The first ghosts I remember were those in stories told to me by my father. I was probably 5 or 6 at the time. Night after night he would spin his mysterious yarns just for me. Some tales were recounted from his own youth and others were wonderful stories created on the spot, with twists and turns probably dictated by my childish reactions and questions.

Then there were those other ghosts that children with too vivid imaginations can conjure up from a bathrobe hanging on a closet door or a bedspread fallen from the bed in an odd shape that resembles something ‹ or someone.

In school and at the movies I met ghosts created by Edgar Allan Poe and others portrayed by Vincent Price. His rendition of Poe's "The Pit and the Pendulum" will never be bested. Sunday afternoons, my father and I listened to "The Shadow" on the radio. Radio is the perfect medium for ghost stories because even the best story can be enhanced with a little help from one's imagination.

When I made my first trip to Disneyland I met up with the famed inhabitants of the Haunted Mansion, saw the holographically generated images that danced around the banquet table in the mansion's great hall and marveled at the Yettis on the Matterhorn ride.

Diehard investigators of the paranormal—those so-called ghost buster types—would scoff at these man-made images, discounting them as so many manufactured figments of some designer's imagination.

Or, were they?

Consider a world without mystery, a campfire without scary stories and marshmallows, theater without Dickens' "A Christmas Carol" and other mysteries, or a library without the works of Poe.

Most stories, even the wildest works of fiction, derive from some grain of truth or experience. There have been ghost stories and other legends as long as there have been people to tell them, hear them, fear them and even to discount them.

Ghosts even haunt the hallowed halls of academia.

Sweet Briar College, my alma mater, has several. Most often seen or sensed have been the ghosts of Daisy Williams who was 16 when she passed on in 1884 and her mother Indiana Fletcher Williams who died in 1900. Sweet Briar was founded in Daisy's memory in 1901. Daisy's ghost seems more mischievous than that of her mother who seems to have continued to maintain a vital interest in her college.

No wonder the fascination with the supernatural endures. There have been enough confirmed sightings of "something" or "someone" and enough mysterious sounds that are more than just creaky steps, that even the most diehard skeptic would be hard-pressed to deny that, on occasion, things occur for which there seems to be no logical explanation.

Despite my own fascination with things that go bump in the night, my first message from "the other side" did not arrive until just after the death of my husband. After 14 years of enduring too many medical problems for any one person, Ken died, at the age of 51.

The message came to me shortly after the funeral, delivered by my cousin's husband Crayton, with a noticeable hesitation in his voice. We had returned to my house following the funeral service.

"There is something I must share with you," Crayton said. "While the minister was speaking, I was very aware of something---I don't know how to describe it--but something in the corner of the room. It appeared to rise and fall in rhythm with the minister's words. I don't know what it was but I sensed Ken's presence somehow. When the minister stopped speaking, whatever it was vanished."

Ken's body had been cremated. The remains were in a walnut urn, in the corner of the room described by Crayton.

My friend, Iona, had overheard the conversation.

"It was Ken," she said, matter-of-factly. "You always go to your own funeral."

She is a believer in ghosts and the supernatural and not afraid to admit it.

Crayton, on the other hand, is an engineer by training, a person who looks at things from the viewpoint of a scientist or mathematician, or, at least he did, until that day.

If Ken did appear at his funeral as Iona believed, and he wanted me to know that he was there, he chose well in appearing to Crayton.

One week later, on our daughter's birthday, Ken may have made one additional appearance. I had given his watch to Heidi. She took it off only to shower.

On her birthday, and at precisely the hour of his death, the alarm on his watch sounded. Was that a final birthday gift from her father? We like to think so.

Whether that was a message from the beyond or not, there is plenty of mystery in life, as well as in death.

Consider for a moment the people who have come into your life at one time or another, and then may have moved on but not passed on. Very much alive, these people may have gone elsewhere to impact other lives as they may once have impacted yours or mine.

Such encounters have led me into the needlework business, the judging of figure skating, competitive curling, travel writing and, most recently, to hunt for ghosts and legends in my adopted community of Venice, Florida.

That Venice is not rife with famous haunted houses and other mysteries has made my hunt all the more interesting.

