Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1905-08-16

question about the possibility of the
ghosts appearing. Headless and acting
for all the world like an animate thing,
the apparition occurs internationally.
Sometimes the elements appear to con-
troll its action, but more generally it
makes its appearance. dinner pail in
hand, on the platform and attempts TO
swing its arms as if it were tagging a
passing train. Then it disappears and
its subsequent appearances are a mat
ter of chance.
Hearing so much of the alleged spirit,
company of young men, accompanied
by newspaper correspondent, went to
the station the other night and the pre-
vious night for the purpose of investi-
eating the matter.
On the first night they sat near the
depot, and amused themselves as best
they could until daylight began to break,
when they returned home without hav-
ing their curiosity satisfied, but the next
night they had different experience.
Reaching the station early in the
night, they prepared to take things easy,
but had hardly made such disposal of
themselves as was satisfactory. when
one of the boys raised his hand and
cried: Hist"
They all looked and saw the ghost
the ghost they had been told about
headless and carrying dinner pail 1t
was no delusion of the eyesight 1t was
the real. clear outline of Columbus Cole
as they had known him in life and the
same eternal dinner pail. For five min
uses or more they watched the apparl-
ton as the arms swung as if signaling
train. and then, spurred on by one unit
ed impulse, they rushed to the place
where they had seen the figure. Moth
ing but vacancy greeted them when they
reached the spot where the figure had
been seen. Coles spirit had entirely dis
appeared and they stood and looked at
each other in silence. marveling at the
supernatural incident and no longer
skeptics, but believers.
Unstrung from the shock of the mani
festation-totally unexpected. by the
way-they walked hume in silence, firm
adherents of the ghost theory.
Some of the good people who live in
the neighborhood of Flaherty are anx-
ious to do something to set the spirit at
rest. They say that something is
troubling it. The generally accepted
theory is that Cole wanted to do some
thing before he died-that the some
thing remains undone and that the
spirit will continue to wander until it
comes in contact with a sympathetic
spirit clothed in worldly clay to which
it can communicate it's desires.
Columbus Cole was well-known and
popular resident of the vicinity of F'lah-
erty. who lost his life years ago in a
boiler explosion. The top of his head
was completely blown off by the acct
dent. Soon after he died the trouble
with the ghost began and the people
have come to look at it in a matter-of-
fact manner. They do not deny the
story. They have got beyond that point
and many interesting incidents are re-
lated of the ghosts history
Flaherty people swear by their
ghost" 1t is an interesting ghost and
it is more powerful in keeping the old
and young within doors than all the
curfews that ever sounded from city hall
or church steeple. There is hardly a
man living within three miles of Flah-
erty station who cannot entertain one
for hours with stories of the ghosts do
irNs. Meanwhile the people are anx-
ious to locate the kindred spirit CARRIED
with human body to which the shade
of Columbus Cole will tell its troubles.