10 Ghostly Mysteries of Canada

No.10 - The Walker Theatre's Ghostly Performers

Winnipeg, Manitoba

Inspired by a prominent Chicago theatre, Corliss Powers Walker's extensive 2,000-seat theatre opened in 1907 and would prove influential in shaping Winnipeg's artistic history. Walker would also create a series of theatres across the country. By the time he stopped working at Winnipeg's theatre in 1933, the seeds had already been sown for a haunting.

Stage actors Laurence Irving and Mabel Hackney drowned in 1914 and ever since they've been apparently engaged in ghostly singing, shouting and stage performances. Recordings have documented the sounds, and the ghostly twosome is known to hold impromptu performances to this day.

No.9 - The Hatley Castle Ghost

Victoria, British Columbia

The building now known as the Royal Roads Military College was originally a castle replica built by the former Premier James Dunsmuir in 1908. Known for its popular social functions, the house was eventually bought by another family in the 1930s. They soon began seeing the ghost of a young man killed in an earlier war.

When the building became a military college, the young ghost remained and he was joined by the ghostly Laura Dunsmuir. She would regularly mess up blankets, drop kitchen pots and watch the soldiers, all in an alleged effort to save them from a wartime death.

No.8 - The Haunted Five Fishermen Restaurant

Halifax, Nova Scotia

One of Canada's earliest schools in 1817, this historic Halifax building became

an art school and eventually a mortuary. As fate would have it, the mortuary was present during the sinking of the Titanic and the Halifax Explosion of 1917.

In 1975, the building became the Five Fishermen Restaurant, and while the food is great, so are the ghosts. Staff and paranormal investigators have recorded strange knocks, seen fast shadows ducking behind the bar, and felt taps on the shoulder. The ghosts have remained mostly invisible, except for an old grey-haired man who enters the bar during the l ate hours.

No.7 - The Banff Springs Hotel's Hidden Room

Banff, Alberta

The opening of the Banff Springs Hotel introduced tourists to the wonders of the Canadian Rockies. What these visitors didn't know, however, was that the hotel was built with a hidden room that only the construction crew knew about. Undiscovered until 1926, the area around the room was blamed for housing spirits and frightening guests.

The 1928 re-opening of the hotel removed the room, but spirits have continued to linger. A ghostly bellhop named Sam offers to open doors for guests and a long-deceased bride haunts the bridal suite and re-enacts the living moment when her dress caught on fire.

No.6 - The Great Amherst Mystery

Amherst, NovaScotia

After an attempted sexual assault in 1878, Esther Cox was victimized by an alleged poltergeist. The attacks began as noises and progressed to the point where Esther was experiencing seizures and continual pain. A death threat even appeared on her bedroom wall.

Actor and psychic investigator Walter Hubbell stayed with Esther's family in an attempt to save her. It was determined that the poltergeist was several spirits, most notably that shoemaker Bob Nickle, but no one knew why Esther was targeted. After going to jail for arson (which she blamed on the poltergeists), Esther was released and the spirits let her be.

No.5 - The Dagg Poltergeist

Clarendon, Quebec

The Daggs were a peaceful family in a Quebec farmhouse in the late 1800s. After they adopted a Scottish orphan named Dinah, a poltergeist began to harass them. Smashed windows, strange fires and moved objects were commonplace, and finally owner George Dagg asked journalist Percy Woodcock to see the events for himself.

Woodcock, Dagg and 15 others watched as the poltergeist started multiple fires, moved kitchen jugs through the house, and tossed stones through windows. Each witness signed documents stating that they had seen the poltergeist and after creating a sufficient spectacle, the spirit left the Daggs alone some three months later.

No.4 - The Baldoon Mystery

Wallaceburg, Ontario

Between 1830 and 1840, John McDonald bought a lucrative patch of Ontario land. He immediately got offers to resell it, especially from an old woman who wouldn't take no for an answer. McDonald refused, only to be plagued by supernatural activity like crashing poles, unknown footsteps and bullets flying through his windows.

Fearful, McDonald visited a psychic who told him to wound any strange birds lurking nearby because it would also wound the perpetrator. McDonald noticed a black headed-goose and after hitting it with a rock, he noticed the next day that the old woman from earlier was now suffering from a broken arm.

No.3 - The Wynyard Ghost

Cape Breton, Nova Scotia

Major Wynyard was a British officer serving in Canada during the American War of Independence. On October 23, 1823, Wynyard was having dinner with his fellow officers when a ghost entered. The other men were afraid, but Wynyard recognized the spirit as his brother. The spirit waved and disappeared before the men noted the date and time of the appearance.

