Legends;]]> legend-tripping;]]> Sandra L. Shaw
Utah State University
Fife Folklore Archives
Logan, Utah
English 423
Instructor: Wilson
Summer 1984
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LEGENDS OF ST. ANNE"S RETREAT
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Sandra L. Shaw
Logan, Utah
Utah State University
American Folklore
Summer, 1984
T ABLE OF CONT ENTS
Cover Essay • • • • . . . . . . . i • Autobiographical Sketch . . . . . . . . . •• vi
Item if Informant Title
I. Hekeda at St. Anne's Retreat
1 Rich, R. The Deer Lady
2 Richardson, D. The Jealous Nun
3 Ferrin, R. Drowning Babies
4 Ferrin, R. Disappearing Keys
5 Alder, E. Freezing Nuns
6 Hardman, L. Hedeka and Her Dogs
7 Neeley, A. S. Hook Lady
8 Jensen, S. The Lynching Mob
II. Modern Day Experiences at St. Anne's Retreat • 9 Jensen, S. Scratched Paint Job
10 Hardman, L. Barking Dogs
11 Hoth, J. Clean and Dirty Swinuning Pool
III. Other Hauntings of St. Anne's Retreat
12 Allred, J. Mass Murderer
13 Nelson, J. Haunted Retreat
14 Budge, L. Pregnant Nun
15 Sinunons, P. Fighting Nuns
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Cover Essay
I have grown up in Log~ and because I know so many people from the area
I decided to focus on something that I could collect from my friends. I
thought of things that were common to most Logan High School graduates
and St. Anne's retreat immediately came to mind. It has always intrigued
me because I had never heard a story before that explained in detail why
it was such a scary place. I had heard rumors that nuns had been killed
at the retreat, but I had always wondered about the details. I thought
it was amazing that such a thing could happen in Logan Canyon because it
was so out of the ordinary for a place like Cache Valley to have a murder
take place.
I have ~een up to St. Anne's a couple of times when I was in high
school, and I knew that other people had often gone up there too. I had
been scared each time I had gon~ and I was also very curious about where
and why the stories had originated. I thought that there must have been
some incident that had started the telling of the legends, and I was
very curious to know if there was any truth to them. I had always thought
that nuns were interesting and mysterious, and this added to my. desire to
find out more about the legend of St. Anne's.
As I learned about folklore, I began to notice that legends like the
one about St. Anne's were not just found in Cache Valley, but allover the
country. I realized that being scared was a favorite pastime of many
people, and even such small towns as Mink Creek had someplace that was
considered haunted. I found that people, especially high school kids, .~
would tell scary stories about a certain place, and then go there to
get scared or carry out some tradition to bring a ghost out. The stories
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usually dealt with some kind of restless ghost haunting the place because
of a sudde~ violent death.
After I had chosen my topic, I began collecting by asking people if
they knew any stories about St. Anne's Retreat. The easiest place to
collect, although it was somewhat ironic, was at church on sunday. I attend
a young adult L.D.S. ward, whose members are mostly people who have graduated
from Logan High School. I would ask as many people as possible if they
knew anything about St. Anne's, and then I would wtite their name down and
call them later to get the full details. This was an easy way to go through
a large number of people without much effort.
I later collected by calling informants on the telephone, and then
writing down what they were saying as quickly and as accurately as I could.
I tried to use the words that the informant had used, but I edited the un­necessaJY
words. I put down the idea of what the person told me, and used
the more original words in their narration. Some of the informants had
a hard time remembering the stories, and would tell me a few circumstances
out of order. For these items (#2,11,15) I put the circumstances in a
story form, however most of the items were told in story form.
