SNOHOMISH-A good place to be from: Here we go again - Article: The Herald, Friday Oct 30, 1998 Local New, B section, p 1B QUOTE- Picture of one corner of the Library by The Herald/ Michael O'Leary, (photographer). Caption- Legend has it that the image of 1920's Snohomish librarian Catherine McMurchy rustles through the Carnagie Building that houses the library. Ghost stories Other-worldy experiences turn readers into believers By Kate Reardon, Leslie Moriarty and Pam McGaggin, Herald writers. One evening after Patty Bagley had put her children to bed, she heard a voice behind her. "Mommy, I need you," it rang out, Bagley recalled. She turned expecting to see one of her children. She saw no one. Bagley scurried upstairs to find her children snuggled in bed asleep. There are several stories like hers about the house, which was her in-laws' home., Two of her husband's siblings died of disease as youngsters. Family members have heard footsteps going upstairs when no one else is home, she said. "We've never felt anything bad." Even so, Bagley said, her brother-in-law won't stay in the house alone. Are there such things as ghosts? It's an appropriate question to ponder on this day before Halloween. Other-worldly experiences have made believers out of some Snohomish County residents. Here are their ghost stories. Make of them what you will. The visiting librarian There are those who say the Snohomish Library has a librarian who's not on the payroll. Mike Bergeson, assistant manager, said a few years back, an employee was eating lunch when she heard noises from the thrird-story loft. A woman came down the stairs. "This woman was dressed in the period dress of the 1920s and was wearing a smart little blue hat squarely on her head," Bergeson said. The employee followed the woman as she continued walking into the main section of the library, but then, she was nowhere to be found. The employee began asking around and described the woman and what she was wearing. "Some of the staff that had been here a long time said, 'Oh, that sounds like it was Miss McMurchy,'" Bergeson said. The staff knew her as a librarian from the 1920s who occasionally makes an appearance. Bergeson, the library archivist, did some research and sure enough, there was a Miss Catherine McMurchy who was a librarian during the 1920s. Bergeson and others wonder, with plans for a new library in the making, if she'll show up to let the locals know how she feels about moving the library from the historic Carnegie Building. (Haunted) House for sale When John Burkholder and his wife moved to Arlington 2 1/2 years ago, they looked into buying a yellow fixer-upper in the downtown area. "We started hearing these stories," said Burkholder, the city's director of planning and communicty development. Neighbors swore it was haunted, a rumon also disclosed by the real estate broker "it kind of gave me the creeps," said Burkholder, who didn't buy the 1930's-era house. Greg White, pastor at the Assembly of God chruch, said he was consulted twice about the home by different people. About five years ago, the occupants told him they heard footstepson the stairs, that beds jumped on their own and that something was grabbing them. "We went in and prayed against the demonic spirits," White said. "We took authority over the demonic spirits in the name of Jesus." White said he didn't feel anything in the house and that the praying prompted no immediate reaction, but that all activity stopped, at least for those occupants. Two years ago, the mother of a potential buyer proclaimed it haunted the minute she walked in, he said. White said he wouldn't mind living there. "But if I was not a born-again Christian, you couldn't get me for love nor money to live in that house." Of tombs and one-legged men This time of year, Mike Malone, reference librarian in Snohomish, gets piles of questions about the Maltby cemetery. Although he has not been able to verify the stories, Malone said local folks have told him there are 13 steps to a mysterious tomb. "When you have a town as old and spirited as Snohomish, it's not unusual to have stories," Malone said. He normally hears from teenagers with lurid tales revolving around the cemetery. "Mostly they hear stories from other people," Malone said. "Typically, kids visit cemeteries. It's easy to mistake a waft of fog for a disembodied soul." Another sighting, Malone said, is at the Snohomish Freshman Campus. Students have reportedly seen somebydy who's missing a leg, wearing clothes from the early part of the century, he said. To keep track of all these stories, Malone said he hopes to start a Snohomish County ghost register next year. A girl in white Sondy McCutcham knows her house-turned-restaurant is haunted with a young female ghost. "I believe in her," she said. "I just don't want to see her." McCutcham, who owns the Cabbage Patch restaurant in Snohomish, is referring to Sybil Sibley, an 11-year-old girl who dresses in white. After she bought the house 21 years ago and turned it into a restaurant, an employee told her the story of her grandparents, who lived there in the 