In the process I have learned that Venice is far more than just the Shark Tooth Capital of the World.

Although the prehistoric fossilized sharks teeth are not without mystery, there is far more to the history of this charming little beach town and its citizens who have come here from so many other places and times.

It was a chance meeting with another writer from another place that spawned my fascination with the other history of Venice, the other worldly history.

This first book of ghost stories and legends of Venice is a result of that encounter.

Was it only a chance meeting? I no longer think so.

As you meet some of the kindred spirits of Venice and its neighboring communities within these pages, you may agree.

To the best of my ability, I have related only true and verifiable tales. Some were told to me in the first person and some of the mysteries were reported in the press at the time they occurred. Second hand tales sent me scurrying to my history books and to the city archives in an attempt to find a relationship between the story and some possibly related incident in the history of Venice. Given the preponderance of naysayers in these parts, most of these tales would never have found their way into this book except for the generosity of the story-tellers who were willing to share their tales.

That too is a common thread experienced by those of us who would pass on tales of the other side. Some people are truly afraid to even contemplate the reality of ghosts and want no part of such stories. Others think it is all make believe. Perhaps reality is somewhere in between.

So, fix a pot of tea, curl up in a favorite chair and take a different look at the Shark Tooth Capital of the World, one of the finest planned communities in America, a city that might have become a ghost town more than once except for its spirit—or spirits.

The characters involved in the first story penned, “Don't Call Me Madame,” were actors encountered by me during my early years as a reporter for the Venice Gondolier Sun. Also involved was a youthful drunk driver now serving time in prison for his part in the circumstances that led to the story. The tale was told to me by the Players' actor who experienced the spooky event in the dimly lit theater. It played out during a rehearsal for another show.

Other stories were tied to Venice only because they involved similar occurrences. A story about a mystery lady and a copy machine that churns out multiple sheets of paper after hours and even when turned off, is somewhat similar to the tale of the cowboy ghost in a Venice office park. He too works only late at night.

Then there were stories that were unique to Sarasota, the older of the two cities.

Venice celebrated its 75th birthday in 2000. Sarasota celebrated its 100th birthday the following year.

Venice is a planned community, tracing its history and development to homesteaders, wealthy Chicago widow Bertha Palmer and to the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and city planner John Nolen.

While Palmer was a major landowner in Sarasota County, the city of Sarasota owes more to its Scottish heritage and to John and Charles Ringling of the circus family. And, while city planners have appeared from time to time to place their stamp on the city, no one person or group ever planned the entire city to the degree that Nolen planned Venice.

Instead it almost seems as though there was some sort of magnetic force field that drew certain people to Sarasota at a time when many of their friends were profiting handsomely on the East Coast of the state.

No other city in Florida has earned such a strong reputation for its residents' support of the arts, nor has any other Florida City ever been such a magnet for people in the arts as well as people who appreciate the arts.

Several people with whom I spoke think there is a mystical quality about the area. They spoke of the white sugar sand of Siesta Key's beach, saying it was pulverized crystals and thus imbued with mystical powers. One lady spoke of the important religious rituals conducted by Native Americans long ago on the same site where the Towles Court Artist Colony is located today.

Whether lured by magic crystals, benevolent spirits or other means, the typical resident or visitor to Sarasota is more likely to be a writer or an artist or a musician than his or her counterpart in any other Florida city. The director of the Sarasota County Arts Council credits the development of the arts in Sarasota directly to real estate developer and circus owner John Ringling, founder of the John & Mable Ringling Museum of Art. Ringling's museum was established as a hook to set Sarasota apart from other Florida cities during the land boom of the 1920s. From that museum grew the Asolo Theatre Company, the Sarasota Ballet and the Sarasota Opera. Whenever the initial cultural seed was planted, it was certainly well tended by the Ringlings and all those who have followed them to Sarasota.

As I learned on Feb. 4, 2003, the spirits of many of the people who followed the Ringlings to Sarasota, are still there.

Thanks to Rev. Pat Charnley of the Angel Ministries in Venice and Carole Lee, a medium for the Angel Ministries, Ron McCarty who is known as The Keeper of Ca d'Zan (the John and Mable Ringling mansion), a local TV crew and I were able to connect with the spirits of John and Mable and literally hundreds of their late friends, associates, neighbors and assorted circus performers during a special event at the historic and newly renovated and restored home on that very special evening.