I classified all of the items as legends, and then I ~anged them
according to theme. From each informant I collected their place of birth,
age, education, religion, and ancestry. I asked each informant a variety
of questions about the circustances in which they heard the story, and I
also asked them what they thought of the story. These questions included
such things as: whether or not they believed the story, if it scared them,
if they had been to the retreat, why they thought that people told the
legends, did they like the story, and why were nuns used in the stories •
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The answers to these questions enabled me to better evaluate the
p~Tpose of the legends and the reasons why people tell them. Most of
the informants thought that reasons for telling the storieses were for
fun, excitement, and thrills. While I was doing this project, I realized
that people love the excitement that goes along with being scared, and
they tell these stories in order to get that excitement. Some people
believed that the legends originated because something really did happen
at St. Anne's Retreat which spa'DkEid the telling of these stories. I do not
know if a murder took place at St. Anne's, but I think that something
mysterious might have happened at the retreat. Another reason for the
stories could be the intriguing qualities that nuns have to an L.D.S.
community like Logan. Few mormons understand nuns, and because of this,
people might have begun to tell stories about them to express their fears
of the unknown. They could have begun as warning stories to young people
to keep them from going up the canyon late at night. This theory is
ironic because telling such legend causes young people to become curious,
and they desire to go to the retreat to find out if it realily is haunted.
Most of the people I interviewed had been to the retreat.
I felt the , comment made by informant if 8, "people tell stories about
St. Anne's because it adds excitement to an otherwise normal place," was
an ,',insightful comment about St. Anne's. It is an ordinary retreat, but
because pe0ple have built up such a significant tradition of legends about
it, it has become an infamous landmark to a large number of Cache Valley
residents. I asked many people if they could tell me a story about St.
Anne's, and most of them could not give me a detailed story about it, but
they had heard of it, and they' knew that legends did exist about it. It
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is amazing that so many people know that St. Anne's even exists. Because
they do know, I think that a conclusion about human nature can be drawn.
People like to talk about the infamous, tragic, mysterious, and sensational,
otherwise the legend of St. Anne's would have died out long ag~ along with
many of the other legend that exist allover the world.
Many of the informants had heard the story at girl's camp where it
is traditional to sit aroung the campfire telling ghost stories. Most of
the other informants heard the story at a party where there was a large
group of people. This shows that people like to talk about the supernatural.
They like to think about those things that are out of the ordinary because
they may feel that their own lives are very normal and relatively unexciting.
Because they do not know what the lifestyle of a nun is like, they may thi nk
that a nun has a more exciting life than they do, especially if she has
a big black dog or a haunted swimming pool nearby.
I think that people receive a superioTity; by talking about these kinds
of things. First, they are eager to pity someone else other than themselves,
and they are also relieved that such a terrible thing didn't happen to
them. They can vicariously experience the fear that the legendary characters
have felt when they visit the retreat, but they feel the security of having
a group of friends with them. They also have the security of knowing that
other people have gone up to the retreat before them and made it back altve.
This gives the person a chance to feel superior to the figures in the
legends, and may enable the person to feel better about themselves.
The variations on the legend are so numerous that it is almost
impossible to come up with an all inclusive story. The nuns are usually
a significant part of the legends, and the black dogs, and empty swimming
pool are often mentioned. These three it~s allow the storyteller to add
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unusual details to their story that will make it more interesting. The
purpose of these stories is significant because they do offer a c~~ce for
the listener to escape from an ordinary life and think about the extraordinary.
Because they are somewhat believable, the stories are exciting and fun to
hear. They are an interesting and exciting way of entertaing people.
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Autobiographical Sketch
I was born on July 25, 1964, in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I grew up in
Logan, Utah. Both of my parents were raised in Ogden, Utah. I have one
older brother, and one older sister. Both -:of them are married, and I
have been the only child living at home with my parents for about seven
years.
For many years my dad worked for Grand Teton National Park during the
summer months as a naturalist. Our family enjoys hiking and camping together.
We enjoy mountains and wilderness because we spent so much time togetether
in the Tetons. We often sat around a campfire and talked until late at
night. I don't remember hearing any ghost stories, but I do remember
hearing jokes and bear stories. During the rest of the year my father
teaches botany at USU.
I have lived in Logan all of my life. I went to Hillcrest Elementary
School, Logan Junior High School, and Logan Senior High School. I am now
attending USU where I have changed my major from computer science to nursing.
