My Deadwood Ghost Stories
By Susan Leatherwood
Ghost stories are easy to find in today's modern world of communication between book stores, cable television and the world wide web, on any night of the year I can find a well told ghost story that will make me want to sleep with the lights on. Still, I love ghost stories. I love the way they pull at my emotions, chill me to the bone, all the while allowing me to relate to a bygone era. Even in places where the ghost sightings are well documented its capable to run into a couple of unheard stories. That's what happened to me years ago when I worked, for a short time, at a casino in Deadwood, South Dakota.
Historically speaking, Deadwood is fraught with reasons a ghost would want to hang around. With its infamous history in gambling, prostitution and general lawlessness that not only built the town; and, in case of gambling, saved it again a hundred years later. The entire town lives with the eternal presence of the men and women of its past that have left their indelible spirits on every street in town. And some would say, in every window watching with curiosity as the tourists below pass by.
A celebrity in his own time, Wild Bill Hickok came to Deadwood to be murdered by the coward Jack McCall in the notorious Saloon No. 10. Which, still exists on Main Street, though it may have moved from its original position. People still play poker there, nowadays, with less gunfire. Martha Jane Canary known throughout the world as Calamity Jane had a reputation as a wild, foulmouthed, hard drinking, cross dressing woman, who, cared for the sick during a smallpox epidemic that struck an unprepared Deadwood in 1878. Buried up in Mt. Moriah Cemetery with her beloved Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane was eulogized by one of the many she had nursed back to health during that terrible time. Despite her raucous behavior, her soul was good and if her spirit is still around, I wouldn't know why. However, another historical spirit from Deadwood's past is still known to haunt his own hotel. Seth Bullock, Deadwood's first sheriff, an entrepreneur first, along with his partner Sol Starr, he started a hardware store on Main Street and expanded to include businesses in Spearfish, Sturgis and Custer. A fire in 1894 led him and Starr to build Deadwood's first luxury hotel; appropriately named, The Bullock Hotel. Friends, since 1884 with a, then, deputy sheriff, Theodore Roosevelt, Bullock would later ride in his friend's Inauguration Day's Parade in 1905 with his "Rough Riders". Hanging on the wall of the lobby an enlarged photo of the event shows a stern looking Seth Bullock sporting a big mustache looking down on the modern gamblers. This is not the image that comes to mind when I hear the stories of his ghost locking people out of their rooms or rearranging the silverware in the dining room. But I suppose he has had the time to develop a sense of humor.
Besides notables such as Wild Bill and Calamity Jane, Mt. Moriah Cemetery has played host to many of Deadwood's society since the town's beginning. The Cemetery includes four sections of what is commonly known as Potter's Fields, where unidentified persons, or those originally buried without clear markers from Ingelside Cemetery are buried. Ingelside Cemetery use to be located on the way up to Mt. Moriah Cemetery. When the officials decided to make the area a housing development they moved up all the marked graves they could. However, it has not been unheard of for a Deadwood resident digging in their garden to unearth human bones. As for, if these spirits are still hanging around? I don't know. But I have heard of new people moving into the area using an old Native American remedy of burning sage in order to get rid of the original "Tenants".
Prostitution is said to have shown up the day after the first miner struck gold. That may have been, but the first mention in the newspapers of their existence in the Black Hills came in 1876. When Madam Mustachio and her friendly rival Dirty Em brought up a couple of wagon loads of "girls" to set up the first of many brothels Deadwood would be home to for the next hundred years. During that period of history, the stories of happy hookers, madams with hearts of gold and many more sad tales too numerous to list, thrived until prostitution was abolished by civil prosecution in 1980. Many of Deadwood's adult entertainments had good reputations for how they treated the women who worked for them, while others didn't. Of the worst, The Gem Variety Theater stands out as a 19th century place of horrors. Owned and operated by a cut throat drug pusher and misogynist named Al Swearengen, who lured young women out west promising them jobs as a entertainer in his theater to force them into a life of prostitution. More than one of these unfortunate young women after being so humiliated, chose suicide; others simply left, either with help from the town, or simply disappeared altogether.