The two lengthiest tales in this book grew out of that private after-hours visit to Ca d'Zan. People with an affinity for the arts have continued to come to Sarasota, even during the city's lean years when the Florida land boom went bust and the Great Depression cast its dark shadows over the whole United States. To this day, the arts remain the city's most powerful lure, even more so than its sugar sand beaches and magical sunsets.

Those people have continued to expand Ringling's vision even as the area from Sarasota to Venice has become known as the Cultural Coast.

Perhaps that is why its spirit and its spirits are different from those of other Florida cities.

There may be ghosts along Sarasota's beaches, but the most interesting specters were discovered right where they were expected to be — in the theatres, the museums, the historic homes and on the sites of sacred Indian lands.

While most West Coast Florida spirits seem to be younger than their East Coast Florida counterparts, a few ancient Indian spirits have continued to watch over their ancestral homes for more than 1,000 years. There also are a few pirate ghosts along the shores of the Gulf of Mexico and some of those are nearly as old as the ghosts of the Spanish explorers who have haunted St. Augustine, the oldest city in America, since the 16th century.

Ghost hunting in Sarasota has been decidedly easier than ghost hunting in the much smaller city of Venice. Yet tracking down these spirits would not have been possible without the help of a number of people, especially Rev. Pat, Carol Lee, Cathleen Carillo, Anne Cederberg, Rilla Fleming, Kelly Fores, Carol Harwood, Jeanne Lambert, Kim Noah, Debbie Perez, Ron McCarty and so many others.

As I continue to “go haunting,” I continue to be grateful for the help and inspiration I have received from my friend and colleague, Charles J. Adams III, one of America's most prolific authors of ghost stories. Watch out St. Petersburg and Tampa, the ghost lady is coming your way next.

Kim Cool
Venice, Florida
June 2003

When Cecil B. DeMille was looking for the perfect place to film the outdoor scenes of his spectacular film, “The Greatest Show on Earth,” it was only natural that he chose Sarasota.

The grand opening scene of the film was filmed in Sarasota,” former Ringling acrobat Alvin Schwartz said. “The parade was filmed in Venice and the train wreck in Sarasota.”

For more than 30 years Sarasota had been the home of the Greatest Show on Earth. The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Even today, the town is home to some 16 circuses that winter in the area.

But, all together, those 16 circuses do not compare with the greatest circus of them all, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus which had been brought to Sarasota originally by John and Charles Ringling in the late 1920s.

“Thank you John Ringling,” animal trainer and Ringling performance director John Herriott said before the 2003 installation ceremonies for the city’s Circus Ring of Fame on St. Armand’s Circle. “If not for him, we would all be living in some very cold place like Pennsylvania or Indiana.”

Or even Baraboo, Wisconsin, which housed the Ringling show briefly after it left Venice and before it returned to Florida.

Herriott is now semi-retired.

Herriott said that he thought there were more circus people living in the Sarasota-Venice area now than at any time since the Ringling show first came to Sarasota.

While he said he has not seen any ghosts, he did speak about the day he revisited the old circus arena in Venice.

“The gate was open and I could see the ring barn,” he said. “It was like something out of the twilight zone.”

After the induction ceremonies, I met dog trainer Dusty Sadler, a performer with the Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. Circus.

Though smaller than the Ringling show, it is considered the largest circus in America that is still performed in a tent. Sadler has had a dog act with the circus for more than one quarter of a century.

Like Herriott, he is happy to be living in Sarasota.

He has a house near the Sarasota Bradenton Airport, in an area where I unearthed a few stories that wound their way into this book. There is no other connection than the location.

Dusty lives in his house with his dog Bailey T and special memories of Toby, his first canine partner in the dog act.

Toby was a Cocker Spaniel with black splotches. Bailey T is nearly identical.

“Toby and I had an act together for eight years,” Dusty said. “Then Toby developed a heart condition and had to retire. She lived another eight years.”

Dusty had her cremated and keeps the cremains in his house, in a special box.

