The Oaken Snuggery Part 23

 

Photos by Suzanne Currie

THE OAKEN SNUGGERY - PART 23

BY TED CURRIE

     Suzanne and I were talking last evening, on the phone, about our early years of marriage, the many jobs we took on while raising two wee lads, and, oh yes, running a Bracebridge Museum on the few hours we had every week to zone-out from trying to make a living. I had been one of the founder of the Bracebridge Historical Society back in 1978, and I was on and off the directorate of Woodchester Villa and Museum up until the autumn of 1989, finishing off my tenure as Operations Manager, with Suzanne serving as my assistant. The non-paid kind. I loved the “Bird House” as it was known because it had been built in the 1870’s by Woolen Mill magnate Henry J. Bird, and I particularly disliked having to leave its employ, but there was too much political interference and agendas to carry-on, especially the very real risk that my good wife would divorce me on the grounds of social, political, historical overload. We hardly spent any time at home that summer season, and when an alarm sounded at two in the morning, I had to drive from area of the former Bangor Lodge, on the Golden Beach Road, to Woodchester, located on the hillside overlooking Bracebridge Falls. But I didn’t want to separate from the museum I had a hand in launching, but family came first. I regretted as well, leaving the myriad of ghosts that lodged at Woodchester, because we had, after many years of varying opinions about one another, figured a way of getting along in the large octagonal estate. We went from being unsettled about the many interventions we attributed to earthbound spirits of former family members, to being quite at home with the typical chatter, banging, knocking, and footsteps up and down the main staircase, without anyone or anything visible that would cause the cadence of steps.

     The first serious introduction to the ghosts of Woodchester came the day my friend, and fellow Historical Society Director, Ted Williams, (a well known book binder), asked my to listen to a tape recording he had made in the parlor of the house, using the antique Victrola and some of the 78 rpm records from the cabinet. The plan, for Ted, had been to record the 78’s onto cassette tapes, and with a new speaker placed in the bottom of the record player, with a connection to the tape machine kept in a nearby bathroom, staff could play the music through the day, especially with guests coming to visit the new town museum. The problem had been, to that point, guests fiddling with the Victrola and overwinding the main spring which would be expensive to replace. This way we could remove the crank and close the lid, and still hear a record being played. This was a good and workable plan. But here’s what happened to an otherwise ordinary recording session in a very quiet room of the old estate.

     Ted asked me to sit in the parlor one afternoon, and listen to the tapes he had so patiently recorded the day before. From the beginning to the end the tape machine, which had been placed just in front of the Victrola speaker, picked up curious noises that must have been happening in the house at the time, but Ted didn’t hear anything but the spinning record and the pleasant sound of period music. There were voices recorded that were definitely not on the record, and there were many knocks, banging, and also, yes, footsteps up the nearby staircase that came out clear on Ted’s recording. Yet he heard nothing beyond the music from the Victrola speaker. There were even the sounds of dogs barking, which was a standard at the museum, heard in almost all rooms of the three story building. When staff would go outside to see where the dogs were, thinking they had been left in a hot car or were otherwise in distress, there was never a canine visible, or barking anywhere in the neighborhood. Ted didn’t hear the barking that was recorded, but it’s clear on the tape a spirit dog made its presence in the house known. By all the noises recorded on those two tapes, Woodchester was obviously a busy place for ghosts and their ilk.   

     At about age six, or maybe it was seven, I had an “angel” dream during a particularly nasty childhood illness that paralleled whooping cough. I coughed day and night, and wretched frequently, my body giving up any fluids in my stomach. On this night, I have to admit that I was feeling quite weak and emotionally drained from sleeping in an upright position for nearly two weeks. On the edge between being awake and falling into the early regions of slumber, I heard my parents talking at my side, indicating that it might be necessary to have Teddy (as I was known in the early 1960’s), taken over to Joseph Brant Hospital, if that is, the fever doesn’t subside. This was the last grasp of reality before slipping peacefully to sleep, despite what felt like a rigorous bout of influenza. The only thing I was aware of physically, is the sensation of cold on my forehead, as my mother kept putting a wet cloth on my forehead. It was within the dreamscape, undoubtedly inspired by my illness, that I came to meet the specter of an angel. I recall being lifted off the ground in her magnificent presence, but not being able to move of my own free will. But then I didn’t want to move. I certainly didn’t wish to run away or hide from this illuminated creature looking down on me from a corner in a room of which I was familiar. No words were spoken but the message was clear. “It is not your time,” was what I remembered, and seeing as I’m still here after all these years, she was true to her words, even though I didn’t actually hear them. I awoke sometime later, with a most euphoric sensation throughout my body, knowing as well that the fever had “broken” as my mother joyfully reported to my father. I had survived the illness but I think I had some other worldly assistance. It was such a profound dream that it is as clear today as it was when I woke up, drenched with sweat, feeling as if my life force had been restored to its youthfulness, when quite honestly, a few hours earlier, I pondered if death was coming.

