I was approached to do a piece for Acoustic Drive Magazine for this issue a few months ago and I happily agreed
without knowing what the piece would be about. While
talking with the boss about what I was to write he expressed interest in a piece about local happenings from a
local writer who had spent time in our previously noted
location.
Long story short, we decided to go on a (wine walk) ghost
tour of The Stockyards. It had not crossed my mind to do
a ghost story, why would it? I’ve heard the stories for years
from the locals and the employees around and thought it
commonplace. I suppose I never really thought about the
ghost stories I heard because it’s not surprising to me for a
place like this to have ghosts. Spirits, beings, souls, the list
goes on and I’ve found most folks either believe they exist
or not. There’s some grey area I suppose, as in anything else
some people just aren’t sure. I really don’t think it matters if
you believe or not, who doesn’t like a good ghost story? I’m
a sucker for a good ghost tour and I’ve been on a few.
My favorite is still the ghost tour my wife and I took in
Dublin, Ireland on our honeymoon; I got to see the house
Bram Stoker lived in while he was working on parts of
“Dracula”. Which parts? I don’t know, it’s just what the tour
guide said. Nevertheless, it was awesome and I read the
book and it was nostalgic and I’m just weird. I digress.
Our tour started at The Cowtown Winery where we loaded
26 | Acoustic Drive
up on bottles of their finest and left out afoot. Come to
find out the tour was given by a former coworker of mine
from the bar I worked in years ago. She’s a talented singer
/songwriter as well so I knew we would have fun, we had a
story teller. We left the winery and it wasn’t long before our
first tale.
The first one that sticks out in my mind takes place in
the old exchange building. There is a little girl that can be
heard laughing and running through the halls, I suppose
she sounds like a typical child which I’m sure she was. She
had gone to work with her father one day, and as children
do she ran and played and hid. She however hid in one of
the vaults where she fell asleep; it’s presumed that after the
workday and everything was locked up she may have suffocated. You can only imagine the panic in those frantically
looking for her and the helpless, horrific sight when she
was found. The little girl at the exchange building, that one
especially creeped me out.
If you go into the Cadillac (according to my source) on a
crowded night you ma y see a cowboy in a red shirt standing in the doorway looking for his lady friend. It’s not uncommon for a man to be looking in the bar for his special
lady, it is however uncommon for the dude to be a ghost.
It’s been said that the man in the red shirt was shot and
killed in front of the bar one night, it appears his special
lady friend may have been spoken for. Then there are the