I was recently accepted into the WSC/USU nursing program. I will graduate
in 1986 with an associate degree in nursing, and I hope to go on to get
my bachelor's degree •
I am an active member of the L.D.S. Church. My hobbies include
sewing, crosstitch, photography, playing the piano, hiking, and skiing.
I work for the USDA Poisonous Plant Lab in the Plant Industry Building
at USU analyzing poisonous plants •
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Item if 1
"The Deer Lady"
Informant Data:
Robert Rich
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Robert Rich, 22, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. He is an active
member of the L.D.S. Church, and he served a mission to Japan. His
ancestry is English. He is a sophomore at U.S.U. majoring in civeil
engineering. He likes skiing, phoography, and sports.
Contextual Data:
Robert heard this story at a high school party at St. Anne's. He
didn't believe the story, and it didn't scare him. He liked the story
because it scared everybody else. He thinks that people tell the St.
Anne's story because it is scary to alot of people, and it brings about
a scary atomosphere. Robert thinks it is fun to be scared, and he likes
to tell scary stories.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Julian was the most beautiful lady in all of Logan. She was working
at a bottling plant to get enough money to get married. One day as she
was working, her beautiful long hair got caught in a machine and pulled
her in, scarring and mangling her face. Her hand was cut off, and a hook
was put in its' place. Her fiancee refused to marry her, and the towns-people
made fun of her ugly features. Angered and discouraged, she changed
her name to Hekeda and moved up the canyon to live. As she watched young,
pretty couples corne up the canyon, she got a wonderful idea of revenge.
She attacked the couples and scarred and mangled the girls. She couldn't
be caught because she could run as fast as a deer, and she knew trails
and shortcuts in the woods that no one else knew of. Sometimes, even
today, you can still see her running in her white nightgown with her hook
hand glistening in the moonlight.
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Item # 2
"The Jealous Nun"
Informant Datal
Darci Richardson
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Darci Richardson, 19, was born in Wisconsin and raised in Logan, Utah.
She is a sophomore in elementary education at U.S.U., and she enjoys
playing the piano, bicycling, and talking. She is an active memeber of
the L.D.S. Church.
Contextual Data:
Darci heard this story at girl's camp. She was very scared when she
heard the story, and she believes that nuns did get killed at St. Anne's,
but she doesn't believe the rest of the story. She has been to the retreat,
and she was scared when she went. She thinks that everyone wants to tell
their own story about St. Anne's because it is fun and entertaining. She
believes it was a Catholic Retreat, and she is curious to know if any of
the story is true. She thinks that people go up to the retreat to showoff
and to satisfy tpeir curiosity.
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The pregnant nuns were sent up to St. Annes. One of the nuns, named
Hekeda was having an affair with the male caretaker. She became jealous
when the other nuns talked to hi~ so she killed all of the nuns. The dogs
barked when she murdered the nuns, and when you go up there now you can
hear them barking and see their green eyes shining •
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Item II 3 & 4
"Drowning Babies" & "Disappearing Keys"
Informant Data:
Rosalie Ferrin
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Rosalie Ferrin, 18, was born and raised in Logan, Utah, She is a
freshman at U.S.U. majoring in communications. She recently graduated
from Logan High, where she was the validictorian of her class. She was
also honored as "Miss Logan." She is an active member of the L.D.S. Church,
and she enjoys dancing, sleeping, and just "hanging out.-
Contextual Data:
She heard both of these stories at girl's camp when they were sitting
around a campfire telling ghost stories. She does not believe the stories
are true, and she thinks that they are told to keep up the tradition of
telling stories. She believes that everyone changes the legends about
St. Anne's, and tells them the best that they can remember them.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
The nuns used to go up there when they got pregnant, and they would
have their babies. Then they would drown them in the swimming pool and
bury them. He~eda was a nun who got caught drowning her baby, and she
got in trouble with her priest. She stays at the retreat to haunt other
nuns who try to drown their babies.
