The Christie Ranch on Santa Cruz Island boasts two seperate ghost stories. The first is a classic "white widow" story - a young woman married the captain of a ship, and the two made their home on Santa Cruz Island at the ranch house. One day, he headed out to sea, and every day she stood at the window at the top floor of the house, waiting to see his ship. He is late in returning, and the young woman becomes worried, despite the assurance of her friends and family. Eventually, word comes that the ship sank, and that the captain went down with the ship. Her grief devoured her, and she stopped taking care of herself, eventually withering away and dying. To this day, her ghost can be seen, dressed in white, standing at the house's window, still watching the sea.
In a slightly more sinister version of the story, the husband was a slave trader, a fact unknown to the wife until she paid an unexpected visit to his ship while it was in port. On discovering her husband's true business, she scorned him and returned to the home. On his next trip, his ship sank and he drowned, and the wife again wastes away and dies, though this time torn between guilt and disgust over her husband's trade. This version of the story often features the ghost not as a passive watcher of the sea, but as an angry and vengeful force.
The second story is centered on a bridge that crosses a ravine that separates the main ranch house from the ranch hands quarters. One night while crossing this bridge, a Chumash servant girl began to scream. The ranch hands rushed out to see what had happened, and found the girl sobbing and gibbering incoherently. They brought her back to the ranch house, where she continued to spout incomprehensible nonsense. Eventually the girl was taken to a hospital on the mainland, where she died many years later, never having recovered her senses. However, to this day, people report hearing a weird, inhuman scream in the dead of night coming from that bridge, and nobody has ever seen its source.
In addition to these stories, the ranch also has reports of strange lights and odd shadows seen moving about in the ranch house, weird happenings on the land, and the occasional odd noise from an unknown source, usually occuring late at night.
Commentary: The land now known as the Christie Ranch served as the headquarters of a ranch that occupied the seaward-portion of Santa Cruz Island during the 19th century. The ranch is no longer used, although descendants of the pigs that were bred there now run rough-shod over the islands native flora and fauna. The ranch headqaurters has not been abandoned, however. The University of California runs a research facility on the island, and the Christie Ranch is a satellite base used by researchers on the southwest portion of the island.
Alhough there is running water (and hence showers and toilets), what electricity there is comes from a gas-powered generator, and the telephone lines to the ranch were long ago cut. Although there are standing buildings suitable for use as kitchens and work spaces, they have not been retrofitted for earthquakes, and as such are not suitable to sleep in, so workign there comprises an odd mix of camping and domestic life. Signs posted throughout the buildings warn of the danger of earthquakes, as well as other signs noting that Hanta Virus is a known danger in the area. Also, there is a telephone in the ranch hands quarters, but the line has long since been cut, and as such the "in case of emergency call 911" sign has been altered to read "in case of emergency call God."
A cozy place, all in all.
People usually work in groups out there, and the main form of entertainment in the evenings is sitting around the firepit outside of the ranch hands quarters. And this is when the stories come out. However the stories got started, they are passed on by researchers staying at the ranch.
Personal Experience: I stayed at the ranch for a week in the summer of 2003, while working on an archaeological research project with my advisor, one of his other graduate students, a graduate student from the University of Oregon, and a set of professors and undergrads from CSULB. On the first day, before we set up our tents for the night, we began telling each other what we knew about the place, including the ghost stories.
After I had told the story of the bridge, my advisor, Mike, decided to place his tent right by the bridge, leading to great amusement for all of us.
Later that night, I told the story of the widow in the ranch house. This led to me being dared to enter the house after sunset (yep, here we were, a bunch of adult researchers, behaving like 13-year olds). I agreed, nervously crossed the bridge in the dark, and made my way towards the house.
I had expected that the house would be locked, and I could return with that news. I tried the door. No such luck, it opened and allowed me in. Now, it was clear that the house had been built in two stages, and that there was a newer "outer" layer to the house, to which I had gained access, and an inner layer comprising the original structure. The doors to the inner part of the house were locked, and I could not enter. Nonetheless, I had done what was asked, I had entered the house, if only the outer portion, and I could now report back.
After all, the sooner I reported back, the sooner I could be an adult again.
Sources: Local Legend, Folklore, Personal Accounts
Showing posts with label Santa Cruz Island. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Santa Cruz Island. Show all posts
Friday, May 8, 2009
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
The Channel Islands 'Antap
Although the native peoples of the area, the Barbareno and Ventureno Chumash, had many stories about the islands, two are of particular interest here, and both were collected by anthropologist J. P. Harrington.
STORY 1: The first story concerns an Italian fisherman in the employ of a Chumash man. They go out to Santa Barbara Island during a fishing trip, and find a large rock containing a cave off of the shore of the island. The top of the cave contains a vent hole, and the Italian man climbs up to it and looks in. He begins acting strangely and returns to the boat. On the trip back to the mainland, the Italian tells his employer that he had seen two men in the cave, both Chumash, and that when water would rush into the cave, they would stand and begin blowing their ceremonial whistles. The Chumash employer returns home and tells his relatives of this. And elderly relative informs him that the whistling ceremony began on Santa Barbara Island, and that anyone who witnesses it will soon die. Not long after that the Italian man drowns while working off of the coast of Santa Barbara.
