Ghost Stories and Mysterious Creatures of British Columbia

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

Each of these volumes in the Lone Pine Publishing series of ghost
stories is an eerily interesting collection of paranormal phenomena
across northwestern North America. While each records mysterious events
of a similar nature, each also contains unexplained incidents indigenous
to its own geographic region, and each is an entertaining read.

More Ghost Stories of Saskatchewan catalogues 48 inexplicable
occurrences in over 30 locations ranging from the major centres of
Regina and Saskatoon; to smaller communities such as Weyburn, Prince
Albert, Estevan, Kindersley, and Yorkton; to various villages and even
farmer’s fields. The entries range from brief reports of ghostly
clankings, levitated objects, or flickering light bulbs to well-wrought
tales such as that of NWMP Inspector Cecil Denny’s retrocognitive
encounter with an encampment of Cree Indians, or of a vengeful corpse
returning to poison her unfaithful husband and his lover. Christensen
has also included 22 brief snippets about UFO sightings in Saskatchewan
skies.

Ghost Stories and Mysterious Creatures of British Columbia is a
compilation of 82 examples of the mystical folklore pervading the Rocky
Mountains from northern Alberta and British Columbia through to New
Mexico. Smith’s compelling catalogue includes mysteries and
misfortunes in mines, ranches, opera houses, saloons, and cemeteries, on
roadways and railways, and at disasters such as the Frank Slide in
Alberta. Some spectral sightings like the bride at the Banff Springs
Hotel or the combatants at the Little Bighorn Battlefield site still
occur. In her informative and interesting introductions, the author
discusses ghosts, poltergeists the altered states of “precognition”
and “retrocognition.”

Ghost Stories of the Rocky Mountains recounts over 60 paranormal events
across British Columbia, including such classics as the Dunsmuir ghosts
at Craigdarroch and Hartley Castles in Victoria, the ghosts at Hat Creek
Ranch, the Quesnel Museum’s possessed doll, the haunting of Carr House
by Emily Carr’s mother, the Blue Lady of Victoria’s Point Ellice
House, and the Barkerville apparitions. In addition to stories of dry
land phantoms of the lower mainland and the B.C. interior, there are
several tales of ships and sailors who, although lost at sea, continue
to be seen and heard. Sightings of British Columbia’s indigenous
Sasquatch and Ogopogo are also included, as are several UFO spottings.