Eventually he got another dog and decided to continue the act. That new dog was Bailey T.

“Bailey T. looks just like Toby,” Dusty said.

One day Dusty was folding napkins in the kitchen.

“There was a Teddy bear design on the napkins,” he said. “except for one napkin. Instead of the bear, it was Toby, with angel wings.”

Right before his eyes, the design had changed. That one napkin had Toby’s face where all the others had Teddy bears.

Dusty folded that napkin very carefully. Cradling it very carefully, he put it in the box with Toby’s cremains.

As it turned out, that was simply the first Toby sighting.

“One night I was at home watching television and I heard a gurgling sound,” he continued. “I have one of those water dishes with a bottle that refills the dish.

“When I heard the gurgling sound, I looked over. There was this clear-liquid-like form of a dog. I could see its head and most of its body and it was drinking from the water dish.

Carole Lee, a Venice medium said that Dusty’s description is consistent with a certain type of spirit.

“Toby was a big water drinker. I sat there stunned, but pleased,” Dusty said.

Dusty has continued to see Toby from time to time.

A few weeks later, he was sure that he had seen Bailey T dash through the kitchen but when he went into the living room, he found Bailey T asleep in a chair.

“It’s like Toby is constantly with me,” Dusty said. “I was so close to that dog.”

Dusty said he is convinced that Toby sent Bailey to him.

“The T in Bailey T’s name is for Toby,” he said.

Obviously Toby was a great believer in that old show business adage, “The show must go on.”

So was Jackie St. Clair, the only living clown to have been honored at The Ring of Fame in Sarasota.

Jackie has fond memories of the cameraderie on the performers in the circus.

He grew up in the circus and especially remembers a night when he was 16 and there was a terrible storm that really shook the tent and scared the daylights out of him.

“What’ll I do, Daddy?” he cried to his father who also was a performer in the Ringling show.

“From then on, every time there was a really bad storm, everyone in the circus would cry, “What’ll I do, Daddy?”

St. Clair said the performers were a very superstitious lot. They would not wear yellow, calling it a Jonah color, but he said they did not talk about ghosts.

“If they ever come back, I hope they come back with the money,” he said.

But if the Ringling ghosts are in Sarasota as many believe then there must be more ghosts than Toby the Cocker Spaniel.

With that thought in mind, I continued to interview circus people in search of the most elusive spirits in Sarasota — the spooks of the big top.

Retired circus performers live all around the area and when they die, they generally remain in the area. Most are laid to rest in cemeteries in Bradenton, Sarasota and Venice.

Karl Wallenda, the great wire walker, was buried in Bradenton after his fatal fall while performing in Puerto Rico on March 22, 1978.

His sister, Jennie Wallenda said that many of the great circus animals are buried on the site of the former Sarasota winter home of the circus, a -acre plot of land that is now home to the Glen Oak Estate development. It is said that in the 1940s, more than 100,000 tourists used to visit Sarasota annually just to see the winter quarters of the circus. That site does have a mystical feeling about it.

Sarasota remains the home of Show Folk of America, the exclusive club for circus performers and fans.

I went there while researching circus stories for Ghost Stories of Venice, proving only what St. Clair said. “Circus performers are a superstitious lot” and they generally do not talk about ghosts.

Perhaps they would not be so reticent if they knew that their former circus priest from the the 1920s remains in Sarasota, dwelling in the shadows at Ca d’Zan, the former home of John and Mable Ringling.

As I've been exploring theaters, I've discovered a wide variety of ghost lights—typically a single light left to illuminate the stage when the theater is not in use. Seeing all the different ghost lights is becoming nearly as much fun as learning new ghost stories. The one at Venice Theatre is pretty basic—sort of an old floor lamp minus a shade. The one at Sarasota Opera House possibly began life the same way but now it has a Sesame Street creature hugging it and, fastened to the stage manager's outpost backstage I found something that looks a lot like dear old St. Christopher, the now-retired traveler's saint.

