Lore 250: A World Away

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It's a discovery that seems to settle the case for good.

The Vikings beat Christopher Columbus to North America.

It wasn't even a close race either, with the Vikings getting here at least 500 years before anyone else.

And the proof was found in an unusual place.

You see, tree farms were important to the Vikings.

After all, when you think about their culture, you think of two things, axes and long ships.

And to build those ships, they needed lumber.

So naturally, the Vikings became very good at managing and sourcing such an essential resource.

Well, a recent study published in the journal Antiquity examined 1,000-year-old lumber used by Vikings in Greenland.

And while a lot of the wood came from tree species exclusive to Europe, some of it came from another place.

trees only known to grow in Canada and modern-day New England.

In other words, the Vikings had come here to get it.

One way to look at this revelation is that the notion of home is never simple.

We might live in one place or even pick up and move to another, but we carry little pieces of our past with us every step of the way.

Oftentimes, those things are physical and visible, like heirlooms or relics from our past.

After all, anyone with a basement or a garage probably has at least one box of childhood toys in it.

For me, it's a lot of Star Wars and Transformers from the 1980s.

But obviously, many of the things we transport from place to place aren't as easy to see.

We bring our cultures, our languages, and our family or faith traditions with us, transplanting them into new soil, hoping that they take root and grow.

And of course, we also bring our baggage, our struggles, our flaws, even our biggest failures.

Everything comes with us, whether we want it to or not, because that's part of what it means to be human.

Everywhere we go, we bring who we are with us, both the good and the bad.

I'm Aaron Mankey and this is Lore.

It took a while to get there.

While the first people to set eyes on the southern coast of Australia were crewmen aboard a Dutch East India Company ship back in 1627, no one compiled a full map of it until 1802, which, in the grand scheme of things, isn't that long ago.

Of course, just like almost every other place that Europeans went, South Australia was already inhabited and had been for a long time.

The Aboriginal people there are thought to be members of the oldest still surviving culture on the planet, going back at least least 20,000 years, but possibly much deeper into the past.

As you'd imagine, the Aboriginal peoples who greeted those European arrivals already had a robust belief system and a rich tapestry of folklore wrapped around them.

There were the creators who shaped the land that they lived in, and then there were the spirits, some of whom were deeply feared.

I point that out to help you understand that ghost stories aren't a purely European thing.

For tens of thousands of years before white people arrived, the Aboriginals were convinced convinced that they were surrounded by supernatural beings, both visible and invisible, who haunted certain areas.

So convinced, in fact, that when Europeans first arrived there, the indigenous people thought that they were ghosts because of their pale skin.

Even today, the common Aboriginal terms for white people are basically ancient words for ghosts.

And one of those haunted, deeply spirit-filled places was the spot where the town of Capunda was established.

Aboriginal peoples had lived there for thousands of years, most likely because of the nearby freshwater springs.

And those who lived there whispered about the wood demon, a shape-shifting spirit that would use its power to lure unsuspecting people into danger and then destroy them.

For Europeans though, the lure to that area ended up being mineral deposits.

Specifically, it was copper they were after.

Once it was discovered in the early 1840s, mines were quickly set up to exploit those resources.

And as we've seen in various parts of the world, when the opportunity for quick wealth pops up, people flock to it like moths to a flame.

Soon enough, a community was growing around those mines, and they called it Kapunda.

Now, if you've heard of the town before, you've probably heard it described as the most haunted town in Australia.

And if you take the stories at face value, that is easy to believe.

Some of those tales center around the site of the first Catholic church in Kapunda, known as St.

John's, which eventually transitioned into a reformatory for girls, complete with all the abusive workhouse-like treatment that you would imagine.

And maybe because of all that pain and suffering, people have assumed that the old building must be haunted by ghosts of the past.

Again, the stories whispered about it seem to confirm that.

Stories like that of Ruby Bland.

She was said to be one of the teens forced to live in the reformatory at the beginning of the 1900s.

And her story involves all the usual elements for buildings like that too, complete with an unwanted pregnancy and a tragic death.