Following the incident, Wynyard received mail from his family in England. A letter informed him that his brother had died two days to the hour after his ghostly appearance in Canada. With multiple witnesses and written documentation, this ghostly tale refuses to go away.

No.2 - Peter MacIntyre's Cemetery Visit

Tracadie, Prince Edward Island

Peter MacIntyre joined some men for an evening of drinking and fireside chats. One man told the others about a spirit that was haunting the Scotch Fort Cemetery. MacIntyre wasn't afraid and offered to go the cemetery alone and put a hay-fork in front of a grave to announce his visit.

The next morning, Peter was found dead at the graveyard with a clear expression of fright and his hay-fork stuck through the back of his jacket. Did one of the men set him up? Was an angry spirit responsible for his death? No one knows for sure.

No.1 - The Haunted Mackenzie House

Toronto, Ontario

William Lyon Mackenzie was Toronto's first mayor. Politics ran through his family as his great grandson William Lyon Mackenzie King eventually became prime minister. During Mackenzie King's tenure, his great-grandfather's old house was up for demolishment, but he agreed to keep it standing as a museum.

The Mackenzie House still stands, but it has been haunted for over 50 years. Ghostly sightings of the old mayor and his wife have been described in detail, as have sounds of his old printing press and his master piano. For visitors, it's now a classic museum that is filled with history and supernatural spooks.

Happy Halloween!

With prospects of ghosts and goblins right around the corner and pumpkins alight with candles, the spookiest of seasons is upon us. One of the traditional plants associated with this season are pumpkins, or “Jack-o’-lanterns.”

The history of the “Jack of the Lantern” dates back to several legends. One legend is based on an old Irish tale. According to this legend, Jack was a mean person who played a trick on the devil. This made the devil mad, so the devil sentenced Jack to walk the earth carrying a lantern made out of a turnip with a burning coal inside.

Jack became “Jack of the Lantern.” This was later shortened to “Jack-o’-lantern.” From this legend came the Irish tradition of placing lighted jack-o-lanterns by doors on Halloween.

Another legend is based on the Celtic celebration of the dead. Celtic ritual believed that the souls of the dead returned on the evening before November 1. Pumpkins were lit in a celebration of the harvest and as an honoring of dead ancestors.

The first fruit that was lit and carved was actually turnips and gourds. The Irish also carved potatoes. Sometime along the way, it was discovered that pumpkins were bigger and easier to carve. European customs included the lighting of pumpkins with scary faces to ward off evil spirits.

Several other legends abound, but all the legends agree that the lighting of the lantern helps ward off evil spirits.

The Suicide Woods of Mt. Fuji

"The perfect place to die." That's how Aokigahara was described in Wataru Tsurumui's bestselling book The Complete Manual of Suicide. A dense, dark forest bordering Mt. Fuji, Aokigahara is infamous throughout Japan as a popular spot for those taking their final journey. In 2002, 78 bodies were found within it, replacing the previous record of 73 in 1998. By May of 2006, at least 16 new suicides had already been found. More than a few of them were even carrying copies of Tsurumui's book. No one knows how many bodies go undiscovered.

Signs emblazoned with messages such as "Please reconsider" and "Please consult the police before you decide to die!" are nailed to trees throughout the forest. However, the woods have such a reputation that these minor deterrents do little to stop the determined. Local residents say they can always tell who is going into the forest for its stunning natural beauty, who is hunting after the macabre and who is planning never to return. "We've got everything here that points to us being a death spot. Perhaps we should just promote ourselves as 'Suicide City' and encourage people to come here," the exasperated mayor of Aokigahara has been quoted as saying.

Part of the appeal is dying at the foot of the sacred Mt. Fuji. Part of it is the foreboding nature of Aokigahara, so dense and thick that from just a few kilometers inside it no sounds can be heard other than those produced by the forest itself. Legends surround the place; for instance, there are said to be massive underground iron deposits that cause compasses to go haywire, trapping innocents along with the purposely suicidal. Japan's Self Defence Force regularly runs training exercises throughout Aokigahara, and claims to have had no trouble with their military-grade lensatic compasses. They admit, though, that commercially available equipment would be pretty much useless.


Aokigahara is considered the most haunted location in all of Japan, a purgatory for yurei, the unsettled ghosts of Japan who have been torn unnaturally soon from their lives and who howl their suffering on the winds. Spiritualists say that the trees themselves are filled with a malevolent energy, accumulated from centuries of suicides. They don't want you to go back out.

