The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-07-01
A HAUNTED HOUSE.
Strange Door and Strange Story
That Chung to It.


The pension examiner, who has been
on duty in a southern state. was in
Washington for a week or two. as is
the custom among that class OF public
servants, and he was telling of what
he had seen and heard in his bailiwick
to Washington Star reporter.
"Oh, yes" he said, in response to a
query, - there were 'ha'nts there. for
where are they not where the darky
prevails? But the real CHEST of the
whole section was in an old house
known as Harley hall. The old house
was nearly 100 years old, and as far
back as the people could remember II
had the reputation of being haunted.
This reputation had primarily grown
out of the fact that in one of the great
rooms of the house was door leading
somewhere which had never been
opened, as far as known. and which
resisted every effort to open it. The
room was wainscoated in oak nearly
TO the ceiling and this door was only
about six feet high and three feet wide
and seemed appropriate as the entrance
to a secret chamber. 1t had heavy
iron hinges and q heavy iron latch and
staple, eaten deeply by the rust. when
l saw it.
In response to a suggestion from
the owner OF the place, who was show
ing me over it and telling me the story
of it's ghost l made an effort to get
the door open. both by pulling at it
and by putting my shoulder against
it and pushing with all my strength l
even went so far as To rig kind of
clumsy jack against it to force it open.
but it refused to bulge an inche- l
could tell that it was a well made door
by the sound ii gave forth when
pounded on. but there was no reason
apparent why it should not open 20 re-
veal what was on the other side OF 1t.
THE story was not a very weird one,
consisting mostly of the rurlor that on
certain nights this door opened and
former master of the house came forth
to wander about He had never done
any harm or any good to any one, and
on the whole the ghost story was
rather tame, but the door was there.
and there was a mystery about that
which was still unsolved through ali
the years.
Last year the owner of the house, at
my suggestion, opened the old hall for
summer bOarders, and 1 led the van
and took the room with the mysterious
door in it.
''Many's the night I've sat and
watched that door. and often of moon
light nights I've sat in the open win
the southern summer night would not
tempt the old master to wander, but
he never came forth to meet me-
"One night. though. came the reVela-
ton of the mystery. A curtain in one
of the windows of a wing of the house
was blown into a candle flame and five
later fire was raging Half an
hour later the fire was out, but the
wing adjoining my room had lost its
upper half. exposing the wall of the
main building. In the repairs that fol-
lowed this wall was partly removed,
and it was shown that the mysterious
door was not a door, but merely a
joke on posterity. played by the origi-
nal proprietor, who had a heavy piece
Of oak put in the wainscoting and had
carved it with his own hands TO
resemble a door. The hinges and latch
he had put in to carry the trick to the
very end. That door," continued the
narrator, by actual measurement was
II inches thick and soldier than stone
wall. so that it was no wonder nobody
could ever open it,"