And of course, because of that, rumors that her spirit haunted the cemetery were common.

Elsewhere in town was the North Capunda Hotel.

First built in 1849 by a local mining company, it started out as a small single-story hotel, but it quickly expanded under the ownership of a local butcher named James Crace.

It became extravagant and earned a reputation as a hotbed of all sorts of illegal activity.

Of course, later on, legends were added to that foundation.

Anytime a number of people die inside a building, people start to get imaginative.

And maybe that's why one of the common sightings to come out of the old hotel involves a mysterious man in black.

And no, it's not the ghost of Johnny Cash.

The spirit is a ghostly figure of a man dressed all in black, wearing a dark, wide-brimmed hat.

Those who claim to have encountered him report feeling overwhelmingly afraid and very threatened.

They say this ghost is abusive, sometimes shouting at visitors, especially ladies.

And of course, all sorts of explanations have been invented to root that spirit in history.

The problem is, none of those tales come with anything concrete to back them up.

After digging around, most of these haunting stories seem to come from just one source, a 2001 TV documentary.

Kapunda might very well be haunted, but I can't help but wonder if those spirits are nothing more than legends that have been dressed in belief for so long that people just assume they are real.

As with so many of these places though, it really does come down to what you personally are willing to accept.

But that dusty old frontier mining town is far from the only haunted location in South Australia.

In fact, about 50 miles to the south is a city with its own tragic past and the historical records to back it all up.

And that truth makes the stories that are whispered about it that much more terrifying.

If there is a single entry point for everything that flooded in, that would be Adelaide.

Founded in 1836, the city is the capital of South Australia.

And from the very beginning, this was where colonization entered the mainland.

A good example of this in practice was the structure built in the early days of the settlement there called Quarantine Station.

Honestly, I don't think the name of the place could be any more clear as far as the purpose goes, but allow me to elaborate just a little bit.

You see, as more and more people headed to South Australia to start a new life, the authorities became more and more nervous about what sort of illnesses they might be bringing with them.

So a building was set up where those people could quarantine for a period of time before finally stepping out into public.

And it was as horrible as you might imagine.

Trapping everyone inside one big dormitory style space meant letting that sickness get spread around.

Sure, the wealthier folks were privileged enough to get private quarters, but most had it much more rough.

And it wasn't a short stay either.

The average time spent at quarantine station was 40 days.

Now the numbers on the place vary depending on the source material, but it's estimated that somewhere between 12 and 26,000 people passed through there over the century and a half that it operated.

And of them, as many as 500 died before leaving.

So you can see why, with all that death in one location, there are so many shadows to explore.

Many of the ghosts witnessed in the building have been spotted in the shower block.

People have seen the figures of small children, a woman in a white gown that is soaked in blood, and a dark man in a fedora.

Others report the sensation of being watched.

There's also a building on the property known as the Gravedigger's Cottage, probably because of its location alongside the facility's cemetery.

Those who have been inside the cottage have reported seeing a man in a black cloak and wide-brimmed hat, the typical uniform for a gravedigger in the 1800s.

But he's apparently anything but friendly.

A few people claim to have felt invisible hands wrap around their throats when they step inside.

Others have experienced what can only be described as the sensation of being forcibly drowned, complete with the pressure against their head that forces them down toward the floor.

As you might imagine, this has left a lot of people feeling terrified.

Elsewhere in the city is the Adelaide Arcade.

Built in 1885, it was the first retail location in Australia to have electric lights and originally contained around 50 stores.

Think of it like a late 19th century mall, if you will, but it's past, hasn't been all bright and cheery.

In June of 1887, for example, the shopping center's security guard noticed some flickering lights and went to investigate them, only to fall into one of the engines that powered the building.

His body was crushed and mangled by the machinery and then lay undiscovered for days.

That mixture of tragedy and loss, they say, is why he still haunts the place today.

Over the years, shoppers there have reported seeing the ghostly figure of a man in old clothing.

Others have heard disembodied footsteps in parts of the building that should be empty.

