My family has always believed in ghosts.

My mother used to freak the kids out with tales of apparitions from her homeland, the Philippines. Her village was built on stilts above water, an area where many were killed during World War II -- she literally lived above a cemetery of sorts. The chore she always dreaded the most was fetching water, because in doing so she had to pass one particular house everyone avoided. No one lived there, but sheet-covered furniture could be seen through the windows. It terrified her and she used to run past it as fast as she could, but never fast enough to miss the loud clanking noises the house emitted. That was just one story and there were many others -- like when her mother saw a headless ghost, or when she heard laughing in the middle of the night.

We even had our own ghost experience in the States. When my brother was still a child, one night he heard a tapping of glass that seemed to go around our house. He alerted my father who proceeded to search outside, but no one was there. We found out the next day that my grandmother died at around the time the tapping occurred.

Shiver…So in honor of Halloween and the creepy, spine-tingling stories I've grown up with I thought a piece on cemeteries and their local lore was in order.

I'll start with a few cemeteries in New Orleans, which I was fortunate enough to visit a few years back. First, let me explain that in New Orleans the dead aren't buried, they are kept in aboveground tombs or vaults-- many extremely ornate and beautiful and some large as a house. The reason for this is the city is situated mostly below sea level and back in the mid-1700s -- when they still buried the dead -- coffins would pop out of the ground during flooding. That quickly ended the burial tradition. Now, New Orleans has over fifteen "Cities of the Dead," as cemeteries there are popularly called.

The oldest surviving cemetery is St. Louis #1. It has a jumbled, labyrinthine layout where Creoles, slaves, immigrants, Protestants and Catholics share the same land. Though they may have been segregated during life, death did not allow for grievances such as a difference in race or religion. Reputedly, the famed voodoo queen Marie Laveau is buried here in an unmarked grave.

The most amazing cemetery I visited in New Orleans was the Metairie Cemetery. It used to be a racetrack back in 1838 and the local legend goes that a gentleman named Charles T. Howard -- who acquired his newfound money in the Louisiana Lottery -- was forbidden acceptance into the exclusive owners association, the Metairie Jockey Club. Angered by this, he vowed that the racetrack would one day be converted into a cemetery and in 1872, as one of the founders of the cemetery, he made certain his statement came true.

Metairie retains the racetrack layout and has the most beautiful, elaborate vaults I saw on my trip -- one almost three stories high. The courteous employees will provide you with a map and tape recorder to do a self-tour.

Now for something a little more creepy…Resurrection Cemetery in Chicago, Illinois. If you know your ghost stories then you are probably familiar with Resurrection Mary, who has been spotted near or in the cemetery since the 1930's. She is said to have blond hair, blue eyes and wears a long white dress. According to years of lore, she was a Polish girl around 18-21 years of age and was attending a dance with her boyfriend at the O'Henry Ballroom -- now the Willowbrook -- on the night she died. She got into an argument with her boyfriend and decided to hitchhike home along Archer Avenue -- the street where Resurrection Cemetery is located. She was struck dead by a hit and run driver. Numerous people have reported seeing her since then.

One man claims to have danced with her all night -- wondering why her skin was so cold -- and when he drove with her along Archer Avenue she disappeared. Many cab drivers say they picked her up only to have her disappear as well, and others claim seeing her along the road or lying in front of the cemetery. Perhaps the strangest reported occurrence happened on August 10, 1976 when a man drove by and saw a woman behind the cemetery gates with her hands wrapped around the bars. He went to the police and told them a woman was locked in the cemetery after closing. When the police showed up there was no woman to be found, but two of the bars were bent and scorched, with what appeared to be small handprints and visible skin texture imbedded in the metal. The bars were removed to avoid spectators, then replaced when the cemetery was accused of having something to hide and have since been removed permanently.

And finally the granddaddy of creepy burial grounds… Stull Cemetery. It is located in Stull -- ten miles from Lawrence -- Kansas and rumored as one of the seven gateways to hell. Stull Cemetery is the least visually impressive of those listed here, but it also has the most diabolical and, of course, most dubious lore. Much of which revolves around an old crumbling church that used to sit behind the cemetery up on a hill and where allegedly Satanists held rituals and burned down all but four stone walls of the church.

Popular rumors claim if a cross were formed with two bottles and thrown at the church wall they would break very easily, but if an upside-down cross were formed -- a satanic sign -- then the bottles would not break no matter how hard they are thrown. Another rumor states that water cannot enter the church, including rainfall, despite the absence of a roof.

Much of this is irrelevant since the church was mysteriously torn down this year -- sources claim the owners did not approve to tear it down -- but there are still the legendary stairs to hell that were believed to exist outside the church. It has been said that when -- and if -- they are found, a force draws one down the stairs and that -- similar to alien abductions -- one suffers a time lapse.

Much of the supernatural and satanic beliefs surrounding Stull Cemetery are most likely urban legend -- some say fabricated by several years of student mischief from Kansas State University. But that has not diminished the interest of many who still come to Stull seeking out the rumored gateway to hell.

So I hoped you found this as creepy as I found the research. Happy Halloween and many ghostly returns!

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© Melt Magazine 2002