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This is supposed to have happened to someone when they went up to
St. Anne's. They drove their car up there, parked it, and turned off
the lights. They put t}h::>lirr car keys on the top of the car to bring Witch
Hekeda down. A light shone on the car and the car keys disappered. They
couldn't leave St. Anne's without their keys, and they never retruned home •
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Item IF 5
"Freezing Nuns"
Informant Data:
Elise Alder
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Elise Alder, 19, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She is of Swiss
and Welch ancestry and active in the L.D.S. Church. She is a sophomore
in elementary education at U.S.U •• She likes to play with children, do
handwork, sew and care for plants. She works at Carousel Square as a food
worker.
Contextual Data:
Elise thinks she heard this story at a slumber party with all of her
girlfriends. She said they would tell scary stories and stay up all night
because they were so scared. They liked to talk about the supernatural.
She thought that if they talked about evil things long enough, something
evil would happen to them. She believed that nuns were used in the story
because they were mysterious, and nobody knew what the lifestyle of a nun
was like. She didn't think it was to put down Catholics, but to play up
the devil. She doesn't belive the storiesi but she and her girlfriends
were very scared by them because they thought something evil could happen
to them.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
St. Anne's was a place where nuns could go on a vacation, usually
in the summer or winter. One winter a long time ago; some nuns' went up-,
there to stay. It was a very s1!V~e winter with lots of snow so a man had
to bring their supplies to them every week. He would take their fuel and
food to them because it was the only way they could get it. One week the
man couldn't get his wagon through, and he had to wait about two weeks
before he could go up there again. He finally made it up to the retreat,
and he found all the nuns had starved and frozen to death. He noticed
that their bodies had been chewed by dogs. He was very wo~ried about this,
and was just leaving when he saw one of the nuns, whose name was Hekeda.
She began chasing him with her two dogs. He got away and told the towns-people
what had happened. Hekeda still haunts the retreat with her dogs,
and you can see her chasing you in your rearview mirror as you are leaving •
It is believed she is of the devil.
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Item fI 6
"Hekeda and Her Dogs"
Informant Data:
Larry Hardman
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Larry Hardman, 22, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. He is of
Anglo-saxon and Danish ancestry. He is active in the L.D.S. Church, and
he served a mission in London. He is a sophomore majoring in business
at U.S.U. He likes sports, writing, and exercising.
Contextual Data:
His friend told him this story one evening when they were bored and
trying to think of something to do. His friend wanted to take some girls
up to St. Anne's and scare them. Larry hadn't heard of St. Anne's before
so he was told this story. He thinks the story is a good one because he
believes it to be partially true. He said that he read in the local news­paper
th~t there actually were some nuns who were killed up there. He
also likes the name Hekeda because it is a good, scary name. He used b
go up to the retreat often when he was in high school. He liked to go
up there to get scared, and showoff how brave he was. He would take girls
there to scare them and protect them.
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All the nuns and mother superior lived at St. Anne's. One of the
nun's name was Hekeda, and she took care of seven afghan hounds. In the
early 1920's a guy went up there and killed and raped them all. All of
the bodies were found except Hekeda's and the dog's. Every time someone
goes up to St. Anne's to fix it up, they always hear dogs barking, and
then see a lantern'on the mountain. You can see the figure of a woman
walking her dogs up there at night. If you yell the name Hekeda three
time~ a blue fog will cover your car, and you won't be able to come down
out of the canyon •
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Item # 7
"Hook Lady"
Informant Datal
Angela Sue Neeley
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Angela Sue Neeley, 20, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She is
of English ancestry and active in the LDS Church. She is a senior at
U.S.U. majoring in elementary education. She enjoys skiing, writing
letters, reading, and crosstitch.
Contextual Data:
She was at girl's camp in Logan Canyon sitting around a fire telling
scary stories when one of the girls told about St. Anne's. She said that
everyone got scared, especially since they were so close to the retreat.
