Church Street is said to have been built overtop old churchyard graves, causing a restless spirit or two to appear. One is a nun, and the other is a woman in old-fashioned garb who seems to be looking for something.
Church Street
Jackson Building
The 15-story Jackson Building is a tourist attraction and the first skyscraper in western North Carolina. It’s ghostly inhabitant is said to be a man who committed suicide during the Depression. The man’s face appears in one of the upper windows, and reports say there is a bulls-eye on the sidewalk that represents the spot where he fell.
Pond Road
The locals may tell you that Pond Road has a ghost dog, seen near the quarry. First, you hear the phantom black hound howl, and then he appears, trotting. Next he starts to run, leaps, and disappears.
Lewis Memorial Park
Lewis Memorial Park is a cemetery where eerie apparitions are said to roam. A ghost horse and rider and a phantom dog are seen here; the rider is thought to be a funeral director, Robert J. Lewis, who donated the land for the cemetery in 1927.
Pritchard Park
Pritchard Park is inside the triangle formed by Patton Avenue, College Street and lower Haywood
Street. Ghostly Confederate soldiers are said to linger here, as this was a staging area during the Civil War. It also used to house the city’s post office.
Thomas Wolfe Memorial
Old Kentucky Home, the Thomas Wolfe Memorial, was the home of the renowned writer and featured in his autobiographical novel “Look Homeward, Angel.” The place has a couple of spirits in residence: those of a woman and a man. The woman’s apparition has been spotted in the dining room; the man in a rocking chair upstairs. Witnesses say a face has peered out an upstairs window late at night, and the sounds of an old-fashioned typewriter have been heard.
Newberry College
At Newberry College’s Keller Hall, a woman committed suicide by jumping from the bell tower during the Civil War era. She was distraught over the death of her boyfriend in the war. Witnesses have heard phantom screams coming from the tower and seen the woman’s apparition up there as well. And at the college’s Kinard Hall dorm, the second floor has a resident ghost. Students say it opens windows, cabinets and drawers and turns on water faucets.
Children's Graveyard - Duncan Chapel Methodist Church Cemetery
Duncan Chapel Methodist Church, built in the 1850s, has a cemetery known as the Children’s Graveyard. The road to get there is across from a McDonalds. Apparently the cemetery is older than the church, as the dates on the gravestones are said to range from the late 1700s to the late 1800s. Folks have reported unexplained lights, disembodied laughing, and the running footsteps of someone unseen.
Montrose Cemetery - Lowthers Hill Cemetery
Montrose Cemetery, aka Lowthers Hill Cemetery, is very old and spooky, according to witnesses who describe feelings of fear and nausea on the grounds. The cemetery was so old and run down that a mass marker was placed outside naming the known burials inside. Some say a murderer brought children here to kill them in the 1950s or 1960s, and their ghosts are heard screaming and crying. Others say apparitions and cold spots abound, and sunken graves are plentiful. Some reports say this is a party hangout for teens and vandals.
Cottageville Cemetery
A local legend surrounds Cottageville Cemetery. It says that those who drive around the cemetery three times, then drive into its center and flash their lights three times, will see the deceased leave their graves, walk around, and throw things.
