Haunted Canada 10: More Scary True Stories

In various cultures throughout history, the oral tradition has been a significant part of community life and has served as a way to teach the next generation about their shared history and experiences. As part of this, ghost stories have functioned in some cases as a means to pass on specific morals or lessons to the next generation. In contemporary times, ghost stories may no longer serve that purpose, but they are still a popular pastime among people who enjoy hearing a spooky story or a way to entertain visitors to a city, as seen by the numerous ghost tours that operate in Europe and elsewhere. However, can these ghost stories still provide some interesting insights from the past that can inform how we perceive or relate to the contemporary world around us?

Haunted Canada 10: More Scary True Stories is the latest addition to the award-winning “Haunted Canada” series which began in 2002. Pat Hancock wrote the first three books of this series, and Joel Sutherland began contributing with Haunted Canada 4, and he has since written the subsequent volumes. Similar to previous collections, this book succeeds in providing a variety of ghostly stories from across Canada. Major cities such as Vancouver, Toronto, and Edmonton are represented in this collection, along with smaller places that readers may be less familiar with, places such as Bible Hill, Creston, and Dwight.

As shown by these stories, particular places may be haunted for various reasons. In some cases, a specific place is haunted by a ghost because the deceased person has a close connection with that place. In other cases, the haunting is simply due to the fact that the person does not wish to leave the place to which it has grown attached, but, in still other instances, the haunting is due to an unresolved situation from a deceased person’s life or a tragedy that has occurred, such as an untimely, tragic, or unsavory death. In yet further situations, the reasons for the hauntings are unclear or the identity of the ghost, itself, is unknown.

For example, the Bickleigh Ghost is named after the place that it haunts in Bickleigh, Saskatchewan. Over the years, several people have been frightened by that ghost which has been seen riding a horse or walking through houses and streets. It is believed that the ghost is a spirit of a man who has been murdered in 1924. In contrast, Edmonton’s Alberta Block building is haunted by the ghost of a caretaker who used to work there. While he was still alive, Sam was regarded as a somewhat odd fellow who was very attached to the building, so much so that he did not want to leave. People claim to have heard Sam singing, and one particular technician has had a more direct encounter with the ghost while carrying a tape machine downstairs.

In other instances, such as Bible Hill, Nova Scotia, the ghostly presences are unexplained. Two sisters lived in a house that was haunted by spirits who would throw and drop objects. Upon hearing that the sisters’ house was haunted, some local photographers visited and took a photo of what appeared to be one of the ghost’s hands gripping an iron on the sisters’ stove. As the story notes, “Perhaps, like the sisters who needed to convince their friends that their house truly was haunted, the spirits needed to convince the country that they truly existed.” (p. 25)

An interesting twist in this collection is one tale about a ghost who helped a family through a difficult time, although it is unclear what the ghost’s origins and motivations were. John Scott and his family owned a grist mill that made flour for the entire county. However, due to illness, he and his family were unable to work, and so sacks of unground wheat accumulated in the mill. One day, John, hearing noise emanating from the mill, went to investigate. To his astonishment, the mill’s lights were on and the machinery was operating to grind the grain into flour. As he got closer, he saw a mysterious man moving around, but, at that moment, everything came to a halt and the man disappeared without a trace. To this day, his identity is unknown. Although other mysterious things happened in Scott’s mill since then, that was his only encounter with the ghost.

More frightening encounters with ghosts are also included in this collection. One story focuses on some kayakers who spent the night in a cabin on Newfoundland and Labrador’s Swan Island. One of them encountered a grinning human head near his feet and blood on his sleeping bag, which felt wet, but both things disappeared after his friends arrived. It was an experience he had never forgotten, but which he was unable to explain. Equally mysterious was the ghost, itself, of which they knew little about. Swan Island used to be the site of a fishing community in the 1880s and was a favourite area because of its diverse marine life. By 1948, most of the families had left Swan Island and it became abandoned, but ghostly presences appear to remain.

Another spooky tale from St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador is about a spirit whom people call The Old Hag and which terrorizes people in an apartment building. The Old Hag is known to haunt people’s dreams throughout the province, but her identity and motivations for haunting remain unknown. Some believe that she is the ghost of a nameless witch.

In many cases, sighting a haunting has created an indelible and unforgettable experience for the person involved. In one story from Regina, a person named Howard was unable to speak about his experience for 20 years as he had been extremely spooked by it. When the news arose that an old woman’s dead body had been found one night after having been missing for years, Howard realized that he may have encountered that person’s ghost in someone’s backyard.