She was very scared, but she still wanted to go to the retreat for the
adventure of it. She thinks being scared when you are in a big group is
fun because you can all hold hands and scream. She thinks the stories
are told for fun, for a reaction, and for scaring people. She has gone
up there a couple of times with friends, and she kept watching for Hekeda
all the way home. She was so scared one time, that she wet her pants.
She doesn't believe the story is true, but it does scare her. She says
she wants to believe the story for fun.
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The most beautiful woman in logan was in an accident while she was
working, and she got caught in some machinery. Her hand was cut off and
her face was marred. She had to we-ar a hook on her hand, and she lives up
at St. Annes. She gets revenge on beautiful girls. Some girls were
found floating the the swimming pool, and they had scraped necks from
Hekeda's hook. If you go up to the retreat . and bother Hekeda, she will
follow you home at night and scratch on your window •
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Item /I 8
''The Lynching Mob"
Informant Data:
Steve Jensen
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Steve Jensen, 21, was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and .lraised in Logan.
He is majoring in Pre-med at U.S.U. where he is currently a junior. His
ancestry is Finnish and English, and he is an active member of the L.D.S.
Church. His hobbies include sports, and horseback riding.
Contextual Datal
Steve heard the first item from a friend, who told him the story,
when they went up to St. Anne's Retreat one day. He later asked his
parents if the story was true, and they told him it was, but they were
on vacation when it happened. He didn't think the story was scary, but
he thought it was amusing in a gory sort of way. He doesn't believe the
story is true, but he thinks it sounds possible, however it is hard for
him to beleive that something like that would happen in Utah without
everybody knowing about it.
The second item was told to him by his brother when they were taking
dates up there. The dates had heard about St. Anne's, but they had never
seen it. The dates wanted to see the place and hear about it. This story
scared Steve because it was more modern, but he didn't believe it.
Steve thinks that people tell stories about St. Anne's because it
adds excitement to an otherwise normal place. He believes that nuns are
used because the retreat was owned by the Catholic Curch. He doesn't
like to get scared, but he does like adventure.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
This actually happened sometime in the early sixties. St. Anne's
was a vacation area, and there were about twelve or thirteen nuns up there
when one of them went bezerk. She just went bonkers. She had been training
these four Black Labs, which she had gotten from Hekeda, to kill. She
kept them in a woodshed on the mountainside, and one night she let the
dogs loose. She got a lantern and a hatchet, and she and her dogs slaughtered
all of the nuns. Time passed and nothing was discovered until someone
made a delivery to the retreat. The person who found the dead nuns went
back to Logan and got a bunch of people together. This mob of people
went up to St. Anne'~ and they found the crazy nnn, and they decided to
hang her. They gave her the chance to speak her last words, and she said,
"I will forever haunt this place." She still haunts St. Anne's today.
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Item it 9
"Scratched Raint Job"
Steve Jensen
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
About eight years ago, four high school guys drove up to St. Anne's.
They were just goofing around, and they thought all of the stories about
St. Anne's were just a joke. -They had a ouija board with them, and they
started saying stuff like, "St. Anne, come and get us. Come here St. Anne."
All of a sudden they heard dogs barking, but they couldn't see them. This
scared the~ so they got in their car and locked the doors. They were
just sitting in the car when the heard scratching noises allover their
car, but they couldn't see anything. They started to drive away, and they
looked out their back window. They saw a woman standing there with four
Black Labrador dogs, and she had a lantern in one hand and a hatchet in
her other hand. When they got down out of the canyon, they found that
the car was all scratched up, and the guy who owned it had to pay $200.00
to get a new paint job.
*Notes Informant and contextual data are found on the previous page.
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Item if 10
"Barking Dogs"
Informant Datal
Lucy Hardman
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Lucy Hardman, 24, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She is a
senior at U.S.U. majoring in art. She is active in the L.D.S. Church,
and she served a mission to Kansas. She does volunteer work at a preschool
for handicapped children, and she enjoys sports, ceramics, and sewing.
She likes to tease people, and she has a fun sense of humor.
