Bjorn Dihle - Haunted Inside Passage: Ghosts, Legends, and Mysteries of Southeast Alaska

HAUNTED
INSIDE
PASSAGE

Ghosts, Legends, and Mysteries
of Southeast Alaska

BJORN DIHLE

Text 2017 by Bjorn Dihle

Front cover photo by Chris Miller

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher.

Several chapters in this book have been previously published, often in different forms, in newspapers and journals: Naked Joe: Alaskas Most Famous and Least Known Ghost was published as In the Spirit of Naked Joe by Earth Island Institute Magazine; parts of The Mysteries of Yakobi Island were published by the Juneau Empire; The Legends of Thomas Bay was published in two different parts (The Second Strangest Story and More Strange Stories) by the Capital City Weekly; and The Sinking of the Islander and the Legend of Its Lost Gold was published by the Juneau Empire.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Dihle, Bjorn, author.

Title: Haunted Inside Passage : ghosts, legends, and tragedies of southeast Alaska / Bjorn Dihle.

Description: Portland, Oregon : Alaska Northwest Books, 2017. | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016034485 (print) | LCCN 2016039013 (ebook) | ISBN 9781943328949 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781943328956 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: GhostsInside Passage. | Inside PassageFolklore.

Classification: LCC BF1472.U6 D55 2017 (print) | LCC BF1472.U6 (ebook) | DDC 133.109798/2dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016034485

Designed by Vicki Knapton

Map by Robin Hanley and Alex Witt

Published by Alaska Northwest Books

An imprint of

P.O. Box 56118

Portland, Oregon 97238-6118

www.graphicartsbooks.com

CONTENTS

PREFACE

D URING a hike on a mountain ridge above Juneau, my friend Ben offered me some advice on how to become a successful writer.

Youre never going to get anywhere unless you make it sexy. You need a book with big-breasted women and zombies, he said.

Maybe he was right. I looked east toward the edge of a 1,500-square-mile icefield, then west toward a wilderness archipelago full of brown bears. I tried the nature writer thing and the pile of rejection slips I received basically told me the same thing Ben was.

After our hike, while I was considering writing a nonfiction book about bondage among the undead, I received an unusual e-mail. A Juneau man named Carlton Smith had read a story Id written about an investigation of a bay supposedly haunted by Koshdaa Ka, the boogeyman of Southeast Alaska, and wanted to meet. By the time we finished our first cup of coffee, Carlton suggested I write a book.

That night I fired off queries pitching a collection of Southeast Alaskan scary stories and unsolved mysteries to publishing companies. I didnt hold back in my cover letter. I confessed that my golden retriever puppy, Fenrir, depressed by my failure as a writer, had taken to binge drinking toilet water. I made it clear my book could only be optioned into a film if Tom Hardy played me and Scarlett Johansson played my girlfriend, MC, an incredibly intelligent writer whose one flaw is that shes clumsy and burns herself whenever she tries to cook. I didnt expect to hear back, except for maybe a short note saying something like I was less funny than watching someone with hemorrhoids riding a bicycle across the country while being chased by a pack of rabid wiener dogs and Chihuahuas. Trust meIve done itits not funny.

To my surprise, I had a book deal by the end of the week.

Haunted Inside Passage evolved into twenty different stories that each took on a life of its own. Reaching out and interviewing people whod had supernatural and unexplainable experiences wasnt always easy. Despite being voted the life of the party senior year in high school, Im intensely shy. Well, there was that time at my little brothers wedding in Newfoundland when I challenged the 300 or 400 Canadians at the reception to a tag-team wrestling match against me and the groom. (All I remember is yelling, We will destroy you, Canada! before my speech was prematurely ended.) Normally, Im as introverted as a Bigfoot riding a unicorn being followed by a UFO. Luckily for me, most folks I reached out to seemed happy to tell me their stories. For some it was therapeutic. Only a few declined.

During the five months I invested in this book I worked nights in the mental health unit of a local hospital, often with extremely psychotic patients. During days and nights off, I wrote and obsessed over these stories. The irony is that, while Im not much of a people person, Im not much of a ghost guy either. I considered myself an open-minded skeptic. Partway into dozens of interviews, something in me began to change. The number of normal people whod had eerie and unexplainable experiences was too great to not admit there was some truth to their stories and the legends. This book deals with some horrible events and terrifying themes. Somethe Koshdaa Ka for examplemade me uncomfortable to explore and, even more so, to put on paper. A few times, I half wondered if something followed me home after an interview or tour of a supposedly haunted place.

I have to confess stories from the Canadian side of the Inside Passage, a little less than half of the nearly one-thousand-mile route, are few and far between in this book. Thats not because Canadians arent interesting or are lacking in spooky stories. I love Canadaeven Quebecbut it would take another book to do the region justice. Who knows, perhaps someday there will be a sequel to Haunted Inside Passage.

For the maximum experience, read the following twenty stories in consecutive order. Some are fun, such as crusty fishermen whove tangled with sea monsters, my search for Sasquatch that ends in a casino, and the ghost of a nude survivalist with a zeal for publicity. Others will leave you wondering, such as the disappearance of fifteen sailors during first contact between Russians and Tlingits, the tales of the Koshdaa Ka haunting the rain forest, and the curious case of Alaskas first supposed serial killer. Some will break your heart, like the spirits of Mount Edgecumbe Hospital, or the sinking of the Princess Sophia and the ghosts of gold rush prostitutes said to still be at unrest. All in all, the book offers a window, for local and visitor alike, into the murky history of Southeast Alaska. Hopefully it will leave you haunted in a sexy sort of way.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A LOT of people helped with this book. Special thanks go to Carlton Smith for suggesting the project. Thanks also go to Joe and Sandy Craig for their friendship and stories; Peter Metcalfe for his advice and help with interviewing; Kathy Howard, my editor, for preventing me from looking even more of a fool; and my folks, Nils and Lynnette Dihle, for three decades of supporting me coloring outside the lines. Ill never forget when I presented my dad with a draft of a novel I wrote when I was nineteen. It was so terrible he didnt know what to say, but he still offered encouragement. Special thanks also go to Mary Catharine Martin, the writer and adventurer with whom I share my life, for making me write again after a hiatus of nearly a decade. Her support and suggestions were critical to the creation of this book.