Follow local historian and “Ghost Lady” Kathi Kresol as she researches the spirits, curses, and curiosities from the Forest City’s shadowy past. Just beneath the glossy surface of Rockford’s rich heritage lies a dark history of tragedy, a troubled and turbulent past leaving scars that still resonate today. Geraldine Bourbon’s final struggle echoes throughout the farmhouse where her estranged husband pursued her with a pistol from room to room before gently laying her corpse on the bed. The sobs of society darling Carrie Spafford still keep vigil over the family plot of the cemetery where she sowed the heartbreak of her twilight years. From the vengeance of Chief Big Thunder to the Witch of McGregor Road, author Kathi Kresol shares the legends and lore of Rockford’s haunted history. Includes photos! “There are reasons why Kathi Kresol believes Rockford is so haunted. The tour guide said there are good ‘conductors’ for the supernatural in the city’s downtown area. These factors include being near a body of water, having limestone in the area and the area having a Native American influence.” —Beloit Daily News

Illinois's mysterious and often violent history has made the state a haven for restless spirits.

The sixth and final edition of Tales of Coles County, Illinois combines the original Tales of Coles County, the Legends and Lore of Coles County, and a new third section on the Hidden History of Coles County with updated pictures, additional legends, and new stories. First published in 2004, Tales of Coles County, Illinois takes an entertaining look at local history through vivid historical fiction. When four students from Eastern Illinois University are stranded during a violent storm, they seek shelter with an elderly couple who give them more than they bargain for. After one night, the four will never look at Coles County the same way. With each story, they learn more about the place they've come to call home. The Second Battle of the Ambraw, the Charleston Riot of 1864, the Coles County Poor Farm, events surrounding the Airtight Bridge Murder, and the Blair Hall Fire of 2004, all are told. In the Legends and Lore of Coles County, Michael Kleen reveals over a dozen hidden stories from the from the area’s past and present, including ghost stories, folk tales, and other legends and lore. When did a poltergeist terrorize one rural family in Pleasant Grove Township? What is the real story behind the “Mad Gasser of Mattoon”? Why do they call one stretch of road "Dead Man's Curve"? The answers to these questions and more can be found in this definitive volume. In part three, Hidden History, Michael Kleen examines events some believe are better left unremembered. What is the history of Coles County’s ghost towns? What were some of its most infamous murders? What happened in the Tornado of 1917? Never-before published information about Mattoon's battle with Prohibition and even a local chapter of the KKK is inside.

Hauntings are believed to be created from violence and bloodshed. And from the beginning, the Prairie State was a place where death thrived, and mysteries became commonplace. Illinois was the home of ancient peoples know as Moundbuilders whose only legacy is silent graves and many unsolved mysteries. The French left behind their own ghostly stories after their displacement by the Americans in the 1700s and countless slaughters such as the Dearborn Massacre gave birth to tales of horror that live on in the history of Illinois. Eerie occurrences, spooky events, unsolved mysteries, and terrifying specters haunt Illinois. Tales of headless horsemen, haunted castles and a penitentiary occupied by ghosts chill the spines of visitors. Haunted Illinois explores the Prairie State’s paranormal side and serves as a guide to its haunted places.

The fascinating ghost stories behind Illinois’s “City of Cemeteries”—photos included! Aurora was the first Illinois city to have electric streetlights, but a dark history has resisted illumination as stubbornly as the chilly corner of the old roundhouse repels the summer heat . . . Learn why Aurora counts “City of Cemeteries” among its nicknames as Diane Ladley describes the nineteenth-century doctor suspected of trading bodies between his cancer center and a neighboring graveyard. Other eerie legends and strange stories revealed in this book include the marauding brave brought to justice in the Devil’s Cave by his own tribe, the sweet legacy of NFL great Walter Payton, and the elephants that saved a circus from a tornado.

From the mediums of Spiritualism's golden age to the ghost hunters of the modern era, Taylor shines a light on the phantasms and frauds of the past, the first researchers who dared to investigate the unknown, and the stories and events that galvanized the pubic and created the paranormal field that we know today.

Established in 1831, Naperville is one of the oldest settlements in the Greater Chicago area. The city's rich and fascinating heritage has been carefully passed down from one proud generation to the next; however, nowhere has Naperville's ghostly oral tradition and haunted history been preserved until now. Most of Naperville's unique legends--compiled for the fi rst time ever in these pages--arose from accounts of actual historic events and from the lives of notable personages in the city's long history. As the tragic events and persons faded from living memory, all that might remain of them would be ghost stories whispered by fi relight and, later, by fl ashlight tucked under a teenager's chin at slumber parties. Some eerie legends in these pages have origins that are lost in time, and still other hair-raising ghost stories included in this work are chilling contemporary, firsthand accounts of paranormal encounters within Naperville's sprawling boundaries . . . perhaps from even just down the street.