And back in 2008, one of the arcade's security cameras even captured footage of a figure that many claim is the guard's ghost.

And lastly, there's the Adelaide Zoo.

It too was built in the 1880s and is the second oldest zoo in all of Australia.

It's a little time capsule with many of the original buildings still in use today, several of which are listed on the Register of State Heritage Items.

But anything that old usually comes with a few ghosts, right?

In January of 1902, Zookeeper Richard Doricott stepped into a cage to feed one of the brown bears only to be viciously attacked.

Doricott lost his right arm in the accident, and the bear was shot and killed by those trying to rescue him.

Just 18 years later, another zookeeper, Samuel May, was mauled by another bear, this time a polar bear.

May also lost his arm, but I haven't been able to discover if that bear was also killed.

Unlike the first attack though, this zookeeper did not survive his stay in the hospital, dying just a few days later.

While memories of those events still linger in the air at the zoo, other more visible memories have also been reported.

One employee reported coming to work early one day at the zoo director's house only to hear pounding from the second floor.

When the noise was investigated upstairs, someone spotted the figure of a woman in a Victorian-style dress.

She vanished a moment later.

Others have heard footsteps in that house, and a few people passing by outside have looked up to see the face of a woman in one of the upstairs windows.

Adelaide appears to be a city with more than a few shadows, and like so many places in our world, it follows that same pattern of tragic events that lead to stories of ghosts.

But before we wrap up our tour down under, there's one more place I need to take you.

Brace yourself though, because this trip will require a boat ride, an open mind, and a whole lot of courage.

Southeast of Adelaide, off the mainland, is an island that most people have heard of, Tasmania.

For a lot of folks, it's the home of the now extinct Tasmanian tiger.

But there's so much more to Tasmania than that, and a fascinating bit of folklore can be found on the southern end in Port Arthur.

Super briefly, Port Arthur was originally a convict settlement that started in the 1830s.

Within a decade, there was a massive flour mill, a granary, and a prison.

Over the years that Port Arthur was used like that, it's thought that roughly a thousand lives were lost.

And what do you do with all those dead bodies?

You bury them, of course.

For Port Arthur, that graveyard was actually an island out in the harbor called, creatively, the Isle of the Dead.

And while there is a lot that could be said about Port Arthur itself, it's that little island that holds my favorite story yet.

Our source for this tale comes from a newspaper article published in 1891, but the events discussed actually took place a few decades earlier, in September of 1834.

Back then, the graveyard on the island was a pretty new idea, so there were only 13 graves there.

The writer of the article claims that 11 of those 13 were executed criminals, which helps the next part make sense.

On September 5th of that year, five men climbed into a small boat and rowed out of Port Arthur toward the Isle of the Dead.

On board were four military privates and their commanding officer, one Corporal Heffernan, along with a handful of shovels.

Their mission was simple, dig a grave for a criminal who would be executed the following day.

Oh, and one other important detail here.

They were doing all of this at night.

Apparently the moon was bright and the sky was clear, so Heffernan decided that it was better than working in the sun.

The men soon landed and got to work, but as they were digging away, Corporal Heffernan looked toward the southern edge of the island and muttered a frightening exclamation and then pointed.

Each of the other men turned and then stopped in their tracks.

There at the top of the cliff edge that led to the ocean below was the silhouette of a gigantic human shape, slightly darker against the blackness of the sky.

Each of them could see it clearly, complete with facial features, items of clothing, and even its long wild beard.

It was, as they later described, a human monster of impossible proportions.

Merciful God, Heffernan was reported to say, that was nothing mortal.

I could see the stars shining through its body.

Over the next few minutes, the figure slowly faded before finally disappearing altogether.

But whether it was gone or not didn't matter.

The men were scared out of their minds and quickly climbed back into their boat and rowed home.

Of course, they told others about it.

And of course, those men laughed at them.

Giants aren't real after all.

Monsters are for fairy tales.

How could a bunch of military men actually believe that garbage, right?