However, even in these haunted woods, regular humans still have a job to do. Forestry workers rotate in and out of shifts at a station building in Aokigahara, and occasionally they will come upon unfortunate bodies in various states of decomposition, usually hanging from trees or partially eaten by animals. The bodies are brought down to the station, where a spare room is kept especially for such occasions. In this room are two beds: one for the corpse and one for someone to sleep next to it. Yup, you read that correctly. It is thought that if the corpse is left alone, the lonely and unsettled yurei will scream the whole night through, and the body will move itself into the regular sleeping quarters. In inimitable style, the workers jan-ken (rock-paper-scissors) to see who gets to sleep with the body. And you thought your job was rough. (above taken from the SeekJapan website http://www.seekjapan.jp/article-1/767/The+Suicide+Woods+of+Mt.+Fuji )

Hunting ghosts in Regina

REGINA -- If there's something strange in your neighbourhood, who you gonna call?

Ghost Hunters! ... Research Team.

Dana Hryhoriw and Wendell Kapay are the Ghost Hunters Research Team (GHRT). They've been helping people with paranormal problems since 2004 -- for free, mind you, all for the greater good.

"One of the biggest things for us is we're not exactly what you see on TV," explains Hryhoriw. "To us, these spirits were and are still somebody's loved ones. We go by respect first and foremost. We try to communicate with the spirits rather than banish them."

Hryhoriw and Kapay say they help roughly 30 people in Regina every year deal with suspected spirits or unexplained noises in their houses. Every investigation is strictly confidential.

"Usually when we go there we'll take a look at every alternative possible. We don't necessarily go there looking for a spirit, but we also don't debunk our client's claims," Hryhoriw says.

They communicate with the spirits using a variety of equipment including night-vision camcorders, cameras, voice recorders, motion sensors, thermometers, candles and compasses.

"I like to use a compass ... Because of the magnetic force of the spirit, it makes the compass kind of dance around when you stand still," Hryhoriw says.

They've saved clips on their tape recorder: A girl's voice in an empty graveyard, a mysterious voice saying "hi" in a suspected haunted house. They've also accumulated creepy photographs over the years. Some have random smoke appearing, while others have orbs streaking through the frame.

They have always considered ghost hunting a hobby, but when they moved from Wynyard to Regina in 2004 they formed their research team. More precisely, the research team formed after the night Hryhoriw saw her first ghost.

She says she and her partner wanted to explore Darke Hall at the University of Regina campus on College Avenue. Just as they were leaving, Hryhoriw says she saw something she'll never forget.

"I looked up at the front doors of Darke Hall, and there was a man standing there," she says. "Just the way he was standing there and looking at us, it was like 1,000 volts of electricity surged through me. It took my breath away."

She didn't know at the time that this mysterious man, who appeared and disappeared in the old hall, was actually Francis Darke, the founding father of Darke Hall. They went to a library to find out more information on the hall when she saw him in a book.

"That's the man I saw," she says pointing to his picture in the library book. The man, 64 years deceased, appeared to her looking the same as he did in a photo taken in the early 1930s.

Both Hryhoriw and Kapay experienced the paranormal at a young age. Kapay explains some of the noises he heard as child.

"I would hear things in the night that I shouldn't have been hearing," he says. Like the rocking chair that would rock back and forth when only he and his brother were home. When his father died, Kapay believed that his spirit stayed in the house.

"Cupboard doors were opening and closing on their own," he says.

Hryhoriw's first real paranormal experience happened while she was in the eighth grade. She was very close to her grandfather when she was young, and in the months before he died she had the same dream every night.

"I was in school, wearing these certain type of clothes. I'd get a call to the office, so I'd leave my homeroom, go down to the office and they would tell me, 'Get ready, your parents are picking you up, your grandpa has passed away,'" she recalls.

Night after night, the same visions played in her dreaming mind. In every dream she had the same clothes on and every time the same result occurred. Disturbed by the dreams, she decided against wearing those particular clothes together and valued every moment with her grandfather.

One day she had slept in so she threw on some clothes in a rush. When she got to her homeroom class, the moment played out just as it did in her dream.

"The minute the secretary said, 'Please send Dana to the office,' I looked down and I realized I was wearing those clothes and I cried all the way to the office," she says. "It hit me like a ton of bricks."

Losing someone so close to her stung, so she's vowed to help out others who have lost loved ones as well.

"If somebody has unfinished business, or they passed away without being able to say goodbye to a loved one, for me, my ultimate goal would be to capture that message and just to be able help them pass on," she says.

With Halloween approaching, calls are coming more frequently for the Ghost Hunters. Because so many people ask for their help, they won't stop their investigations, not until the day they finally get an answer.

"For most people it's one of the most popular unanswered questions: What's out there?" she says. (above taken from the Leader-Post website )