Showing posts with label Yellowstone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yellowstone. Show all posts

Friday, March 21, 2014

Hiram's House

Hiram Martin Chittenden
One of Yellowstone National Park's important early figures was Hiram M. Chittenden. Working for the Army Corps of Engineers, he spent two extended tours of duty in the park. A West Point graduate, he first came to Yellowstone as a lieutenant in 1891 and for the next 4 years was in charge of maintenance and construction of the roads and bridges. Like so many others, he fell in love with the clean air, beautiful scenery and wondrous sites he was exposed to every day. After 4 years there, he requested to remain, but it was not to be and he had to report to a post in the northwest.

In 1899, his request to return to Yellowstone was successful and he was overjoyed that spring when he was able to return. His return came with a promotion and he was assigned to the post of Engineer Officer. In 1902, the government gave him a larger budget and Hiram was able to turn his attention to new buildings and offices, including a badly needed new mess hall.  Later that year, with the planned arrival of the Northern Pacific Railroad to Gardiner, Montana at the park's northern border, he was able to convince Washington, D.C. of the need for a magnificent entrance to the park. 


Historical picture of the Roosevelt Arch at Yellowstone
On February 19, 1903, under Hiram's supervision, construction on what has come to be known as the Roosevelt Arch at the north entrance was begun. President Roosevelt was visiting the park when construction on the arch itself was started so he was asked to place the cornerstone. The stone he laid covered a time capsule containing a picture of himself, a bible, several local newspapers and a few other mementos of the time. The arch was completed on August 15, 1903 at a cost of $10,000. 


Roosevelt Arch as it looks today.

With the larger budget, Hiram was also able to have a new home constructed for himself. He personally oversaw the construction of his house which was located just east of the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel. The house was a rather simple design and built of wood, but it fit him perfectly and was large enough to accommodate his family on their frequent visits. His wife Nettie and their children Eleanor, Hiram Jr., and Teddy remained at the family home in St. Louis during most of his various posts, but often came to stay with Hiram at Yellowstone for extended periods of time. He had one of the rooms in the house built as his office and he spent many hours at his desk smoking his cigars while reading, writing, and making plans for the future of the park.

The Chittenden home now serve as offices for several
park organizations.

In late 1905, he was given orders to a post in Seattle, Washington. After a total of ten years in his beloved Yellowstone, he was loath to leave, but he answered the call of duty and left behind his park and his home. He and his wife planned to return to Yellowstone in retirement to live out their lives, but in 1917 at the age of 58, Hiram contracted an illness and passed away without ever seeing the park again. At least not while he was alive.

The original Chittenden home is currently occupied by the offices of the Yellowstone Association and the Yellowstone Institute. The employees are sure old Hiram returned here after his death. Computers in the office sometimes shut down and then turn themselves back on while an employee is working on them. Repairmen cannot explain it because they can find nothing wrong with the equipment and when removed from the premises, they work perfectly. Overhead lights flicker on and off. Electricians have been summoned numerous times, but can find nothing wrong with the wiring. The employees are convinced Hiram doesn't like his home having electricity and is trying to let them know of his displeasure.


Could Hiram's spirit still be staying here?
Other than the annoying, but harmless pranks with electrical items, the employees consider Hiram to be friendly and even helpful at times. Doors often open and close by themselves. Upon entering in the morning, the employees will find doors that were left open will be closed even though the building was locked and no one had entry during the night. One of the managers tells how once he had forgotten a report he needed so he returned that evening to retrieve it. Upon entering the front door, he saw the door to his office, which he had definitely left open, was closed. As he crossed the room, his office door slowly swung open for him. After looking around to make sure nobody else was there, he retrieved the needed report and left, making sure to lock the front door behind him. He was the first to arrive the next morning and found his office door to be closed once again.


Hiram, Nettie, Hiram Jr., Eleanor, & Teddy
The conclusive evidence of Hiram's presence though is the aroma of his cigar. Smoking in public buildings has been prohibited for a number of years now, yet the smell of cigar smoke is often present in the room which used to be Hiram's office as well as a room upstairs which used to be his bedroom.

Shortly before he died, Hiram confided to a friend that his only regret was not accomplishing more while in Yellowstone. Evidently he has returned to spend eternity in the place he loved the most and perhaps to help guide those who are today working on the park and its future.

Maybe Henry Wordsworth Longfellow had Hiram in mind when he wrote, "All houses in which men lived and died are haunted houses. Through the open doors the harmless phantoms on their errands glide with feet that make no sound upon the floors."

Friday, February 28, 2014

Lovelorn Light

Have you ever suffered the pain of being in love with someone who doesn't love you back? Those unfortunate souls know precisely what the term "holding a torch" means. For how long, though, does one continue to hold this torch? For some, like Ed Wilson, the answer is forever.