     For fifty-five of sixty-two years, I have worn this dream as if an invisible crucifix. Yet, I have never been overly religious, and have only attended church a few times in my life. Every detail of the childhood dream is clear and has a sensory texture and aroma attached, including the music that companions angels when they visit their mortal assignments. As I have cherished this recollection, and found strength from its innermost energy and positivism, I have great concern about how I shall remember the incident from yesterday morning, here in Rose Hill, on the property of the Bosevelt family’s “The Oaken Snuggery,” Bed and Breakfast. I was returning to the country inn along the main pathway to the old farmhouse, with a quickstep because of the much heavier rain falling at that moment, and wishing not to drown in the deluge getting worse moment by moment. I had distinctly heard the distant roll of very light thunder, but thought it was still a long way off, and as I was very close to the Snuggery, I felt confident I wasn’t in the least bit of danger. Admittedly, and strangely, two ghostly waifs appeared in my line of vision, through the heavy veil of rainfall, who looked the part of the two sisters from antiquity, who had been haunting the Snuggery actively for the past year. I had only seen them as wafts of mist, and could have been interpreted as just that, versus anything paranormal. A friend of mine, a guest by the name of Angela Collins, had seen the girls in full regalia, as Victorian children, sitting together in the hallway of the Bosevelt’s house, one evening when entering the building. The girls were said by her, an active psychic, to be Cynthia age 12 and Francis, age 10. There have been quite a number of what could be called paranormal incidents here since I arrived for a month-long stay, back in early April, but nothing of a serious nature. Rather, they have all been as if the handiwork of a mischief maker, and this case, two of them working together. The usual stuff. Knocked over dolls in Mrs. Bosevelt’s bedroom, books pulled off the shelf, some being toppled to the floor, and various sightings of the wee specters pretty much all over the house, although there was a sighting of an old woman knitting while rocking in a chair, that doesn’t fit their style of haunting. But when I saw the girls disappear into what appeared to be a log cabin to the right of a cluster of lilacs, I was finally, after weeks, fulfilling my mandate to situate and identify the spirit-kind haunting this beautiful rural Bed and Breakfast here in the very northern limit of what is still considered South Muskoka.

     I don’t know how the spirits arranged that I should, first of all, see the girls slip into this pioneer abode, of which was burned down well before the turn of the century, and then see it all vanish before my eyes as if I was suffering from some dream again, this time, without the attending angel. Then came the lightning strike onto the rocks at my side, with enough force of energy, to knock me off my feet, to lay prone in the heavy rainfall, while I gathered my sensibilities to retreat, mud-caked and disoriented, into the nearby farmhouse. Only to be informed by a puzzled Mrs. Bosevelt, that there had not been a lightning strike, and no one in the house, including newly arrived guests, had heard even the faintest roll of thunder in the distance. How would I deal with this dream-like situation that had apparently attached itself, with some purposeful intent, to the actuality of my trying to secure shelter from the coming storm. A storm that materialized in rainfall only. In only a matter of a half hour from my incident, imagined or not, the sun broke through the cloud canopy, and this April day turned out to be one of the finest and warmest of the spring season thus far. So what was it all about? Was I afforded an inside glimpse of the innermost details of the pioneer era, of which Francis and Cynthia were obviously attached? I had asked for them, by thoughts alone, to show me more details, about what they were hoping to achieve by haunting this property, specifically the fine folks who operated this Bed and Breakfast. I didn’t get an answer to any of my questions, but then I didn’t expect they would respond immediately, as the ghost sense of urgency is obviously down-scaled from the mortal penchant for expedience and timeliness. The vision, if one could call it that, was potentially their way of answering some of my enquiries. Seeing as I wasn’t drinking anything with an alcohol content, and I was fully awake and alert at the time, to the situation unfolding around me, and in front, there aren’t many other ways to look at the actuality of the moment, or delusion although I haven’t really had a lot of experience with the latter.