1950s. "She said they had a daughter, Sybil, who would have been this employee's aunt," McCutcham said. "Apparently, the little girl fell down the stairs and broke her neck when she was about 11 years old. "When I bought the house, I ran the restaurant downstairs and my aunt lived upstairs," McCutcham said. "She would tell me she heard her all the time." After a few yers, the upstairs of the 1910-era house was mad into a lounge. As many as four different customers have seen Sybil upstairs all the time. "About six months ago, I was talking to a woman, a new customer who had never been in the place before, when she began stgaring over my shoulder. I asked her what she saw and she described the young girl dressed in white floating." McCutcham said another time, a youngster who lived next door was outside in his yeard talking. His mother was inside, but could hear him talking to someone and went to check. "The little boy told her it was the little girl from next door," McCutcham said. "The mother couldn't see anyone, but her son could." The gu in plaid Richard Cottage of Granite Falls, has been working on a book about local ghost stories for about two years. One of his favorites is about a woman in Marysville who kept seeing a shirt walking from her bedroom to her daughter's bedroom. She had been afraid to tell her husband, since he apparently did not believe in such things, Cottage said. After several sightings, she had a change of heart. "She said, 'Dear, we have a ghost and he said 'Oh, you mean the guy in the plaid shirt?' "Cottage said. After searching through various records, the woman learned the name of the man who had lived on the property. He apparently had been a logger, Cottage said. Reminders of the past Everett photographer Jim Arrabito said he has seen shadows and felt a presence while remodeling his home in the 2600 block of Grand Avenue in Everett. He may have captured it best when he said:"Maybe ghosts are the only part of our past that we can't throw away." END OF A VERY LONG QUOTE. COMMENT: Miss McMurchy (Catherine McMurchy), as we called her, was our librarian in the 1930s and we all knew her very well. Since I was born 1924, I don't remember from those years, but I surely remember her from the 1930s. She and her sister, spinsters, sopped by and visited me as welll as others in later years. They were both living in a home near 5th & Cedar in Snohomish, my Herald paper route. 50 cents/mo. subscription rate. Miss McMurchy would sometimes find me in the section of the library with books on psychic phenomena, which would be tagged parapsychic today. When Miss McMurchy found me searching that section of the library, she gently explained to me that that material was really not for children to read, and would guide me back toward the children's books. The McMurchy sisters were very slim, prim, mediaum height, wrinkled, WCTU members, their distinctive hats cocked atop their heads accompanied by very slim, wrinkled throats; the perfect example of what spinsters would look like and dress like according to a Norman Rockwell painting. Catherine would stamp your library card with the pen/date stamp that always stamped the date with purple ink; the smell of that ink still is retained in my memory. Everything was done very business-like, but always accompanied by a smile of a friendly librarian. When I was down with an extended illness, the McMurchy sisters always made it a point to come by and visit through the many years. Catherine was librarian at the old Carnegie Library, which had to be added onto in later years. Today, the old library is called the loft of or Children's section. A whole new library is desired. The story about the 11 yr. old girl that had fallen down the flight of stairs in the old house now called the Cabbage Patch Restaurant, on Ave. A near 1st Street ( the beginning of my Herald paperoute of the late 1930s/early 40s.) is right next door to the house that was the home of my Aunt & Uncle when they first married in 1912. I have never heard of "the little girl in white" before, and Snohomish News traveled fast, especially via barber shops, the hair dressers, and the cliques! Still does! Eventually it comes out in the newspapers, perhaps, but with different versions. There is a 1720 Clark house back in Southington, CT. on what was called Clark Farms, on Clark Farms Road . It is reknown for having been haunted by several ghosts, but the most prevalent is a young teen aged girl. Many people are fearful of the place; others are curious about it. (I've even figured out who she was in my gen. info.) What do I think? I put it all up on a shelf, along with the UFO stuff and other paranormals, and figure when I have enough evidence to know better, I will then perhaps say that I believe. In the meantime, I hope that those who see my friend, Catherine McMurchy at the Library ;be sure and give her and her Sister my best regards. Now it is up to Snohomish Cemetery to yield ghosts, and ghostlike phenomena. They have already turned over in their graves! Carroll in Snohomish. & & & 30 & & & ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]