STORY 2: The second story concerns an Anglo-American (in the mid 19th century, these distinctions mattered) and a Chumash boy who went to Santa Cruz Island to gather abalone. The Anglo man found a cave in the rocks in which he saw two men with a bullroarer and an elderwood flute practicing ceremonial dances. When the water was at high tide, the cave was hidden, but at low tide it was exposed. As waves crashed into the cave, the two dancers were not affected. The man and the boy left to return to the mainland. On the way back, the man fell out of the boat and drowned. The boy returned home and told his grandmother what he had seen. She told him that he had seen the ‘Antap, a dangerous thing to see, and she gave him a potion made of toloache (Jimson weed) to prevent evil from coming to the boy.
Commentary: Probably the two most common things that one hears when an alleged haunting is discussed are: the location of the haunting is built on an “Indian Burial Ground” (usually nonsense), the other is that “The Native Americans have stories about this being a bad place” (also usually nonsense). There are many Native American stories about supernaturally dangerous places and things, but most of the popular ghost stories that claim a Native American link make that claim falsely. But not these two.
These stories, as noted, were collected by the early Californian ethnographer J. P. Harrington. Harrington was an odd and rather controversial figure who has gained both loyalty and notoriety amongst those with whom he lived and worked. ex-wife even wrote a tell-all book about her life with him in an age before tell-all books were the rage. The family of the woman who took care of Harrington in his old age, with whom I am acquainted, claim that the ex-wife’s book is all exaggeration and lies. Personally, I don’t claim to know, but I do know that he was a colorful character and a fascinating story in and of himself.
These stories are interesting because they show the continuation of older traditions, but also the way that those traditions were changed by the arrival of Europeans. The ‘Antap were an actual group in Chumash society – a religious/ritual organization that could only be entered if one’s parents paid for one’s entry during childhood. In order to rise through the ranks of Chumash society and become a person of high status, one must be a member of the ‘Antap. Like many traditional and “mystery cult” organizations, the ‘Antap held that it was dangerous for the uninitiated to witness ceremonies. As a result, the ‘Antap’s ceremonies, and many aspects of ‘Antap society, remained shrouded in secrecy, and the ‘Anatap themselves seem to have become boogie men towards the end of the prehistoric period. By the early 20th century, many have ceased viewing the ‘Antap as human shamans and ritualists at all, and have come to view them as supernatural beings, as seen in these stories (it should be noted, though, that many people continued to view them simply as powerful humans – shamans, sorcerers, or even assassins, but human nonetheless). As such, the ‘Antap had now become associated with places of magical danger.
SOURCE: Academic Publication
STORY 1: The first story concerns an Italian fisherman in the employ of a Chumash man. They go out to Santa Barbara Island during a fishing trip, and find a large rock containing a cave off of the shore of the island. The top of the cave contains a vent hole, and the Italian man climbs up to it and looks in. He begins acting strangely and returns to the boat. On the trip back to the mainland, the Italian tells his employer that he had seen two men in the cave, both Chumash, and that when water would rush into the cave, they would stand and begin blowing their ceremonial whistles. The Chumash employer returns home and tells his relatives of this. And elderly relative informs him that the whistling ceremony began on Santa Barbara Island, and that anyone who witnesses it will soon die. Not long after that the Italian man drowns while working off of the coast of Santa Barbara.
STORY 2: The second story concerns an Anglo-American (in the mid 19th century, these distinctions mattered) and a Chumash boy who went to Santa Cruz Island to gather abalone. The Anglo man found a cave in the rocks in which he saw two men with a bullroarer and an elderwood flute practicing ceremonial dances. When the water was at high tide, the cave was hidden, but at low tide it was exposed. As waves crashed into the cave, the two dancers were not affected. The man and the boy left to return to the mainland. On the way back, the man fell out of the boat and drowned. The boy returned home and told his grandmother what he had seen. She told him that he had seen the ‘Antap, a dangerous thing to see, and she gave him a potion made of toloache (Jimson weed) to prevent evil from coming to the boy.
Commentary: Probably the two most common things that one hears when an alleged haunting is discussed are: the location of the haunting is built on an “Indian Burial Ground” (usually nonsense), the other is that “The Native Americans have stories about this being a bad place” (also usually nonsense). There are many Native American stories about supernaturally dangerous places and things, but most of the popular ghost stories that claim a Native American link make that claim falsely. But not these two.
These stories, as noted, were collected by the early Californian ethnographer J. P. Harrington. Harrington was an odd and rather controversial figure who has gained both loyalty and notoriety amongst those with whom he lived and worked. ex-wife even wrote a tell-all book about her life with him in an age before tell-all books were the rage. The family of the woman who took care of Harrington in his old age, with whom I am acquainted, claim that the ex-wife’s book is all exaggeration and lies. Personally, I don’t claim to know, but I do know that he was a colorful character and a fascinating story in and of himself.
These stories are interesting because they show the continuation of older traditions, but also the way that those traditions were changed by the arrival of Europeans. The ‘Antap were an actual group in Chumash society – a religious/ritual organization that could only be entered if one’s parents paid for one’s entry during childhood. In order to rise through the ranks of Chumash society and become a person of high status, one must be a member of the ‘Antap. Like many traditional and “mystery cult” organizations, the ‘Antap held that it was dangerous for the uninitiated to witness ceremonies. As a result, the ‘Antap’s ceremonies, and many aspects of ‘Antap society, remained shrouded in secrecy, and the ‘Anatap themselves seem to have become boogie men towards the end of the prehistoric period. By the early 20th century, many have ceased viewing the ‘Antap as human shamans and ritualists at all, and have come to view them as supernatural beings, as seen in these stories (it should be noted, though, that many people continued to view them simply as powerful humans – shamans, sorcerers, or even assassins, but human nonetheless). As such, the ‘Antap had now become associated with places of magical danger.
SOURCE: Academic Publication
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