Is the Ghost Town of Calico Truly Haunted?

In a proclamation signed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2005, the town of Calico actually became the Official State Silver Rush Ghost Town. Another old mining town, named Bodie a little further north along the 395, became known as the Official State Gold Rush Ghost Town.

Not sure where the Official State Bronze, Tin or Recycled Beer Can Ghost Towns are, but we will keep looking fervently. Actually, I’m not going to bother to look – except a recycled beer can ghost town could be fun. Probably a lot of happy spirits reside there. 

 With Halloween just around the corner, we wanted to see if there’s any truth to how haunted this once bustling mining town of Calico really was. Of course, when visiting such places in search of the paranormal, it is crucial never to trespass or do anything else which may be considered illegal or in poor taste. 

 An example of illegal would be, breaking and entering supposed haunted buildings, houses or other property. In poor taste, would be running down the street with a sheet over your head, screaming for ghosts to show themselves.

Of course, that may even be considered crazy. There are some pretty interesting hauntings going on in the little burg of Calico. I mean really interesting in the realm of: “OMG, there’s a ghosty right there. I can’t wait to Instagram my friends with this selfie, well, after I post what I had for lunch, of course.”

Laureen and I decided to take our four legged wards on an overnight camping trip to the historical 1881 silver mining town, but not before I made a sensible suggestion. “You know, we can leave them home. They are dogs, after all.” 

 Laureen looked at me solemnly. “They’ll miss us.” 

“For five minutes, and then they’ll be sleeping and drooling all over the furniture.” 

We loaded our four beasts into the motorhome, and we were off for the short jaunt to Calico. 

The San Bernardino County Park has plenty of spaces for camping large rigs, not so large rigs, tents, and even cabins for rent. Some guests haul out their off road toys and enjoy cruising the hills behind Calico looking at this or that. 

 When looking at this or that though, be mindful that there are open vertical mine shafts – those are the ones that go straight into the earth. 

Some of these old mines are not safe and very deep. So deep, that I’ve heard in one of them, colonies of trolls live, waiting for an unsuspecting off-roader to miscalculate and end up as a troll entre for dinner.

But seriously, when cruising anywhere abandoned mines are located – extreme caution should always be used. I travel off road a lot and am always on the lookout for dangerous road or trail conditions – and also groups of trolls. 

 So, we arrived at our camp site, set up everything, and made sure the doggies were well taken care of inside the motorhome – water, food, air conditioning, blinds closed, and Jimmy Buffet playing softly in the background. 

 The dogs had it so good, I wanted to stay and have a cold one, while listening to Margaretville. 

But Laureen was adamant. “Listen here, Buster. We’ve got ghosts to find.” 

 Funny thing, when we hit town, everyone wanted to talk to us about how haunted the place is. 

Mr. Anonymous had great stories to tell us. Ms. Anonymous had even better stories to tell us. Baby Anonymous had by far the greatest of all the stories. Sounds like something out of the Goldilocks fairy tale. 

Actually, when people talk about ghosts, unless they are high paid television paranormal types, they don’t want their name used in public. 

 “They’ll think I’m crazy,” stated a woman wearing a tin foil hat. 

 “I doubt you believing in ghosts will be the giveaway,” I replied. 

One story we heard about was a little girl who haunted the wooden bridge which spans a deep gulley near the one room schoolhouse.

The old school house located in Calico Ghost Town

Seems, as the tale goes, back in the late 1880’s, a school teacher had a young daughter – maybe ten or eleven years old. 

One day, tragically, the girl fell off a high cliff near the bridge and perished from her injuries. Ever since then, people claim this girl wanders the location of the bridge, talking to children. What she is saying, is very sad but sweet. 

According to many we spoke with, the ghostly little girl is warning the children to stay on the bridge, and to be careful about falling down the steep sides of the ravine. 

 Stranger, only children see her. Adults have had their children tell them that a young girl, dressed in a long white dress with a white bonnet, has been scolding them about the dangers of not looking when running and playing. Parents look, but to no avail. The ghost who cares is gone. 

 “Even my friends this year, told me their kids said this little girl approached them, warned them and then just disappeared,” Mr. “I don’t want to be identified” stated. 

And no, this person was not donning a tin foil hat. 

We walked across that bridge a thousand times. 

No ghostly apparition of a tyke in period clothing. I even crossed it a few times on my knees to make myself look smaller, in case I could outsmart the girl. No such luck, but, just because we adults didn’t see her, doesn’t mean she doesn’t exist. 

 “You have got to check out Hank’s Hotel.” Someone stated. 

“That place is really haunted. Doors slam shut when there is no wind. Things get tossed across the rooms. People used to stay there, but by dark, they were heading for their cars.” 

 “Really?” I asked. 

 “Would I lie to you?” 

 “I don’t know. You won’t even tell me your name.”

Hank's Hotel, supposedly haunted in Calico Ghost Town

The hotel was locked. 

Laureen and I peered through the windows. Nothing slammed. No things were thrown around the rooms. But that doesn’t mean the place isn’t haunted. 

 Another person with no name, told us that some shops in town have poltergeists. Those are the angry, or misunderstood ghosts that like to throw items at people, hitting them and sometimes causing injury. 

We walked through every store that was open, and the only thing which got hit, was my wallet. 

A store means purchasing in Laureen’s world. 

