Mumbles

I’ve been visiting Calico for over 20 years now and came across your sight by accident.  I will be visiting Calico the first weekend in February to do some four wheeling and was doing some research.  Anyway browsing your sight reminded me of a story from when I was back in junior high camping with my parents. My sister, a friend and I had all taken a walk down to the cemetery just to go for a walk.  My friend had never been to Calico so we were showing him around.  It was dusk and the wind was picking up like it does at dusk so the cemetery was looking a bit creepy anyway.  As we walked around the graves I commented to my friend that they were all real.  He insisted that they were just a made-up tourist attraction.  We made our way up to the top of the hill where the cross is and noticed a wiry old man with thin wispy hair wearing black pants and a black duster blowing in the wind.  He was moving slowly through the cemetery occasionally stopping at certain graves.  We didn’t pay much attention to him and decided to go back to camp.  As my sister and I headed for the exit, my friend went over to where the man was and asked him about the authenticity of the graves.  I was close enough now to see the man in detail.  He was very pale, bald on top with long wispy white hair around the sides and back.  He was missing most of his teeth and the ones he had were yellow and crooked.  His face was rough with a squinting scowl.  His clothes were a worn-in long black duster coat and black pants with cowboy boots.  My friend turned and came back over to us.  He looked somewhat puzzled and scared at the same time.  “Well, what did he say”, I asked.  “He just mumbled”, my friend replied. We left the cemetery and headed down the hill that leads to the parking lot.   Along the way we joked about the “ghost” we just saw and gave my friend a hard time.  Now here’s the creepy part; as we entered the large open parking lot we looked back at the cemetery and saw that the man was now on the top of the hill facing into the wind with one arm around the base of the cross.  I will never forget the image of him with his hair and coat blowing in the wind.  The thing that freaked us out is that there is no way that he could have made it up that hill in the amount of time it took us to see him.  That was when we did the mature, responsible thing and ran screaming back to camp. R. S.

The Working Man on School House Roof

While on a tour not too long ago with 35 people, 6 people looked up at the roof of the school house and said that they could clearly see a man working on the roof with a hammer. This definitely was a selective sighting. The youngest person was about 8 years old to the oldest being in her 60's. I interviewed all six people individually after the Ghost Walk and then gave me identical descriptions of the figure. None of the people were related or knew each other to coordinate this sighting. The man was a shadow person with a hammer in his hand. He moved up and down the roof making, what looked like, repairs. All of the viewing people called out the movement simultaneously as he did his work. We commonly have sightings on the roof of shadow people, but this was the first time we had a description of a workman.

Restroom Echoes

Many times as I stand prepared to give the Ghost Walk and meet the tour, people come up to me and tell me of the female voices that we heard in and around the restrooms by the Leather Shop. Most of them tell me that the voices come from the ladies restroom, but occasionally I will get a report from the men’s restroom.   One report came from a married couple from New Jersey. The wife had asked her husband to stand at the door while she entered the restroom. It was dark out and there was no body in town or around the rest rooms. As she entered she heard women talking. She looked at her husband who perked up quickly. He had heard the voices too. He walked to the door with his flash light and shined it in the darkened room. There was no person in side. The wife told him, “Never mind I’ll hold it!”.

Horse Play

One occurrence that keeps popping up again and again is the horses in town. We have visitors that hear and smell the sound of horse in front of Joes Saloon. Well this is where Calico had its stage coach stop. Reports of the horse sounds sometime accompany the occurrence. This does not just occur occasionally, but very often. In fact it may be one of the most report occurrences. Interestingly, it also occurs one in a while up by the Blacksmith’s Shop.