Heffernan and the rest became the butt of constant jokes.

Then, eight days later, another officer by the name of Lieutenant French took a boat into the harbor for a bit of fishing.

He had a handful of other soldiers with him, and the fishing was so good that they stayed out well past midnight.

And wouldn't you know it, their drifting journey finally brought them to the waves at the foot of those cliffs on the southeastern edge of the Isle of the Dead.

And that's when they saw it.

Looking up from their boat, French and and the others all clearly spotted the exact same gigantic figure silhouetted against the night sky.

French remembered noticing how the stars could be seen through its body and how the rough clothes and long beard reminded him of sketches of old druid priests.

Just like the first group of men, French and his friends also watched the giant for a long time.

They even rowed a little closer, hoping for a better view.

But just as before, the huge figure was only visible for a few minutes and then slowly faded to black.

Of course, Lieutenant French and his friends now had a problem.

They had mocked Corporal Heffernan when he had reported what he had seen.

And now here they were, witnesses to the exact same unbelievable vision.

They had been cruel, but they were also men of integrity.

So with a lot of humility, they approached Heffernan and told him all about it.

The corporal, to his credit, didn't laugh at them or call them liars or even suspect a trick.

He listened carefully, nodded along with their story, and paid attention to how how all the small little details lined up exactly with his.

And then, according to the article, he responded to them by saying, Gentlemen, it's a ghost for sure.

It's no use saying there ain't no such thing.

And with that, as they say, the legend of the Isle of the Dead was born.

We like to believe that we can always start over, that a clean slate is possible, just waiting for us a world away.

And on the surface, that seems like it was true for a lot of history.

Stories of people in the past who packed up and moved away, oftentimes by abandoning everyone else around them, are a dime a dozen.

These individuals would travel a couple hundred miles, take on a false identity, and then start their lives over.

And without the internet or social media to track them, this was entirely possible.

Those who moved to South Australia in the 1830s were often attempting something similar.

Granted, fewer of them were running from the law or debt or burdens they no longer wished to carry, but a fresh start was still the top priority on their minds.

Except there's really no such thing, is there?

We might try to leave it all behind, but we can never escape ourselves.

Our flaws go wherever we do.

Our personalities and tendencies and idiosyncrasies and everything else.

As the character August Nicholson says in the village, we cannot run from heartache.

Heartache is a part of life.

And the other thing that we can't run from is the truth, as the story of the Isle of the Dead teaches us.

You see, those frightening experiences certainly led to a lot of rumor and whispering.

Folklore thrives on that sort of thing.

But it also brought a lot of attention to that little island, probably more than some people were looking for.

As more and more folks tried to experience the shadowy giant for themselves, the waters off the coast of the Isle of the Dead started to get a little more busy, and more eyes meant more observations and more revelations.

You see, it turns out that there was a cave on the island, and it was being used by a group of local smugglers.

In fact, it had been part of their operation long before the military started burying dead criminals there.

If it hadn't been for that cemetery, folks might not have spent a lot of time there, and those smugglers could have stayed hidden.

One of those smugglers, they say, had a bit of experience using lights and glass lenses to create illusions.

No one knows where he might have learned this, although by the 1830s, light shows like the Phantasmagoria were well known.

So maybe this particular smuggler had a connection to the London theater scene.

Whatever the case, these smugglers had been using glass and lights to create the giant apparition spotted by Heffernan and French and all the rest.

The plan had been to frighten people away from the island to keep their smuggling operations operations safe, but the result had been a lot more curiosity than fear.

It was a plot twist straight out of a classic episode of Scooby-Doo, a scary ghost that turned out to be nothing more than a guy in a costume and some fancy lighting.

Then soon enough, the smugglers were discovered and arrested, putting an end to the mystery that had frightened so many people.

But not the stories.

Because story is a lot harder to stop than a handful of criminals.

Story takes on a life of its own, living beyond us.

We might dream of a clean slate or a chance to run away and start from scratch, but that will never truly be possible because story can never be left behind.

