Mount Absalom

Mount Absalom, Ohio, was founded in 1796 by the Reverend Silas Lodge. The current mayor is Edgar Lopez, with Chester Warren as deputy mayor.

## History

The official history of the town, told in the Founder's Day pageant, is that Reverend Lodge's original travelling party was killed by Native Americans. Lodge was later found by and joined a different party, who had recently lost their reverend to cholera. The group built Mount Absalom at their meeting place, naming the town after a nearby hill. However, a letter by one of the original town founders, Hezekiah Bennington, reveals Lodge was originally found surrounded by around fifty bodies. The bodies, which had no marks on them, appeared to have died from cholera.

The founders soon discovered that the land of Mount Absalom had a connection beyond life. Initially there was worry about what this might mean for the living, but the founders decided that no place which provided such good harvests could be close to hell and damnation.

However, while most founders agreed that the living and the dead could co-exist in peace, Reverend Lodge did not. Seeing the presence of ghosts as an ill omen, he anointed himself the Revelator and, with a small group of followers, fought against the town, and was eventually eventually cast out beyond the borders of Mount Absalom.

There have been two large fires in Mount Absalom's history; one in 1896, which burned down a large portion of the town, and another in 1996.

Sometime during the 1960s and 70s, a large number of birds were shot in the woods around Mount Absalom over the course of several months.

## Notable Locations

Main Street is comprised of The Golden Groove, a record store run by Marisol Cabrera; Otto's Auto; De Souza’s De Ice Cream; and The Movie Knight, a movie rental.

Other notable locations in the town include Fenwood House, a boarding house run by Dot Harper located near the edge of town; Hunter's Diner, which may or may not be on Ash and 3rd; Mount Absalom's observatory; and a large wood known locally as the Burning Woods.

Just out of town is a Seven-Eleven, and the nearest town is Julian.

## Ghosts

The existence of ghosts in Mount Absalom is something of an open secret; while many people in the town know about them, it doesn't often get discussed, as townsfolk want to be been as liars, or become the Salem of the midwest.

Known ghosts are Tim Anderson, former maintenance worker at Fenwood House; Theodore Wesley, a teenager currently working at Fenwood; Norah Tendulkar, designer of the telescope in the observatory; Joey, a childhood friend of Lily Harper, and Silas Lodge, who lives in the woods with his two large dogs. Other supernatural occurrences in the town include strange voices in Fenwood's radiators; a strange door that appears in Fenwood's basement; and the strangeness of Hunter's Diner.

## Events and Culture

Events in Mount Absalom include the Annual Mount Absalom Founder’s Day History Pageant and Meat Raffle hosted by the Delphic Order (which isn't held every year); the annual Celery Festival in the summer; and the annual hay ride against nearby town Julian.

Celery is a big part of the culture in Mount Absalom, as it is a crop that grows extremely well in the area. Mount Absalom has a celeric bottling works which employs a large portion of the town, and produces celery soda and celery liquor. The first celery plot is an important place for the local historical society, and there is also a tradition of planting celery on grave sites. Celery is even mentioned in the town's anthem.

Mount Absalom has a dark sky ordinance, which, alongside the rebuilding of the observatory, is part of the town's astrotourism.