Contextual Datal
Lucy told me this story as a personal experience which happened to
her when she was in high school. She believes the legend of St. Anne's,
and she believes that there really were dogs chasing her and her friends.
I don't know if she was teasing me when she told me that she believed the
story or not. She loves to be scared,and she thinks that is why people
tell scary stories. She doesn't believe that nun stories are told only
in Cache Valley, but allover the world.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Lucy and her friend were driving around the canyon one fall night
when it was really nice and warm, and they decided to go to St. Anne's.
There were three guys who wanted to go, and three girls who didn't want
to go. Since the boys were driving, they went. They parked the car by
the highway, and began walking up the dirt road. On the way, one of the
guys said "Do you know what happened up here?", and he proceeded to tell
story of the nuns. '~he nuns used to come up here in the wintertime and
stay. One spring the nuns didn't come back. The townspeople went up to
investigate, and they found the bodies of the nuns floating in the swimming
pool, because they had been raped and murdered. They also found mother
superior's black dogs chained up and starved to death in a shack." The
guy telling the story suggested that they go look in the swimming pool.
l"'hile they were looking at it, one of the guys yelled, "I'm scared," and
ran to the car as fast as he could. Everyone else followed him, but the
girls were slower. As they were running down the mountain, they heard
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dogs barking and chains dragging on the ground, and they thought the dogs
were chasing them. The dogs were howling and looking for the nuns. The
girls were crying because they were so scared •
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Item it 11
"Clean and Dirty Swimming Pool"
Jana Hoth
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
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Informant Data: Jana Hoth, 20 was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She
is of German ancestry and active in the L.D.S. Church. She is a sophomore
at U.S.U. majoring in business. She likes sports, sewing, and watching
T.V •• She works at Schriber's Cheese.
Contextual Data:
Jana can It remember where or why she heard this story, but her friend
told her the story as if it had happened to her brother. She didn't know
if it was true or not, but she believes that stories are told about St.
Anne's because something did happen at the retreat, and people add on to
and change the real story. She had never been to St. Anne's or heard the
legend about the nuns.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Some guys went up toS:t:o,Anne's once, and while they were drivinB'-up
the road a tree fell down in front of their car, and they thought they
might have seen a lady jump out of the trees too. They saw the swimming
pool and half of it was dirty and half of it was clean, but they didn't
know why. Some girls also claimed that they saw ghosts or something there.
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Item if 12
"Hasa{Murderer"
Informant Data:
Jeff Allred
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Jeff Allred, 21, was born and raised in Log~, Utah. He is of English
ancestry, and he is active in the L.D.S. Church for which he served a
mission to Oklahoma. He likes footbal~ softball, motorcycles, and women.
He is attending U.S.U ••
Contextual Data:
Jeff heard this story when he was in high school. He was talking
with his friends at lunch time and sitting on the jock bench--this is a
bench at Logan High where all of the "jocks" sit--when the subject of St.
Anne's came up. The legend was told to entertain, and to scare the guys.
He went up to St. Anne's often in high school. He liked to take girls up
there, and scare them. He doesn't believe the story is true, but he does
like it.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
On a dark and dreary night, a fugitive from the law murdered his
wife . and his neighbors on both sides of his house. They were left in
pools of blood. The cops came to get him, and he cut their throats :with
a knife he had hidden in his left shoe. He drove the cop car up fourth
north, and on the way he saw a group of preschool children, which he picked
up and drove to St. Anne's, where he butchered them and put them in the
swimming pool. The nuns living there came out to see what was going on,
and he slaughtered them too. He threw them into swimming pool, .and it
had become a pool of blood. The police came up to the retreat to find
him, but they never did. The cops took all the bodies down to the dump
in garbage trucks, and they came back to go swimming in the bloody pool •
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Item IF 13
"Haunted Retreat"
Informant Data:
Jenny Nelson
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Jenny Nelson, 20, was born in Colorado Springs, Colo., and reaised
in Logan, Utah. She is of Swedish ancestry and active in the L.D.S.
