Janice Oberding - The Big Book of California Ghost Stories

Janice Oberding is a Nevada-based writer who was lucky enough to have grown up in both California (the Monterey Peninsula,) and Nevada (Reno). She enjoys traveling and researching history, true crime, and the paranormal. She is one of only a few people who have spent an entire night at Alcatrazaside from those who were incarcerated there. She worked as consultant and historian for the Alcatraz episode of SyFys Ghost Hunters (with Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson).

She has also worked with the History Channel, LivingTV, and the Travel Channel, and has appeared in episodes of Dead Famous for Twofour productions, Travel Channels Haunted Hotels, Ghost Adventures, and Foxs Scariest Places on Earth.

Janice has previously published spooky books with Stackpole, Arcadia/History Press, Pelican Publishing, and Fonthill Publishing. When shes not writing, she teaches an annual ghost hunting 101 class for Truckee Meadows Community Colleges Paranormal Series. She also speaks at local events and paranormal conferences. Although she has had inexplicable things occur during her research, Janice remains a skeptic. You can find her online at facebook.com/JaniceOberding and Twitter, @JaniceOberding.

Anger, Kenneth, Hollywood Babylon II

Bell, Horace (Major), On the Old West Coast

Blanche, Tony, and Brad Schreiber, Death in Paradise

Caldwell, George D., MD, Ghost Stories of the California Missions and Rhymes of the Gypsy Trail

Carr, Harry, Los Angeles City of Dreams

Chessman, Caryl, Cell Block 2455

Clough, Charles W., San Juan Bautista

Clune, Brian, Hollywood Obscura

Clune, Brian, and Bob Davis, Haunted Universal Studios

Dwyer, Jeff, Ghost Hunters Guide to Los Angeles

Friedman, Mel, California Gold Rush

Hauck, Dennis William, The National Directory of Haunted Places

Holdredge, Helen, Mammy Pleasant

Holdredge, Helen, Mammy Pleasants Partner

Holzer, Hans, Americas Haunted Houses

Hotel Del Coronado Heritage Department (editor), Beautiful Stranger: The Ghost of Kate Morgan and the Hotel Del Coronado

Jacobson, Laurie, and Mark Wanamaker, Hollywood Haunted: A Ghostly Tour of Filmland

Karpis, Alvin, On the Rock

Kashner, Sam, and Nancy Schoenberger, Hollywood Kryptonite

Lee, Hector, Heroes Villains and Ghosts Folklore of Old California

Mahony, Patrick, Unsought Visitors

Marx, S., and J. Vanderveen, Deadly Illusions: Jean Harlow and the Murder of Paul Bern

May, Alan M., The Legend of Kate Morgan

May, Antoinette, Haunted Houses and Wandering Ghosts of California

McGlashan, C. F., History of the Donner Party

Morehouse III, W., Millennium Biltmore:A Grand Hotel Bom of Hollywood Dreams

Mulholland, John, Beware Familiar Spirits

Oberding, Janice, Haunted Lake Tahoe

Ogden, Tom, Haunted Hollywood

Ogden, Tom, Haunted Hotels

Older, Fremont Mrs., California Missions and their Romances

Older, Fremont Mrs., Love Stories of Old California

Reinstedt, Randall A., Ghosts and Mystery Along Old Montereys Path of History

Reinstedt, Randall A., Ghosts of the Big Sur Coast

Schroeder, B., and C. Fogg, Beverly Hills Confidential

Senate, Richard, Ghosts of the California Missions

Senate, Richard, Ghosts of the Haunted Coast

Senate, Richard, Ghost Stalkers Guide to Haunted California

Senate, Richard, Hollywoods Ghosts

Shillinglaw, Susan, Carol and John Steinbeck: Portrait of a Marriage

Shulman, Irving, Harlow: An Intimate Biography

Starr, K., Material Dreams: Southern California through the 1920s

Steinbeck, Gwen Conger, My Life with John Steinbeck

Wall, Rosaline Sharpe, A Wild Coast and Lonely

Walska, Ganna, Always Room at the Top

Weller, S., Dancing at Ciros

Wing, R. (editor), The Blue Book of the Screen

Wlodarski, Robert J., and Anne Nathan Wlodarski, Haunted Catalina

Wolfe, Donald H., The Black Dahlia Files

Yasuda, Anita, Haunted Monterey Peninsula

Borderline, January 1964

Coronet, January 1951

Exhibitors Herald, December 6,1924

Fate, August 1968

Saturday Evening Post, July 2,1966

Saturday Evening Post, June 3,1967

Screenland, December 1921

Whisper, February 1956

Bodie Morning News, September 9,1879

Butte Montana Standard, November 28,1942

Gasconade Republican, January 30,1947

Reno Evening Gazette, February 27,1882

Sacramento Record Union, January 16,1897

San Francisco Call, June 26,1902

San Francisco Call, June 6,1909

San Francisco Call, March 10,1920

San Francisco Call, October 18,1896

San Francisco Call, September 8,1898

Santa Cruz Daily Sentinel, June 25,1895

I n 1845 Theophilus Magruder and James Marshall came west with an emigrant train to the Oregon Territory seeking gold. Both men were destined to play a part in Californias history. James Marshall was a skilled carpenter. Theophilus Magruders parents were socially prominent residents of Washington, DC, and he hoped to show them he could make his own wealth. It didnt happen. With the mens quest proving futile, James Marshall moved on to California where he started the California gold rush with his discovery of gold at Sutters Mill in 1848.

Theophilus Magruder stayed in Oregon and served briefly as the states territorial secretary in 1849. Seven years later, the lighthouse at Crescent City was completed; it began operating on December 10, 1856, with a kerosene light that could be seen from fourteen miles out. Theophilus Magruder, who had left Oregon for California, was awarded the job as the lighthouses first keeper with a salary of one thousand dollars yearly. Three years later he resigned when his pay was cut. Although he was no longer working at the lighthouse, Theophilus remained in Crescent City.

Over the next several years, Battery Point lighthouse keepers would come and go. John Jeffrey came and stayed awhile. He arrived in 1875 with his wife and children and served as lighthouse keeper at Battery Point for the next forty years. The question is, has John Jeffrey decided to maintain a residence at the lighthouse indefinitely? Some ghost investigators believe he is the ghost whose heavy boots are often heard climbing the lighthouse stairs, or walking across the floor. Other investigators claim Theophilus Magruder is the ghostly keeper who climbs the stairs and John Jeffrey is the ghost who is accompanied by a woman and three children.

In March 1964 a 9.2 megathrust earthquake struck off the coast of Anchorage, Alaska. The most powerful earthquake ever recorded in North America, it resulted in 131 deaths. Of those, nine people died in Crescent City when twenty-foot waves came sweeping into neighborhoods. Property damage was catastrophic. And yet, the old lighthouse withstood the onslaught.

Lighthouses, like theaters, seem to be haunted by their very nature. Whoever Battery Points ghosts are, theyre known for activity like a rocking chair that will suddenly start to rock without any apparent help, the aroma of a burning cigar, and items that are moved from place to place.

Battery Point was one of Californias first lighthouses. It is registered as a California Historical Landmark and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Visitors, with the exception of the ghostly sort, should be aware it is located on an isthmus, and is only accessible at low tide.