I hope you enjoyed our brief journey today through the faraway yet familiar lands of South Australia and Tasmania.

It's fascinating to see how much of their past those early settlers brought with them and how that baggage impacted the stories they told about their lives.

And naturally, for a region that big and expansive, there are plenty more tales to tell.

In fact, my team and I have picked another fun one to share with you.

Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.

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Much of early life in Port Arthur centered on the prison.

It was the reason the settlement was cut out of the trees and brush, after all.

And the prison brought jobs for the few who weren't criminals themselves.

Like a lot of prisons in the early 1800s, the one in Port Arthur had a chaplain.

Remember, the goal for these early prisons was reformation, to use environmental changes and religion to sort of pound the dents out of crooked people.

Whether or not it actually worked is up for debate, but that process often involved a minister.

For Port Arthur, that was the Reverend George Eastman, who lived in the parsonage from 1857 to 1870.

He wasn't alone either.

George and his wife were surrounded by their 10 children, which honestly is enough to leave any parent with a haunted expression, right?

When George Eastman died in his bedroom in 1870, his family moved out and a new one moved in.

According to a newspaper article from 1893, one of those ministers was the Reverend H, who arrived with his wife and kids to turn the parsonage into their new home.

But right away, there was trouble.

On one occasion, the Reverend H took a trip with his family to Melbourne, but while they left together, he returned home early, probably because of his responsibilities at the prison.

Now, the day that Reverend H was scheduled to come home, a friend of his, one Dr.

McCarthy, was passing by the parsonage when he spotted lights turn on upstairs, so he approached the house and knocked on the door.

Reverend H greeted him with a tired expression.

He had only just walked in the door a moment before and hadn't even had a chance to go upstairs and pack, which Dr.

McCarthy found odd, so he mentioned the lights he had seen come on.

Both men went upstairs to investigate, but found the second floor dark and empty.

Weeks later, the Reverend and his wife were sitting in one of the upstairs room with the door open, a clear view of his closed office door across the hall.

And as they sat there, both of them watched as a brilliant light filled up the crack around the door.

Not wanting to frighten off whoever or whatever had turned on the office lights, they both crept across the hall and looked through the keyhole.

And sure enough, the inside of the room was lit up as bright as day.

The moment he gripped the handle and opened the door, though, there was nothing in his office but darkness.

Now, for me, that might be a signal to pack up and move out, but our intrepid family didn't give up so easily.

A few years later, they hosted a friend who stayed in their first floor guest room for a number of nights.

And one evening during her stay, this friend came running up the stairs to the bedroom where the Reverend and Mrs.

H were sleeping, terrified by something she had experienced in her room.

It seems that her guest room had filled up with a loud banging sound, as if someone were dropping large boxes all over the floor.

It went on for so long and grew to such an intensity that she couldn't stay in the room, so she came to them for help.

Oh, and on her way up the stairs to tell them, she said she was followed the entire way by the sound of an invisible pair of feet.

thumping along behind her.

The final experience in the house took place just after their guest packed up and left.

The family employed a housekeeper who went into the guest room to clean the room from top to bottom, including washing the floors.

When she was done, she lit a fire in the fireplace so that the heat would help dry everything off, and then she left.

A while later, she popped back into the room to check on the fire, but the moment she stepped inside, she let out a horrific scream and fainted, crumpling into a heap on the floor.

The Reverend and his wife tried for a good long while to wake her up, even using smelling salts, but nothing worked.

It wasn't until hours later when her eyes finally opened and she became responsive again.

What did you see?

They asked the housekeeper.

A man, she told them, standing outside the window, and he had a knife in his hand.

And clearly, the story has lived on much longer than any of the people involved.

Even today, the parsonage is still whispered about.

Some modern visitors have reported strange lights, and on at least one occasion, a young girl refused to enter the house house out of utter fear her reason she saw something near one of the downstairs windows that made her feel unsafe the ghostly figure of a man with a knife

This episode of lore was written and produced by me, Aaron Mankey, with research by Sam Alberty and music by Chad Lawson.

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