Church. She enjoys reading, playing the cello, and skiing. She works
as a secretary, and sh is a junior at U.S.U. majoring in English.
Contextual Data:
Jenny was at a high school party in Logan Canyon when she heard this
story. Guys and girls were sitting around telling scary stories when they
began talking about St. Anne's Retreat, and they decided to go up there
and look around. Jenny didn't believe all of the story, but she did believe
that someone had been killed at the retreat. She was scared when they
were at the retreat, and she felt like something might happen, but she
didn't know what. She thinks that people tell the stories because ito: is
fun to be scared, and she does not feel that the stories are told to
demean Catholics. She felt that the experience she had at the retreat
enhanced the associations between the guys and girls, and she thought that
some boys would take girls up to the retreat so that they could act as a
protector and show off their courage.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
There was a murderer hanging around the canyon who visciously
slaughtered one or two of the nuns, and their ghosts haunt the area
now. When they were murdered the dogs barked at the murderer, and you
can still hear them barking and the nuns screaming when you go up there
at night. The dogs will bark until you fall into the swimming pool.
They closed the nunnery because of what happened there. The hauntings
have caused more deaths, and someone dived off the diving board into an
empty pool. Other people have gotten killed there.
13
•
•
•
Item if 14
"Pregnant Nun"
Informant Data:
Lanice Budge
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Lanice Budge, 19, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She is an
active member of the L.D.S. Church, and she is of German and English
ancestry. She likes to swim and ride horses. She is a sophomore at U.S.U
majoring in math education.
Contextual Data:
She can't remember where she heard this story or who told it to her
because she has heard so many stories about St. Anne's at different times.
She thinks that she probably heard it at a party in the canyon with a group
of her friends. She tried to go up to the retreat onc~ but a man told
her to leave. She doesn't like the story, and she dOGS not believe any
of it is true. She thinks it is a sick story, and whoever made it up
had a morbid imagination. She was not at all scared by the story. She
thought people told the story to get scared and excited.
* * * * * * * * * ~ ~ *
One of the nuns that was living up at the retreat got pregnant, so
she killed all of the other nuns because she didn't want anyone to know
that she was pregnant. She had the baby, and it reminded her that she had
killed everyone else, so she killed it toq by drowning it in the swimming
pool. She haunts the area today.
14
•
•
•
Item If 15
"l1ighti ng Nuns"
Informant Data,
Patricia Simmons
Logan, Utah
July, 1984
Patricia Simmons, 19, was born and raised in Logan, Utah. She is
a sophomore at U.S.U. majoring in economics. She is of English ancestry,
and she is active in the L.D.S. Church. She enjoys playing the piano,
reading, playing tennis, and music.
Contextual Data,
Patricia was at a party in the canyon with her high school friends
when she heard this story. They went up to the retreat to look around,
but she was truo scared to go all the way to the swimming pool. She doesn't
enjoy getting scared, and she didn't like the story or believe it. She
was scared because of the spirit of telling ghost stories, and she did
have a little belLef in the story. She thinks that people tell the stories
about St. Anne's because they like to get attentnion, get scared, and show
off. She believes that the story is told about nuns because it was once
a nunnery.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Two nuns were fighting by the swimming pool at St. Anne's retreat.
One of the nuns was knocked into the swimming pool where she hit her
hea~ and went unconcious and drowned. She haunts the swimming pool today.
15]]> Shaw, Sandra L.]]> Digitized by : Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> Digitized by: Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> legends (folk tales);]]> application/pdf;]]> 7959861 Bytes]]> eng]]> Text;]]> Logan Canyon (Utah); Cache County (Utah); United States;]]> 1970-1979; 1980-1989; 1990-1999; 20th century; 2000-2001; 2000-2009; 2010-2019; 21st century;]]> Legends;]]> legend-tripping;]]> Cache Valley Legend Tripping
Holly Williams
History 5700
Professor Gabbert
Utah State University
Spring 2010
• Living Legends
Holly Williams
HIST 5700
Assignment #3
In a culture of gossip and adrenalin, it's no wonder that legend tripping is such a popular
activity. Legend tripping, or the act of traveling to the location where the legend supposedly happened,
tends to be popular among the young adult age group. I spoke with three men, who had all experienced
legends, or supernatural happenings, personally, or who had heard of others experiencing them. All
these legends take place in Cache Valley. This paper will discuss why these men traveled to the
locations they, or others, did and why they tell the stories to others.
