice of spirits. Marian Spore Bush, Bay City's first female dentist, moved to New York City, where she became a psychic wonder--and a secret philanthropist. Old witchcraft superstitions drove a Mount Morris family insane and caused another man to murder his godmother in Trenton.

Researcher Amberrose Hammond brings to light strange and unusual tales from Michigan's colorful and exciting past.

Listen to the unrestful dead of the Buckeye State's many graveyards

Throughout Ohio, chilling tales abound of places where the dead do not rest in their peaceful earthen beds. In a field east of Cleveland, the ghost of a missing farmhand returned to expose his murder. The violin music of a Cincinnati-area abolitionist continues to linger at a small burial ground in the hills west of the city, and a grave in Central Ohio is haunted by the spirit of a young girl with an ancestral connection to a dark chapter of America's past.

E.R. Cutright, founder of Columbus Ghost Tours in Columbus, explores the sundry Ohio cemeteries and graveyards where the dead demand their stories be told.

On December 26, 1910, Oscar Chitwood lay lifeless on the courthouse lawn in Hot Springs, his wrists shackled together, and his body torn by bullets. The deputies on the scene claimed that masked men had lynched their prisoner and that the lawmen were innocent bystanders to the carnage. Newspapers everywhere proclaimed this killing another example of vigilantism run rampant. Within days, however, the official story fell apart, and these deputies were charged with cold-blooded murder. Authors Guy Lancaster and Christopher Thrasher tell the little-known story of accused outlaw Oscar Chitwood, the authorities he dared defy, and the mysterious resort town of Hot Springs, a place where the Wild West met the epitome of civilization, and where the boundaries between lawman and outlaw were never all that clear.