During Swearengen's time, Theaters and Saloons, like the Bella Union Saloon, were confined to the North end of town. Entertainment and drinks were served on the first floor, and the brothels operated on the second floor. And much like their prdecessors, the last four remaining brothels in 1980 were all located on the second floor of the West side of Main Street on the North side of town. All four brothels had had at one time proper names, but became infamous by the colors of their entrances. There was the Purple Door, along with the Green Door, the White Door and the Beige Door. Over the years, these brothels were run by locally famous Madams like, Diddlin Dora Dufran or the the "Queen of the Blondes" Mollie Johnson, as well as, the last Madam, Pam Holliday of Pam's Purple Door. Nowadays, the history of prostitution is celebrated in books, and at the Adams Museum. However, if you happen to be walking down Deadwood's Main Street and see scantily clad mannequins posing in second floor windows blindly looking back down at you, don't be too surprised if you see something else looking down at you for less than a second. It may have been nothing but something in of the corner of your eye, or it could be,... something?
It's been years since this story took place, and the casino I worked at then has since changed its name. And over the years, I have lost touch with my then co-workers; and even now when I go up to drop a dollar or two into a slot machine, I rarely run into a familiar face. So I don't remember how it all came about exactly, it might've been a combination of boredom and casual curiosity that were the motivating factors behind the idea to go up to the second level and explore the now defunct brothels. Now it seems to me that there wasn't that many people on this expedition. Just my manager, the maintenance man, a bartender, a cashier and me, or I may have made amalgams out of the people that were really there. Instead of dissecting my memory thoroughly, I will try and keep things as simple as possible. So, besides me, there was my manager, let's call her Ann. "Ann" was 40ish in age, from the eastern side of the state, with a good sense of humor when she was in a good mood. The maintenance man, Larry, that sounds good. "Larry" was in his late 50's, small and thin, a hard worker and a bit of a curmudgeon on the best of days, belying the fact that he could also be kind. "Joe" the bartender, (why not?) mid 20's, newly graduated from some college on the West Coast, working his way across America. The cashier, we'll call her Jill to keep it simple. "Jill" was in her late 30's, a local with a knowledge of all the gossip and a love of romance novels. And then there was me, at the time, a cocktail waitress, early 30's, newly moved to be the area from New Mexico without any particular knowledge to note. Our loosely gathered group met outside the entrance of the Green Door, to go up the stairs single file. On the way up, Jill stated out loud to no one in particular, that she didn't want to see any ghosts.
Hello? I had to ask, "What, ghosts?"
In the stairwell, we all stopped to listen to Jill as she told us the sad story of a woman with long blond hair, who, either committed suicide, or was murdered, sometime in the 1920's. Since then, it is said that her ghost walks the halls of the brothel at all hours. After this story, Jill declared she needed to compose herself before she could go inside. Perhaps it was impatience, but I thought that if I spoke out loud to the ghost and declared to it our intentions that this would calm Jill's nerves. Stating out loud to the ghost, I told it that we meant no harm, and, I added that that there was no need to come out and see us for any reason. Satisfied, I quickly realized I had the opposite effect. Not only did I not calm down Jill. I had managed to freak out Ann, who, now wasn't sure if she could go on. Thankfully there was Joe, who without a word to anyone, took care to be as polite as possible, as he pushed pass Jill and Ann, and went into the historic Green Door. Larry and I, following suit, passed them by as well. Within a matter of seconds, Ann and Jill having gotten over their collective chills soon joined us.
We filed into the main part of the brothel, then barren with painted white walls resembling business offices. Well, maybe, that's what they were all along. The first room I went into was a open area with a bar along the wall. This is where the customers came in to be greeted, buy a drink and take their pick of the merchandise. In the hospitality room, Larry found a paper doily and gave it to me, which I still have. I wrote on it: Historic Green Door found in Kitchen 1999.
Glancing over the hospitality room and kitchen, I followed Joe down the main hallway into a open work area. Where I was told, a friend of Joe's was planning to open a night club. I believe, today it is called the Bella Union Theater, offering a different sort of entertainment from its names' predecessor. I wish I could remember the outlay of all the rooms and hallways, but I don't. I remember wandering down different hallways following Ann and Jill as they were reading a loud handwritten cards taped outside some of the rooms. Each card bore the name of the former occupant with a interesting fact or two listed below. For example, as Larry happily pointed out to me; Sue's Room indicated she had a marbled mirror ceiling and that she had collected unicorns.
