Spooks, stories and specters
Tales of ghosts and spooks will entertain guests who visit West Overton Museums during the Haunted Village tours being held Friday through Sunday.
Taking a page from the history of the village, guides this year will enlighten visitors of legends and tales of strange sightings and sounds that have occurred within the village limits.
"We're going to focus on the stories that are in our book," said volunteer Mary Ann Mogus. She is referring to the recently released "Weird West Overton."
Mogus collaborated with Ed and Brendan Keleman on the book, which is in its second printing.
The tour will be broken into 10 stations, where visitors will stop, look and listen.
"The guides will take people around to each station set up throughout the village," Mogus said.
The tour will begin at the summer kitchen, with West Overton volunteers offering apple cider and cookies.
It will proceed across the main house grounds to the Overholt house and continue onto the back cemetery. After a visit to the stock barn and the surrounding areas, the visitors are then invited to the distillery for a Halloween party.
Visitors will be treated to stories of spirits that have been spotted in different areas throughout the village.
"These are stories from visitors and from the staff," Mogus said. "And the re-enactors who have stayed here have seen things over the years."
In addition to the ghostly walking tour, visitors are welcomed to settle in for scary storytelling. The winning short stories submitted to the "Flash Fiction" writing contest will be read aloud in the distillery.
The contest was sponsored by the Ligonier Valley Writers group. This year's subject was "Vampires."
There will be a photo presentation that will run continually. It includes photographs taken in the village by guests and employees, many showing unknown images.
Museum and Halloween themed items will be available for purchase in the distillery. "Weird West Overton" books and T-shirts will be sold as fundraising items for West Overton.
A new route and location pattern was designed to allow the least amount of road exposure as possible.
"We are making this as safe as possible," Mogus said. "We want people to have fun visiting the stations, then come back to the distillery where they can sit and relax and listen to stories. It'll be nice and it will be fun."
The tours will be from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. and will last about 40 minutes. Price for the ghost walk is $10 for adults and $6 for children age 12 and younger. For information, call 724-887-7910.