North entrance to Yellowstone near Mammoth Hot Springs
In 1885, Ed came to Yellowstone Park just 13 years after it was established. There were very few visitors to the park yet, especially during the bitterly cold, snow-bound winters. The U.S. Army guarded the park and there were few if any park amenities established other than the Army camps. Ed hired on as an Army scout. His duties were to guard against poachers and to provide the camps with fresh meat which he was authorized to hunt and kill. By all accounts, he was good at his job and took his duties very seriously. After catching and turning in several soldiers he had caught illegally hunting or shooting animals for sport, a few of the men didn't particularly care for him, but everyone respected him. He didn't make close friends with anyone as far as can be found. He had a reputation as being strange because he spoke of the mysterious and the unseen and, unlike the other scouts, he preferred to travel in the wilderness alone and at night. During the darkest and fiercest storms when everyone else would stay inside their shelter, Ed would always venture out to scout and never return until the storm had passed.


Mr. G. L. Henderson, a widower with 4 daughters and a son, was hired in 1891 as the Assistant Park Superintendent. He moved to the park with his children and established the Mammoth store and the post office within the park which his children managed. Ed met and fell in love at first sight with Mary Rosetta, Mr. Henderson's youngest daughter. In his own way, Ed tried to court Mary Rose to win her hand, but she didn't return his affections. She had no doubt heard the strange stories about Ed and being in his late 30's, he must have seemed ancient to the young and very beautiful Mary Rose. With her beauty and the lack of females in the park, Mary Rose had the pick of any young soldier and it soon became obvious to everyone that Ed had no chance.

On a warm day in July, Ed walked up the hill behind the Henderson's store and he didn't return. He had told nobody he was leaving and no one saw him go. Given his peculiar habits and his comings and goings while performing his duties, no one knew he was missing for several weeks. When it was determined he had not checked in and nobody had seen him for almost a month, his quarters were searched where his guns and other items he would have carried with him while out scouting were found. A group of soldiers was organized and a search was begun. After several weeks of intense searching and another month of looking with no results, the official search was called off due to the winter weather setting in.


The hill behind the store where Ed's remains were found and
where his light can still be seen.
A year had passed when one day several soldiers decided to enjoy the nice weather and a day off by hiking to the top of the hill behind the store. There they stumbled upon Ed Wilson's skeleton. Next to his remains still clutched in his bony fingers was an empty bottle of morphine. It was determined that Ed had committed suicide by poisoning himself.

Now, almost 125 years later, there's an unexplained faint light that many people have seen on the top of the hill behind the Mammoth Hot Springs Village store. Both employees and visitors have regularly reported seeing it, most of whom have never heard of Ed Wilson's story. Oh, it's not there every night, but sometimes when the clear night sky is especially dark and it seems there are a million twinkling stars shining, a door from Wilson's dimension opens into the dimension of the living. The light on the hill is where Ed sat and with a heavy, broken heart, decided it would be impossible to live without his beloved Mary Rose.

Monday, November 11, 2013

Haunted Mammoth Hotel

If at all possible, a trip to Yellowstone National Park should be in your plans. Don't plan to get through it in just a few hours or even a day or two. Stay a week or more because that's the minimum required just to see all the jaw-dropping wonders there is to see. There's good reason this park was nicknamed "Wonderland" by early visitors. Some of those visitors were so taken by Wonderland, they never left.

One of the few lodging accommodations inside the park is the storied Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel. Originally built in 1883, it was remodeled and enlarged a number of times to meet demand. In 1936, the original hotel structure was demolished and rebuilt except for the north wing which had been built in 1911. To say that unexplained things frequently happen in the hotel is a bit of an understatement.

Doors to rooms will often refuse to open and even the hotel staff cannot budge the "stuck" doors. A few minutes later, the door will open with no problem. This phenomena happens so often the cleaning staff has learned to simply go to the next room and upon finishing that room, return to the skipped room whose door now easily opens. 

One young housekeeper was in the process of cleaning a room when she went into the hall to retrieve clean towels. As soon as she was out of the room, the door slammed shut! When the door wouldn't re-open, she went into the adjoining room which had a connecting door and used her master key to get into the closed room. She found a heavy wooden dresser in the room had been moved and was blocking the door. There had been no one else in the room with the maid and there was no way anyone could have gotten in and moved the dresser in the few seconds she had been locked out. She ran to her supervisor who was on the same floor at the end of the hall and the two of them came back to the room within 2 minutes. Upon arrival, they found the door was standing open and the dresser back where it was supposed to be 6 feet away. The housekeeper swore she wasn't lying and abruptly handed her name tag to the supervisor and quit. At first, the supervisor was suspicious, but then she noticed deep scratches on the floor showing the path traveled by the heavy dresser from across the room to the door and back.

