Utter the word “ghost” and you’ll instantly have everyone’s attention. Even skeptics aren’t immune to hauntings - in fact ghosts don’t seem to mind who they spook. While sightings of ghosts are pretty rare, other more ethereal demonstrations of their presence are not so unusual – smells, shadowy movements, sudden cold drafts, or the sounds of things moving or crashing can all signal a ghost may be in your viscinity.
Here in the Hills, stories of ghosts and haunted buildings abound. Sometimes, we forget that a great many people have passed through our world over the past century and many lives, both good and bad, have unfolded in the same buildings we now inhabit.
Take the case of Maddie Whitfield who’s owned the 150-year-old “Nutmeg Gallery” on Queen St. in Alton for the past year. Built in 1857 probably as a mercantile building, over the years it’s gone through many owners and incarnations as a general dry goods store, butcher shop, a barber shop with a pool room, an art gallery and now a home décor and gift store. The Whitfields have previously lived in over 21 homes, many of them old and they’ve collected some tingly personal ghost stories.
Over a year ago when they moved into the building, they learned the former owner had felt so strongly there was a little girl “living” there that she put a little child’s desk and chair in the corner of her art gallery to appease the willful and active young spirit. After the Whitfields moved in, Maddie’s mother came to stay for a while and she often remarked about the little girl who’d sit on the end of her bed at night and pester her with her chatter. What added to the strangeness of this particular story is that the lady had never been told about a possible child ghost.
Maddie frequently gets a strong whiff of a sweet, musky perfume or an awful smelling cigarette, despite the fact that she rarely wears perfume and they are non smokers. “We’re used to it – we’ll be sitting here, and a cushion will just roll off the couch – we have no pets and our kids are grown up and gone. Other times, we’ll be watching television and something will fall upstairs – we go up to look and nothing is out of place.”
Carol Vidoni operates Mulberry Farm Antiques & Collectibles, running her business out of the barn on Hwy 9 near the Gore Rd. Two years ago on an autumn day, a woman, drove in to see her antiques and not too long after, she came back to the 1890’s farmhouse. Carol says, “She walked up to me as I stood behind my counter and told me she’d just met a ghost outside by the barn. As soon as she’d got out of her car, she met him and they had a conversation about who he was and how he’d died – he was dressed like an old farm hand and he had bad teeth. It was so uncanny, and I was so skeptical, but there I was, asking her questions across the counter about this man.”
“All of a sudden, this visitor started swatting the air, exclaiming, ‘Go away, leave me alone – go away!’ I’m getting goosebumps just telling you this. The whole thing was so strange,” she added. Even though the ghost was apparently pestering the woman, Carol couldn’t see a thing.
Charmon Nicol was also a skeptic but she’s become respectful of the spirits that haunt the Nicolston Mill where she lives. She not only acknowledges them, she’s nicknamed them. Her husband, Franklin Daniel Nicol is the 5th great grandson of the founder, who built the mill in 1853 and today he and his family operate a family campground on the site. They opened the doors of the grist mill in 1999 to the public so they could view this historic landmark.
During the summer of ’93, Carol ran a summer day camp and one day a little boy who was supposed to be going to his swimming lesson lagged behind to inform her that she had a ghost in the mill. “The kids would say ‘there’s something in the mill’ and I’d tell them nonchalantly that it was a spirit and her name is Isabelle. I had nicknamed her that, and whenever anything unexplainable happened, we’d just say it was Isabelle - she was seen as a protector…ooh, I’m getting goosebumps now!”
“A psychic once stopped by the mill with his daughter and remarked, ‘Oh there’s a lot going on – oh yes, there’s about five men here!’ He walked around for a while, then he left, saying ‘I gotta get outa here.’ That same week a lady dropped in and she too felt something and she started chanting.”
“Then my black dog, “Bailey” did something totally out of character – she jumped up and bit the woman’s necklace off!” Carol was shocked but later she learned that bad spirits can take over the body of an animal, and she thinks this is what happened while the lady was chanting.
