Haunted Statesville Reveals City's Paranormal Past

STATESVILLE, NC – Betcha didn’t know downtown Statesville has ghosts, did ya? Neither did the production crew that was shooting the movie Leatherheads. Coming out of the Vance Hotel, they asked about the wet young girl. Her appearance was unscheduled and she certainly didn’t have her Screen Actor’s Guild card!

That was pretty good, eh? Want to hear another one?

You can during Haunted Statesville, a walking tour that will be held on Friday and Saturday, October 24-25 and October 31-November 1. All tours are $8 per person and run from 6-8 p.m. Reservations are highly encouraged.

Tours will start at the old city hall at the corner of Front and Center streets. Guides will be Statesville residents who are interested in ghostly activity downtown.

“We’ve wanted to do something like this for a very long time,” said Nancy Davis, public information officer for the City of Statesville. She has been working with local historian and writer O.C. Stonestreet in researching and writing the tours.

Stonestreet stumbled across the town’s paranormal activity while he was researching material for students in his North Carolina history classroom. “Books didn’t cover a lot, so I spent my time researching. Along the way I learned about Wampus. He was an omnivorous character that was first seen in the 1930s. Newspaper stories recount the part cat and dog creature may have eaten chickens. It apparently howled. Wampus is still a mystery,” he said.

Then of course there’s the story of ol’ Tom Dooley. Well, actually his name was Dula, but to make it rhyme, it came out Dooley in the famous song recorded by the Kingston Trio.

He played the field and got caught in a love triangle. One of the girls wound up dead and he got hanged. But that didn’t occur in downtown Statesville like the song says. It was out in the country near her house. Nonetheless, today people either find the story humiliating that such a thing could have occurred in Statesville – or they find it fascinating.
While a man was helping construct the old courthouse, he fell and died. Today, people working there tell that they sometimes hear a noise or feel a sensation.

Spooky.

You’ll just have to take the tour to learn more about Statesville’s spirits.
For more information and reservations, call the Statesville Convention and Visitors Office at 704-878-3480.