Following the progression of the hallways our little group came to the back of the building to a chained locked backdoor. On either side of this backdoor were two rooms, their open doors opposite each other. The door on the right had a card reading; Linda's Room. Married to the town drunk, Linda would leave the backdoor unlocked to allow her husband access when she didn't want to sleep alone. I'm thinking Linda's story wasn't quite a love story, but a lonely one. Opposite Linda's room and, in my opinion, the best room in the place for size alone. Since some of the rooms we had passed didn't even have a window, but in this room... The sun just caught in this room and the window looked out on the row of houses going up the mountain and into the blue sky. Even though it was a bit disappointing that there was no name card, I still felt compelled to walk in and look out the window. I called out to the others to join me. Ann, Jill and Larry looked in insisting that I get out of the room. NOW! And, since I was standing there with a questionable look on my face, this is how I was told the story of the last murdered prostitute in Deadwood.
Surely embellishing the story a bit, my co-workers took turns in getting the details of the story right. According to my storytellers, a woman and her sister came to Deadwood to apply their trade during the 1970's. Each sister took up residency in a different brothel, and became quite popular with the regular clientele. Women living in Deadwood brothels, from the early days until 1980, adhered to some strict rules; one of which, they were not allowed to leave their brothels except for vacations or on Thursdays. Every Thursday the women had a weekly checkup appointment with their Doctors. After the checkups the women were allowed to go shopping for a couple of hours before returning to their residences. So, the story goes that it was on a Thursday that someone noticed that the poor woman hadn't gotten up, or even come out of her room that day. Maybe she was sick? Finally, someone came to look for her and found that she was missing. I'm not sure, but either the police were called first or the sister was, but it was the sister who made the gruesome discovery. Putting together the piecess of the story, a customer or an intruder, (Linda leaving the backdoor unlocked) had somehow gotten in and quietly murdered the woman. Then the murderer dismembered her body, put the parts in garbage bags and shoved them into the closet, before he left the premises without a trace. An unsolved murder is always fertile ground for a ghost story, and my friends swore that no one could stay in the room for very long without hearing muffled cries coming from the closet.
Really?
With my friends standing at the entrance too afraid to cross the threshold, I went straight to the closet and abruptly opened its door.
Nothing.
The interior of the closet was void of any point with discolored marks in the wood, on the floor and walls. Anticipating the worse, I was startled only lightly when I felt a cool breath of air emitting from the closet. But I quickly realized that this was because no one had been stupid enough to open it in a really long time. I turned to smile at my overtly, amused audience.
A good Western Buff or a educationed Historian could probably fill you in on many more interesting facts about the Green Door, and, its role in Deadwood's illustrious past. But I'm neither. I'm not even sure of which, the Purple Door or the Beige Door, the second half of this story takes place in. Mainly, because the fronts of the brothels no longer stand having been replaced with a facade in 1997 after fire damaged the originals buildings. It seems to me, that it was Larry, the maintenance man, that, thought the brothel we had climbed the back stairs into was the Purple Door. But Ann, our manager, disagreed. And so, there it is. I don't remember having enough time to properly explore this brothel, for its different rooms only walking through the two rooms dividing the kitchen area from the front room. As far as size went, the rooms were cramped with the first room having two doors and a small closet with the other room cornered off with not enough room, it appeared, for a proper sized bed. Standing in the front room looking past the mannequins posed in the two full sized windows overlooking Main Street, Larry told me this is where he was when he saw the Forgotten Child Ghost.
The story is very simple, long ago a little girl dressed in boy's clothes lived with her mother in the brothel. The child was kept in the closet in the middle room and was told to not make any noise while her mother was working. One winter evening, while the mother was away, the town officials fearing avalanches ordered the town evacuated. For reasons, unclear, the mother and the other brothel's residents left the child behind, purposely, or by accident. When the incident came to light no one could get up the canyon for several days, and by that time the child had froze to death. After that, people like Larry, working by themselves up in the remains of the brothel have experienced the sudden sensation of not being alone or the feeling of being stared at. And, when Larry started to turn his head he saw, out of the corner of his eye, a child, or something dressed in old fashion britches, running into the middle wall. Ever since that time that moment Larry, and many others who have experienced the presence have refused to come up to that portion of the building alone; if at all.