As I continue to check out theaters, I am going to start asking to see the ghost lights. When there is a show going on, or even a rehearsal, the ghost lights are usually backstage taking a break from their late night duties as protectors of their various stages. Supposedly the first ghost lights were used to deter the ghosts of past plays from reappearing although the most important reason for a ghost light is really safety. Even when the sun is shining, theaters can be dark places and finding the light switch can be a challenge. A ghost light can be very helpful—sort of like an electrical Casper the Friendly Ghost.

Should anyone out there in the blogosphere have a photo of a ghost light in a SW Florida theater, I would love to see it and could possibly work it into the book. Feel free to tell us about your theater's ghost light in the comments below.

Back when I was writing Ghost Stories of Sarasota, I had been told a ghost story about the building. Later, after the book was released, I learned more, but it was up to Rosemary to add to the building’s history.

While the ground floor has always been some sort of theater, the upper floors have been used in many ways—some more interesting than others.

The building began life as the Edwards Theatre, which functioned initially as a vaudeville house and movie theater. Over the years it received it's share of fame. Elvis Presley played there while on his way to the top and The Cecil B. DeMille film, "The Greatest Show on Earth," which had been filmed in Sarasota, had its world premier at the theater.

When the Sarasota Opera was looking for a home, the theater seemed to be a match made in heaven. After a recent $20 million renovation and restoration project, the old theater is better than ever. It has a new glass skylight above its grand lobby, a larger orchestra pit, state of the art technical systems and, it seems, some additional residents of the ethereal variety.

When I began researching the theater book, I envisioned writing something shorter than my other books. I didn't expect to find as many ghost stories for theaters as I had for cities and towns, but apparently my expectations were wrong. Southwest Florida is rife with theaters, and not just along the Cultural Coast.

Not only are there more spirits in many of the theaters than are typical in other buildings, it seems there are simply far more theaters than I'd realized. My goal has now expanded. I want to find every one of them and hope people out there in the blogosphere will help. The goal is to find every professional and community theater on the Southwest coast of Florida, from the Greater Tampa, St. Pete area south to Marco Island. I have all the theaters listed with the American Association of Community Theatres and all the Equity houses. What I do not have are the smaller drama troops that may perform in a church or community center. The murder-mystery troops that may perform in a restaurant are also fair game. Ghost do not necessarily remain in one place.

If you have contact information for such a theater or drama group or know a ghost story pertaining to such a theater and would care to share it, please submit it below. I look forward to hearing from you.

Before my friend Rosemary Altea, the world famous spiritual medium, headed back north for the summer, she came ghost hunting with me to Fort Myers, which seems to be quite spirited.

At the Edison-Ford Winter Estates, it was not surprising that she spotted Mina Edison. In the inventor's former lab, something drew her attention to one of the work areas at the far end of the room and then, on the second floor of the Ford house, she discovered the mistress of that manor, a vivacious woman who had such an extraordinary life in that house that she seems to have decided to stay.

This brought back shades of Ca d'Zan, the former winter home of John and Mable Ringling in Sarasota. I have lost count of the number of times I have been there with various mediums. Each time they tune in to John and Mable and often, they also meet up with Emily, John’s second wife. On other occasions, I have had the opportunity to be in the house with members of one or another paranormal society. One of them returned with a recording made on one of those evenings. The investigator played it several times for us, offering it as proof of the presence of one of the ladies who once lived in the house.

Similar paranormal groups have been contacting other sites, requesting permission to visit late at night with their equipment to see if they can come up with electronic proof that ghosts exist.

Somehow I think the increasing numbers of these societies may be more interesting than their actual findings.

Bus tour of haunted places in and around Venice and Englewood Lunch at Goldrush Restaurant (said to be haunted) Dessert in afternoon at Luna Ristorante (also haunted) $75 includes, bus tour, lunch, dessert and copy of the newest book from Historic Venice Press - "Ghost Stories of Venice Old & New"

To register, call:
St. Petersburg College
Lifelong Learning
727-341-3184
727-341-3185

Kim Cool will sign copies of all her Florida-themed books (history, ghosts and roads less traveled from SW Florida to Orlando and beyond).

Arts, crafts and BOOKS! at Phillippi Estate Park
5500 South Tamiami Trail, Sarasota *Sponsored by Historical Society of Sarasota County

Listen to Kim Cool on the Cliff Roles Show.