 The cemetery. Now, that had to be haunted. All those souls on boot hill. They couldn’t have been happy, and probably spent the evenings wandering around complaining to each other.

A cemetery plot in Calico Ghost Town

When it was plenty dark, we carefully and respectfully wandered the tombstones. 

Laureen thought she saw an eerie light floating toward us. 

Nope, just other tourists looking for a close encounter with a being from the after-life. 

 Is Calico haunted? Could be – but just not on our visit. But perhaps, if you drive out there – it just may be.

John can be reached at: Beyersbyways@gmail.com

Dinosaurs in the Desert

After spending a quiet Sunday afternoon watching, or to be more exact, re-watching Jurassic Park, two issues were quite apparent. Being a leisurely Sunday afternoon meant not really thinking too deeply into this marvelous film adapted from the novel by Michael Crichton, but two points did resonate with J.

First, there were no T-Rexes during the Jurassic Period (which was roughly 145 million to about 200 million years ago). The Tyrannosaurus existed during the Cretaceous period around 66 – 145 million years ago, probably more like 66 to 68 million years ago. The reason the film was named Jurassic instead of Cretaceous was probably the sound – Jurassic has a better ring than Cretaceous and really, how many people could pronounce that era anyway.

Hollywood has a license and that license is known as a poetic one. And that is defined as - the freedom to depart from the facts of a matter or from the conventional rules of language when speaking or writing in order to create an effect.

In other words – they lie, but as professional writers we at J and L prefer to call it ‘embellishing’ the facts. A lie is such a nasty turn of phrase.

The second point was that not all dinosaurs are gone from this earth. In fact, in Southern California, a sleepy little area known as Cabazon, there exist two behemoths just north of Interstate 10. That stretch of asphalt is the home of both an Apatosaurus and a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Both of these creatures roamed the globe during the Cretaceous Period when the earth in which they resided was warm and tropical. They flourished for millions of years until, according to most scientists, a huge asteroid decided to play bumper pool with the earth down in the Yucatan about 65 million years ago. Large clouds of dust blew up into the atmosphere blocking sunlight for nearly two years which killed off the herbivores and then when they perished, the carnivores, having no food source, were next.

Only certain land dwelling creatures still existed after the tragic present sent to earth from outer space - primarily rats but let's not talk about politicians.

Claude K. Bell at the beginning of Dinny

The two large dinosaurs are actually the creation of Claude K. Bell who had a restaurant named the 'Wheel Inn Restaurant' in Cabazon. The restaurant started in 1958 and made it all the way to its closure in 2013. Bell decided from his time as a sculptor and portrait artist for Knott's Berry Farm, that what he needed was  a little sideshow to draw more customers to the restaurant. With that in mind, he started working on Dinny the Apatosaurus  (Dinny, short for dinosaur) in 1964. And Dinny was a huge undertaking. She measures 156 feet in length and 45 feet in height. That is one big old dinosaur. It took nearly twelve years to complete the steel framed sprayed concrete colossus, at a cost of $300,000. Dinny is hollow inside, with a steep staircase upon which the hearty can troop up into the belly of the herbivore and shop for trinkets while learning a little of the history of this tourist attraction.

The completed project - well not really

This concept of Bell's worked very well and business boomed - thus part of the reason the restaurant was a success for 55 years. Of course, Bell wasn't done with Dinny alone - no, the T-Rex was next. But Rex wasn't started until 1981. Today this prehistoric beast stands 65 feet tall. It had a slide for a tail, but that didn't last long, and it was filled in with concrete. Rex stands watch gazing southward toward the Interstate and watching the visitors who pay tribute to a creation by a very talented and patient artist by the name of Claude K. Bell.

That's one big dude, er dudette!

Unfortunately, Bell passed away in 1988, and so his dream of a Woolly Mammoth and prehistoric garden never came to fruition.

"Oh Yeah - I'm bad to the bone," yells Mr. Rex

The land and everything Bell had built was sold by his heirs in the 1990's to a partnership which received approval from the city of Cabazon to erect a motel, restaurant, and other financially sound ideas for the rest stop. The area is now known as a 'creationists dream' where evolution is poo-pooed and a museum located near the dinosaurs explains their belief.

Here at J and L will not go into this area but all views are valued and must be looked at on their own merit. It is up to the people reading explanations and doing research on their own to come up with the truth they desire to believe in. But, we thought it was an important aspect to add to this blog.

So, there after an afternoon of watching a film about dinosaurs chasing and eating people around a fictitious island the idea of Cabazon came into J's mind.  And it so happened that J and L's travelling buddy Paul Bakas had been on a recent trip with them and stopped to investigate these giants looming over the skyline of Cabazon.

The really positive side of this is that there are no Raptors running loose - if there had been, no stopping by this research team would have occurred.

No taking sides at J and L - that would be too much to bite off

On a side note and an important one - Dinny and Mr. Rex are celebrities. They had made appearances in the 1985 comedy - Pee Wee's Big Adventure, in the 1985 music video for Tears for Fears - Everybody Wants to Rule the World, in 1988 on the album cover for Notes from the Lost Civilization by Tonio K's and numerous other documentaries, music albums/videos and the like. The two are as famous as perhaps the original ones during the Cretaceous period - yeah, and not the Jurassic Period.

Attention - this tram will not be stopping any time soon