     I had to trust my instincts on this, I suppose, as one who has had an angel dream, and digested all its delicious contents, as well as one who has been a long-time writer, reporter, and historian, who has on more than one occasion, covered a story that defied all other stories as far as being strange to the furthest extent of unbelievable. Putting the information together, much of it provided by my psychic friend, Angela Collins, also including the other tidbits of paranormal crumbs I had been extended subtly since I arrived at the Snuggery, I could only assume that there has been a lingering, unresolved issue involving the Victorian age sisters, who may or may not have been involved in the theft, at some point, of two metal crosses, potentially connected to homestead church services, held weekly in the homes of neighborhood pioneers, during the period when there were no nearby churches to facilitate worship. Keeping in mind that I had been afforded the opportunity of examining a fused together relic, of two metal crosses, which based on the weld between the two, had something to do with a significant heat source at some point. Was it a potential in this cold, cold case, that the girls carried the crosses on them, possibly one of the girls holding both of the ill-gotten icons, when a thunder storm produced a lightning strike that hit the log cabin, during one of these Sunday services, conducted by a roving preacher, resulting in a fire than consumed the structure and may have contributed to the loss of life. I don’t even know at this moment where all these obtuse possibilities are coming from, except an overheated imagination, but maybe it’s the case my own guardian angel, known for most of my like, is weighing in on the matter without my first having asked for assistance. Possibly she was the girl’s guardian angel before she intervened in my dreamscape, meaning in a very light-hearted way, that it’s more than likely the lasses survived the lightning strike and resulting fire, even if the crosses didn’t fare as well. I need to rest. I really do. Forgive me for having to put down this notepad and pen, as I am half asleep as I jot down these final few words for today. Goodnight!

     I couldn’t nod off before thinking about Woodchester Villa once more today. The old house has been haunting me for decades, but in a good way I think. There was an event Suzanne and I had organized for the lawn outside the main house, in the shadow of the Museum annex which was the rebuilt model of the first Presbyterian Church in Bracebridge. It was part of our Christmas in July week of events that summer, and Sunday was supposed to be the grand finale of the celebration, featuring the Ontario band of the Salvation Army, which was terrific by the way. It was a beautiful but hot day and there was a large crowd building even an hour before the concert was to be performed. It also happened to be a day when Suzanne and I both came down with a terrible stomach disorder, and what fun it was to navigate all the technical details and difficulties while running back and forth to the washroom. Did I mention we had our two boys with us, and while they were feeling okay, they were also acting as aggressive as possible, sensing we had less control than usual.

     I was in the downstairs kitchen making up a big cooler of lemonade to go with the huge cake that Suzanne was cutting in the front verandah in preparation for the celebration at the end of the concert. I was worried about Suzanne because she was feeling much worse than I was, and she had decided to keep both Andrew and Robert with her, letting them play on the front lawn for awhile. On three occasions I ran up the stairs and through the house, from back to front, to see why one of the boys was crying. I’d get to Suzanne, and she’d look at me strangely, pondering what I was going on about, as far as crying was concerned. “But I heard a child crying Suzanne. I thought one of the boys had fallen and hurt themselves,” I said, before retreating back downstairs to finish making the lemonade. A few minutes later, the same crying could be heard coming from upstairs, yet there was no crying child. Mine or anyone’s at that point. Just like the invisible dogs, there was no crying child. On the third trot up the stairs I just looked at Suzanne, when she shook her head, and winked about yet another ghost at Woodchester we hadn’t previously recognized. After this day, I heard the crying child several more times, and I even tried to sneak up on the place where I was sure it was originating, but no luck identifying the unhappy child. When I got close, the crying stopped. The ghosts of Woodchester, I think, liked the fact Suzanne and I, and of course, Ted Williams, validated their presence, and of course, their right to haunt the family home that they obviously had an old time investment in, dating back to the 1870’s. Who were we to tell them to get lost? It was the provenance of the old house, and as strange as this may seem, we did have a hard time looking back at that house on that last day, as we pulled down the long narrow driveway, sensing those spirits we had come in contact with over most of a decade, we watching us from the windows, knowing once again, chance was being thrust upon their humbled antiquity.