City Life
Proctor Arts Fest
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TACOMAWEEKLY.com
FRIDAY, JULY 26, 2013
SECTION B, PAGE 1
in errified in Tacoma T REAL GHOST HUNTERS LEAD TOURS OF GRITTY CITY’S HAUNTED HISTORY By Steve Dunkelberger stevedunkel@tacomaweekly.com
Some people know some of the stories. Not everyone knows all of them. There are hundreds of tales, after all. Tacoma historians Charlie and Andrew Hansen have researched about 50 ghost sightings and paranormal experiences in downtown Tacoma, but they only mention about 25 of them in their “Terrified in Tacoma” tour because they strive to weave Gritty City’s past with its haunted history by visiting the sites on their walking tour. Some of the great hauntings occur in the suburbs and residential neighborhoods. The tours started slowly last October but are now picking up in popularity, thanks to a marketing and reservation partnership with Spooked in Seattle Ghost Tours. The man behind those tours, Ross Allison, is a Tacoma native and founder of AGHOST, the Advanced Ghost Hunters of Seattle Tacoma and author of a handful of books on all things ghostly. He runs the Pacific Northwest Paranormal Research Center and has been a guest on Sci-Fi’s “Ghost Hunters” television show and a host of other paranormal TV and radio programs. He is also working on a book with Teresa Nordheim, titled “Tacoma’s Haunted History,” through Arcadia Publishing. “Tacoma doesn’t get the attention it deserves,” Allison said of the walking tours. “It has a lot of great history. What we try to do is keep it real. It is run by real ghost hunters. A lot of these types of tours make up stuff to scare people. We don’t do that. We give the history and talk about what we have found in our investigations, so if you are not really into ghosts you are going to walk away with some history.” The Hansens cover the better-known ghosts of downtown, including “Gus” in the Old City Hall, the sightings linked to Alexander Pantages and Klondike Kate in the Pantages theater, the Case of Allan Mason and his cursed mummy and the mysterious sinking of the Andelana. On Jan. 14, 1899, the chains to the ballast logs broke during a squall during the night. The ship capsized at the mouth of the Puyallup River. The master and crew of 18 drowned. Two divers also died while trying to recover the ship, making it Tacoma’s largest maritime disaster. But the tours also cover the tale of Jack the Bear, who was the mascot of the Tacoma Hotel before he was accidentally shot by a Tacoma police officer while wandering downtown. The story of the Native American “sky stone” on what is now a pocket park along Pacific Avenue also gets a mention since it overlooks what had been called “the Harbor of Phantoms.” Of course, the tour mentions the legend of the “Shanghai tunnels” running from the infamous Bodega Saloon, which is now Meconi’s, since every visitor on the tour asks about them. But there are other stories as well. “Even though I was born and raised here, there are a lot of things we are still finding out,” Charlie Hansen said. Commencement Bay, for example, was the site of an incident in 1947 that first coined the phrase “UFO” and actually involved federal investigators – the original “Men in Black.” For folks not in the
know about such matters, writer Steve Edmiston is producing a short film based on the story of the “Maury Island Incident” – taken directly from declassified FBI documents – of Harold Dahl’s June 21, 1947 UFO sighting. An investigation followed that resulted in a mysterious crash of a B-25 carrying evidence from the incident. The investigation went all the way to the FBI’s top desk, J. Edgar Hoover, who expressed personal interest in it. While not ghostly enough for a tour, the UFO sighting also gets a mention along with the fact that Pierce County has the highest number of Bigfoot sighting claims in the state, which has the highest number of sightings in the nation. That fact makes it ground zero for those investigations as well. Pof! hiptu! tupsz! uibu! gfx! mpdbmt! ibwf! ifbse!pg!jowpmwft!uif!dbtf!pg!Kblf!Cjse-!xip! dpvme!ibwf!cffo!uif!nptu!qspmjgjd!tfsjbm!ljmm. fs!jo!Bnfsjdbo!ijtupsz/!Cjse!xbt!tfoufodfe!up! efbui! jo! Ubdpnb! gps! uif! byf! nvsefs! pg! uxp! xpnfo!boe!dvstfe!bmm!uiptf!jowpmwfe!xjui!ijt! tfoufodjoh/!Boe!uif!dvstf!dbnf!usvf/
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MORE INFORMATION: Terrified in Tacoma tours are offered at 6 p.m. Thursday to Sunday. Reservations are booked by calling Spooked in Seattle (425) 954-7701.
OLD HAUNTS. Tacoma historians Charlie and
Andrew Hansen researched Tacoma’s haunted past and have now partnered with Spooked in Seattle Ghost Tours to create Terrified in Tacoma.
THE THINGS WE LIKE ONE JAZZ UNDER STARS Pacific Lutheran University’s “Jazz Under the Stars” series continues Aug. 1 with Grammy Award winning trumpeter Tracey D. Hooker, 7-9 p.m. in the Mary Baker Russell Amphitheatre. Hooker, a 22-year veteran of the United States Navy Music Program, has traveled extensively throughout the United States and Europe as a featured trumpet soloist. He brings his current band, “Hook Me Up” to PLU. Complimentary coffee provided by Seattle’s Best Coffee. Admission is free.
TWO PAGODA YOGA Wake up your mind, body and soul with weekly outdoor Vinyasa flow yoga instruction on the lawn at Point Defiance Pagoda. A complimentary refreshing pomegranate tea or fresh lemonade is included.
Instructor Bev Pinkerton has 20 years of yoga experience to share, as well as a life-changing yoga story of her own. Saturdays in August, 9-10 a.m. Bring a yoga mat, block, strap and water bottle. Cost: one class $15, five classes $70, drop-in $20. Register at www.metroparkstacoma.org/fitness or call (253) 305-1022.
women to learn construction skills to build homes. Donations (of books, clothing, small appliances in working condition, furniture, and kitchen/housewares) are greatly appreciated! Email Jasmine at jkaneshiro@pugetsound.edu.
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and love and hate. All performances take place at Curtis High School on Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m. Info: www.tmp.org.
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LADIES NIGHT OUT
‘RAGTIME, THE MUSICAL’
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RUMMAGE SALE Ta c o m a / P i erc e County Habitat for Humanity Women Build is having a rummage sale on July 27 at Immanuel Presbyterian Church, 901 N. J St., 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Funds will benefit Women Build projects, which encourage and empower
Tacoma Musical Playhouse continues its all-time community favorite “Ragtime, The Musical” through Aug. 4. A beautiful story with a gloriously diverse score, “Ragtime” intertwines the lives of three distinct families of the early 20th Century and poignantly illustrates history’s timeless contradictions of wealth and poverty, freedom and prejudice, hope and despair,
The “Ladies Night Out Concert Series – Summer Groove Edition” hits the Showare Center on Aug. 2. Hosted by comedian Ralph Porter and music by DJ Funk Daddy, the evening includes performances by Ginuwine, Jon B, J. Holiday, Case, Adina Howard, Soul for Real and Changing Faces – with increased speakers and video screens added. Doors open at 7 p.m., show starts at 8. Tickets: (253) 856-6999 and at www.showarecenter.com.