My curiosity piqued. I pressed my co-workers for all they knew before we had to leave our little expedition and go back down to our jobs. I asked around after that until I could piece together the story of how this tragedy could've taken place in the first place, and now I'm telling you.
The timeline for this story is always somewhere in the "early days", or more accurately, no one knows. The only thing that is consistent is that the mother in the story did not start off life as a prostitute. Described as a poor, young widow with a young child to feed, she chose prostitution in the hopes of securing a better future for her child. It is a well known fact that economic hardships have been the main reason women have turned to prostitution throughout history. However, in the 19th century, even with half her price going to her "employer", the money a prostitute could make was more than the living wage for the era. The allure, or more rightly the desperation to survive, in a time where women were not paid a fraction of what men were paid for their work, prostitution must've been very attractive to the poor mother despite the dangers accompanying the profession.
I can only imagine that when the poor mother entered the house of ill repute she had secured a proper townswoman to be a caregiver to her little girl. Of all the costs to a prostitute, especially one with children, childcare was of the utmost on the list of must expenditures. However, the little girl ended up living in the brothel, as the story goes. Perhaps the poor mother fell on hard times with a illness that took most of her money to get well, which might've, included a addiction to something that took precedence over childcare. Whatever the reason, children of this era did end up growing up in a brothels, sometimes even put on the menu at a certain age thus starting, or, continuing a cycle of abuse that many fell victim to. The fact that out story breaks to explain that the little girl was purposely dressed in boy's clothes to protect her from the brothel's clientele, if they had a opportunity to see her outside the closet, proves that the child was loved. Making the idea that she was forgotten or left behind altogether without an attempt to retrieve her, dubious at best. However, desperation is not always a sound judgment maker.
Without a calender to measure the length of time the child had been living in the brothel or any proof that everyone involved knew that she was there in the first place. In fact, for anyone's knowledge, the child was not suppose to be there that night. Perhaps the madam had ordered the child to be sent back to the caregiver? Perhaps the poor mother didn't have the money for the caregiver and thought she could hide her child a little longer? Whatever the reason, there seems to be some deception and a sense of desperation around this story that has clung through the decades since it was first told. The reason lost to time, only the image of a child being put to bed in a closet with her toys, her mother putting her fingers to her lips, hush. Vivid. The vision of the mother descending the stairs to the saloon in order to drum up business; to get that needed money to put her child in a safe home. Real. The announcement that the town had to be evacuated for a devastating winter storm moving so fast, bringing potential avalanches, to the point, that everyone left in such a hurry that no one could go upstairs and get a child from a closet. Murky. However, that is the story. She was forgotten. To be fair, the poor mother may have thought that the evacuation would not last as long as it did. After all, the mother may have figured one night alone would not harm her daughter, but getting thrown out of the brothel would leave them both homeless with nothing. However, without any knowledge of what the mother's true motivation was, we will never know why she abandoned her child. We only know that it was a fatal and a unforgivable decision.
Although this may be wishful thinking, but common wisdom has it that the child froze to death the first night. It is better to believe that than any ulterior thought to the number of days that it would've taken, weather permitting, to get back up the canyon. I want to believe that she fell asleep in the closet waiting for her mother and never woke up; and that's how the story says she was found. Here the story fizzles to a end. Nothing is ever said of what happened to the poor mother. Was there any justice taken for her actions? No one knows. She disappears from the story leaving her child to haunt the empty halls over a steakhouse on Main Street. Most people who have worked up in Deadwood or are from the area, have heard of the Forgotten Child Ghost to some degree. Varying stories and different experiences have been known to have happened over the last hundred years. No one knows why she stays, or what will make her go on; only that she must be having fun looking down at all the people walking by and occasionally playing hide and go seek with confused maintenance men.
It doesn't matter if you believe in ghost stories or not, Deadwood has a lot of real history beyond the paranormal to thrill and delight any listener. I love ghost stories, the best ones I believe are ones where I learn something about the people and the history involved in the story. Of course, the best ghost stories are all around us in the history of where we are from, or just up the canyon where a legendary gunman came to stake a claim and fell victim to a coward's bullet.
THE END.
