Alleged Haunting
According to The World's Most Haunted Places by Jeff Belanger, there have been sporadic accounts of a female "ghostly presence" at the Andrew Bayne Memorial Library for decades. The spirit, identified with Amanda Bayne Balph, allegedly began making herself heard especially since the deterioration of the Lone Sentinel elm.
When neither Amanda nor Jane provided heirs to the Bayne property and agreed to turn over their father's land to the borough, they added four stipulations: that the surrounding streets be named "Balph" and "Teece," the mansion be used as a library, the 4-acre (16,000 m2) estate not be developed, and the estate's elm trees not be removed. Throughout the 1900s, all the elm trees perished from Dutch elm disease. Suffering the loss of a large branch in a 1998 windstorm, the Lone Sentinel had to be removed for fear of it falling on nearby buildings. The library director said the ghost "seemed to be very active right around the time that our Lone Sentinel was dying".
Visitors have reported seeing a woman in the window wearing a large hat when the library was closed, and the ghost is also allegedly prone to playing with light switches, ceiling fans, and the library's computers.
Read more about this topic: Andrew Bayne Memorial Library
Famous quotes containing the words alleged and/or haunting:
“Most observers of the French Revolution, especially the clever and noble ones, have explained it as a life-threatening and contagious illness. They have remained standing with the symptoms and have interpreted these in manifold and contrary ways. Some have regarded it as a merely local ill. The most ingenious opponents have pressed for castration. They well noticed that this alleged illness is nothing other than the crisis of beginning puberty.”
—Novalis [Friedrich Von Hardenberg] (17721801)
“Let us consider that we are all partially insane. It will explain us to each other; it will unriddle many riddles; it will make clear and simple many things which are involved in haunting and harassing difficulties and obscurities now.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (18351910)