Furniture is often moved around in the storage room also. Extra beds, tables, chairs and supplies are kept in a storage room to replace any items that may get broken in the hotel. Maintenance personnel have frequently reported chairs that were once stacked against one wall will be stacked against the other wall from one entry time to the next. Once, the head maintenance supervisor had retrieved a box of light bulbs for his men to replace several which had burned out. He locked the door when he left. He received a call on his walkie-talkie for some other item almost immediately so he turned back, opened the locked door and found something was on the other side. He pushed it open to find an unopened case of toilet paper had been pushed against the door. The cases of toilet paper are kept against the far wall in the back and there is only the one door through which to enter.

The wide, usually quiet hallway on the 4th floor of the hotel where,
sometimes, a little girl's laughter and running feet can be heard.
Long-time employee's of the hotel say these unexplained matter are rather unsettling, but they have never felt threatened. The feeling is more like their resident spirit is simply mischievous and likes to play jokes. Workers and guests have reported hearing what sounds like a little girl's laughter when there are no children around. They also have heard little footsteps running in deserted hallways. Several psychics have said they felt the ghost is a very young girl whose name is Emily. There is a grave of a young girl in the Fort Yellowstone Cemetery a few yards from the hotel. Emily Sievert was the youngest daughter of Chaplain H. A. Sievert of the 9th U.S. Calvary. She died in 1903 just shy of her 2nd birthday. Perhaps this is the hotel's ghost. Perhaps little Emily is forever happy playing jokes in the hotel, teasing staff and guests alike.


Friday, September 27, 2013

Haunting In Yellowstone

The historic Roosevelt Arch, the north entrance to Yellowstone 
National Park. It was dedicated on April 24, 1903.
Yellowstone National Park was established in 1872, but in a short-sighted budget move, the government allocated no funds for the upkeep, protection and management of the park. For the first 14 years of its existence, the park was seriously threatened by poachers killing the animals, people throwing rocks and broken tree limbs into the geysers and hot springs in a misguided attempt to stop them up, souvenir hunters broke off large pieces of the geysers and unauthorized developers set up camps for tourists next to hot springs where they built bath and laundry facilities along with toilet facilities located directly over the streams. 

Finally, Congress hired civilian superintendents to protect the land, but there were only a handful to oversee more than 2 million acres of park. In 1886, the park looked to the U.S. Army for help. The cavalry soldiers who came to Yellowstone made their headquarters at the foot of the Mammoth Hot Springs Terraces. Their campground was called Camp Sheridan, but after enduring 5 harsh winters in poorly constructed "temporary" buildings, a permanent post was built and named Fort Yellowstone. 


Simple headstones and wooden markers still stand over the graves
of civilian workers and family members of the soldiers.
By 1910, there were 324 soldiers stationed at Fort Yellowstone. In addition to the soldiers, there were officer's families (marriage was discouraged for enlisted men) and many civilian employees living in the fort. Most of the soldiers considered the assignment to be a good duty station as the work was varied and the scenery couldn't be beat. However, with the very hard winters, encounters with wild animals and the general hazardous duty of army life, deaths inevitably occurred.  Soldiers, wives, children and civilian employees alike were all buried in the nicely tended Fort Yellowstone Army Cemetery.

Congress eventually appropriated sufficient funds for civilian operation of the park and at sunset on July 4, 1916, an Army cannon located at the top of Capitol Hill was fired for the last time. The next day, the army left behind Yellowstone and their dearly departed friends and loved ones. The cemetery was left unattended and for the next year, the grass and weeds grew over the graves and the headstones and wooden markers faded in the winds and snows of winter. The dead didn't seem to mind. 


Even today, coffin-shaped sunken indention's in the ground can 
be found where the soldiers remains were removed.
The very next summer, however, some government official made the decision to move the army dead from Fort Yellowstone Cemetery to  the military cemetery at Custer's Battlefield in Montana. All remains of the soldiers were dug up, but the wives and children were left where they lay. 

An obviously very loved 5 year-old boy's grave. The inscription reads -
"Tis a little grave, but oh take care. Fond hopes are buried there."
That fall, reports started coming in; reports of something strange happening around the old Army Cemetery. Visitors who happened to find themselves  near the cemetery after the sun went down were hearing voices and the sounds of children crying, always coming from the direction of the fenced-in graveyard. Too many reports from too many strangers to dismiss out of hand and all of them saying basically the same thing - children crying, the sound of footsteps in the high grass when nobody could be seen and a feeling of deep sorrow and sadness overcoming those few brave enough to approach near the graves. It's been so for almost a hundred years now. 

The Park Service eventually began maintaining the cemetery; the weeds are kept cut back and an iron post fence was erected a few years ago. But sometimes, after the sun has set, people have reported the children are still crying and the voices are still calling out, calling for their fathers and husbands and friends who were taken away from them.
So many children and all destined to spend eternity without
a  daddy beside them.