One day, an amazing thing happened as Carol went down under the mill to get firewood. Mounting the stairs with her load of wood, she looked up and stopped dead in her tracks. Across the room was a man standing alone with Carol’s dog. “I said, ‘Oh hello Mr. Quibble.’ I had no idea why I said that. I looked down at Bailey and she was fine with him - they were both looking at me. They were less than five feet away, and ooh, I’m getting really cold – oh, I hate that!
“My husband said there used to be an old fellow who’d walk down to the mill every day in the 1930’s wearing a top hat and followed by his dog.” Carol described her mill ghost as being older and he seemed to be wearing a black jacket and a top hat. After that chilling experience, her son saw the ghost a few more times, but when Bailey died last year, Mr. Quibble didn’t come back.
Danielle Sweeney has worked in “The Deck,” an Orangeville pub for the past eight years. Originally it was built as a homestead for the Julls, one of Orangeville’s earliest pioneering families. Staff there often hear unexplainable noises. When everyone else has gone home and they’re cleaning up, dishes rattling in the kitchen at 3:00 a.m. is not unheard of.
Some spirits are said to frequent the buildings they were once attached to - to “check in” or visit their loved ones. They can become dispirited however when the building undergoes a change or renovation. Danielle leads me to the kitchen to see the stack of pristine white plates, adding matter of factly that she sometimes sees shadows in her peripheral vision. Through the doorway in the room next to the front door, a stack of lumber lays on the floor – the room is being renovated!
The Millcroft Inn and Spa in Alton also has its share of ghostly stories and experiences. According to Charles Banfield, the Mill’s marketing manager, most of the mill’s buildings have seen their share of haunting phenomena: apparitions, drafts, noises and smells and stories told by employees and visitors all add up for some neck tingling stories.
Charles recounts, “There was a puzzling ‘incident’ that occurred a few years back when the Millcroft Dam (over which the our waterfall flows) was being refurbished. A cement machine that was being used to pour in the new concrete suddenly stopped working shortly after starting. The mechanics who came to the site couldn’t figure out what the problem was so the rest of the cement to finish the dam had to be ported and poured via wheelbarrow. When the equipment was removed from Millcroft property, it suddenly started working again.”
In Wayne Townsend’s highly readable, recently published book, “Orangeville, The Heart of Dufferin County,” he cites the compelling story of Orangeville’s most famous ghost. For weeks in 1895, the Springbrook Ghost attracted hundreds of would-be ghost watchers, out to catch a glimpse of this notorious spook. He was known to have haunted the area of the Greenwood Cemetery on the west side of Orangeville, mostly in the area of the nearby train tracks and around the corner and over to a nearby tavern.
“Mr Ghost,” as he was known, was described by many as varying from 8 to11 feet in height and was a very active spirit. When darkness fell, and horses and buggies were on the roads, he at times was described as running alongside, and peering in the windows of the conveyances, scaring the death out of the passengers.
The accounts in the local papers, who were having a field day with the situation, were just incredible. One man saw the ghost melt into the road after running alongside his horse, while another proclaimed Mr. Ghost, dressed in his all black clothes had sat on the dash of his buggy, ridden for a while, then disappeared. It was reported that horses, even if they were a mile away from the affected area of town, would start to rear up and become terrified, long before they reached the cemetery
One diligent ghost hunter reportedly attacked the phantom with an axe and drew blood. In another case, an employee from the newspaper headed out one night determined to track down the ghoul. He and a friend were successful in locating the ghost and managed to pull off his coat in a hair raising chase..
Whether the sightings were genuine or more likely the result of copy cat pranksters, we’ll never know. The excitement was elevated to a fever pitch and the train was often full of the curious, who came from as far away as Toronto to experience the ghost mania. Quite incredibly, for the next 20 years, the spectre kept “popping up,” providing ever more incredible ghostly stories and experiences, which only continued to keep his spirit alive.
There are so many more haunted stories to recount, but you’ll experience your own spine tingling pleasure if you dare to ask as you venture through the buildings in this region, “Do you have any ghosts here?”
Sandra Traversy publishes in the local media and freelances from her home in Erin. You can see more of her writing and photography at
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