Thursday, October 2, 2008

Haunted Florida Month - Creepy Inns

What better time to spin a few ghost tales than the month of October. Throughout the month, I'll be sharing a few ghost stories on Florida's haunted places. It's been said that Florida is the most haunted state in the nation, perhaps because of its long and war-torn history.

I'll start off with a tale of a Haunted bed-and-breakfast inn (coffee please with a side of ectoplasm!)

Seven Sisters Inn, Ocala, FL


If you’re the owner of a bed-and-breakfast inn built on grounds where hundreds of soldiers gasped their dying breaths in battle in the 1800s, you should probably expect a few ghosts to be in residence. The Seven Sisters Inn is actually two Victorian-style mansions – the Pink House and the Purple House- in the historic district in Ocala. Legend and some historical records suggest that the Inn is built on the grounds where the Florida Osceola Indian tribe ambushed and killed soldiers from Fort King during the Florida Indian wars.

And if that’s not enough, the Purple House is also the site of several terrible fires. The ghost that is believed to haunt this part of the Inn is known for her dislike of fire, always blowing out candles as they are lit.

There have been sightings of men and women in period clothing, sounds of a small child, furniture moved or knocked over, and the sounds of mysterious guests who enter in the middle of the night. These ghosts pull their own weight, though. A workman at the house finishing a remodel on the second floor came downstairs to ask the owners if they had seen the other workman who had asked to borrow his hammer. He couldn’t find the hammer or the workman who he had spoken to. The owners told him he was the only workman on the property that day. The hammer was never found.

The highly entertaining Sci Fi series Ghost Hunters actually featured Florida in its episode this week (Wednesday nights at 9 p.m. on the Sci Fi Channel). They visited the Seven Sisters Inn and encountered the spirits that haunt the place. In fact, one mischievious ghost even made off with one of the Ghost Hunter’s flip flops.

Click here to see the Ghost Hunters take.

Click here for video interviews with owners of the Seven Sisters Inn, Bonnie & Ken.

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