Restless Spirits of Fairhaven: Don't Disturb the Murdered Dead

Beware when you climb beneath the streets of haunted cities, like Seattle, San Francisco, New York. And Fairhaven.

Fairhaven Hotel. From the 1890 Fairhaven Illustrated magazine. Courtesy: stumpranchonline.com

(FAIRHAVEN, Wash.) - As many areas of the USA which once were havens for the "Pioneer" culture, now commonly "Chinatown" or "Old Town" areas, Fairhaven, Washington has many restless ghosts, buried secrets and lost treasures.

This is a quick story of how my gallery was shut down by restless spirits. Our art gallery project was set up on the 5th floor of an old brick building, above a classical music instrument shop with the loveliest violins and guitars. Down in the basement, however, was a kind of creepy club, windowless and tomb-like, which had once been a "speakeasy" type mobster hang-out. Legend had it bodies had been found in the walls during an earlier renovation.

Fairhaven was the main jumping off point above San Francisco during the gold-rush days, and had been packed with saloons, opium dens and courtesan houses. It is now the "Old Town" area of Bellingham, and many of the original buildings reamin, including this one. In the next building over, a black cat colony still survives, from the days when they were actually raised for their fur!

After being in that building late several nights, I can say that the strange noises coming from the basement were ghostly indeed. Doors closing, footsteps, murmuring. So much so that several times I climbed down the stairwell to check to see if anyone was there. I got the feeling the restless dead did not appreciate the dance club, called "Speedy O-tubs" which had been bulit in there, where they had live bands & beer.

One night I was working in the gallery and left a burning candle on a nightstand, my mistake, while I went downstairs to the bathroom for a few minutes. By the time I got back upstairs, the candle had been dumped over, had ignited a canvas, which had already gotten out of control and spread to the closet where I had paint stored. I grabbed a fire extinguisher and tried to put it out, but when the piant caught, it was time to evacuate.

Luckily, there were many people around at the coffeeshop across the street, the fire department showed up within 5 or 10 minutes, and everyone rushed to save the precious wooden instruments. That part was really heart-warming, the people voluntarily rushing in like angels, carrying big cellos & little violins out in the glow of flames and smoke. But the gallery was totalled, and that was the end of it.

I'll always question how that candle gott tossed over, when there was no wind, indoors. I consider the restless dead, the curse of the murdered Chinese workers, who were buried in the coal mines under Bellingham, drove us out of there. Beware when you climb beneath the streets of haunted cities, like Seattle, San Francisco, New York. And Fairhaven.

Go visit the ghost of Dirty Dan when you're there... but that's a whole 'nother stroy.

Source: http://CosmoCorps.org