This book opens with a personal introduction from Joel Sutherland that welcomes readers to this latest collection of stories However, in contrast to Haunted Canada: The Second Terrifying Collection which combined three books that were originally published as three separate volumes, Haunted Canada 10 does not contain an epilogue with additional information. Although not a crucial feature to include, the epilogue from that other collection does provide readers some interesting insight about Sutherland and his interest in the paranormal. Like the other collections in this series, Haunted Canada 10 does not have a table of contents. Since this collection is only some 120 pages in length, the lack of a table of contents is less problematic because readers will not take too long to locate their favourite stories in contrast to some of the longer volumes three times the length of Haunted Canada 10.

Those who have read other books in this series before will be familiar with this latest collection’s language, narrative style, and format. Each chapter opens with an atmosphere grey-toned picture at the top of the first page, followed by the story’s title, geographical location, and text, itself. The opening two paragraphs set the appropriate tone for the story by introducing the main protagonist, setting, and preliminary scenario that would set the stage for the haunting encounter that is to follow. With the book’s having the same conversational and informal style as its predecessors, readers will find the stories engaging because they convey the impression that a live storyteller is speaking to them, a feeling which would be enhanced if the stories were read aloud. Although the suggested age group is nine to twelve for these stories, younger readers can still enjoy them if they are read aloud. For younger readers, parents or teachers may need to explain the meanings of more complex words or those words that refer to unfamiliar contexts. For particularly inquisitive readers, it may be beneficial to provide some additional information about the historical setting or geographical location so that they can better understand the story’s significance. Nevertheless, readers should still be able to enjoy the stories without this additional information as they can understand the gist of what is happening.

Similar to previous collections in this series, selected chapters include photos that contribute to the stories’ spooky flavour. For example, in the story “Nighttime in the Asylum”, the inclusion of a photo of Quebec’s Sainte-Clotilde-de-Horton Asylum helps readers to visualize where the haunting took place. Similarly, a historical photo of a soldier walking around Fort York suitably complements the story from Toronto by evoking the atmosphere of the 1800s when the hauntings took place. The photo included in the story “The Séance House” is somewhat different as it relates to the actual hauntings rather than their setting alone. Readers can view a reproduction of a historical photo from March 10, 1930, that reveals what appears to a female ghost sitting between Mary Marshall and W. B. Cooper.

For teaching purposes, the “Haunted Canada” series provides a wide range of stories for both teachers and students to choose from. They can supplement classroom discussions about a specific geographical location’s historical or contemporary context by demonstrating how stories can create a sense of belonging among people within a community and instill the places that they know with significance and meaning. For students in high school or at the college and university level, teachers could use these stories as starting points for potentially interesting discussions about reality and imagination, “fact” and “fiction,” as well as “truth” and “falsity”. Indeed, in the current climate of people’s skepticism about journalism and fake news, it may be interesting to have students reflect on these issues in the context of narratives about supernatural events and, more broadly, in the context of storytelling. For example, teachers could adopt a more open-ended approach by using questions as a way to get students thinking critically and to connect these topics to their current lives. Using questions such as the following could generate some provocative discussion: (1) To what extent does “truth” matter in terms of making a place meaningful for that community?; (2) What does truth mean in the context of ghost stories or, more generally, other stories in which the events cannot be scientifically proven?; (3) Do the “facts” of events have to be true when those stories speak to a higher “truth” for the community that finds meaning through the stories that they tell about these events?

These stories could also fit well into a unit about oral narratives and the purposes that they have served throughout history to pass on a community’s collective knowledge. Alternatively, teachers could approach these stories from the perspective of the media and generate discussion about how these stories may be similar to or different from the ways in which the supernatural is represented in film and television. One possible teaching activity could involve having students conduct research on the context behind these stories or, alternatively, on other stories about hauntings that have occurred for places that they select.

Winner of the Silver Birch and Hackmatack awards, Joel A. Sutherland is a librarian and author of several books for young readers. He has written a number of books in the “Haunted Canada” series as well as Be a Writing Superstar, Summer’s End, and Kill Screen. His short fiction has also appeared in many anthologies and magazines. Sutherland appeared as the “The Barbarian Librarian” on the Canadian edition of the television show Wipeout. Currently, Sutherland lives with his family in southeastern Ontario where he continues to pursue his avid interest in ghosts. To learn more about Joel Sutherland’s works, visit his website https://www.joelasutherland.com/.