The first person I interviewed was John Reynolds. Each story that he told was a first hand
account of something that he had experienced. Why would John tell me stories that had happened to
him personally? Did they make the stories more scary? Did they make them more real? John, I believe,
• wanted to share his experience with others so that they could experience, too, what he had felt at those
moments.
The first story he told was from when he was in high school. He and some friends decided to
watch a scary movie in the old boy's gym at Logan High. They heard some creaking noises from the
dark corner, but ignored them. Then there was a loud metallic crash and everyone scattered. They later
found out that it was just some boys setting up a dinner for a school dance.
Why would John tell this story and then say what the real reason for the noise was? To start off
his story, he told of how the gym was supposedly haunted, since it was the floor above an old
swimming pool where several students had drowned. Naturally, watching a scary movie in a
supposedly haunted location, would give the gym the aura of spookiness. Similarly, in other legend
tripping adventures, the participants go to the location only when the conditions are right (i.e. on a full
• moon, at midnight, at a certain time of year).
1
John ended his story by giving a real reason for the noise, as opposed to a supernatural one.
• What does this mean? Bruce Jackson says:
•
•
"Stories aren't just retrospective: they rationalize, compartmentalize, and
organize the past, but they also license the future. Our narratives provide
the charter for moral decisions, define the permissible and impermissible,
the good and the bad ...
With stories we know our world and where we are in it and where
everyone else is in it" (Jackson, 188).
So in Jackson's view, John was telling how it was something "real" that made the noise to find his place
in the world. He wanted to leave the possibility of there being a ghost open. Yet he rationalized his
character by indicating that the probability of it being something other than another person as being
very slight.
John's second story is similar in many ways. He starts his story off by telling the "facts" of the
story. These facts later justify his reasons for being scared at the house and for finding the house
creepy. After telling the facts about the story, John goes on to tell about visiting the house alone for the
first time, and then going back with friends and their reactions. To him, it didn't matter what time you
went to the house, it was always scary. He describes what the inside of the house looks like and why it
is so scary. He ends his story by saying, "anyway, it's the scariest house ever."
The Petersborough House, in a way, is Cache Valley's Winchester Mystery House. The house
itselfhas no paranormal stories associated with it. The only thing that makes it ''the scariest house
ever" is that fact that it is abnormal. While the main focus of the tours of the Wmchester Mystery
House is "a crazy lady", the main focus of the Petersborough House is the guy that "kind of lost his
mind over time" and disappeared, just like his wife (Goldstein, 100)
Just like the stairs that lead no where, or the doors in the floor of the Wmchester House, things
in the Petersborough House are strange too. The house looks completely abandoned, not moved out of,
just empty "as if they just left the house as is and and took off". This sense ofthings being unnatural,
2
• makes the house what it is, no ghost stories are necessary.
In John's last story, he explains why something isn't real, and why people think it is, similar to
his first story. This is a story about John and his friend going to the Weeping Widow, a famous statue in
the Logan Cemetery. He explains that the Weeping Widow is weeping because she had lost all of her
children in infancy. Supposedly on every full moon (although John was not quite sure) you can see the
statue crying real tears from her eyes. John explains that there are stains down the cheeks of the statue
from water, but that they could have gotten there from the rain.
His experience starts when he and his friend go out to the cemetery to look at the statue. They
shine their car lights on the statue to see it and then turn off the car and go look at it. Apparently "her
eyes are kind of glowing and her mouth is glowing a little bit too ... as if it was like stitched shut or
something, these like glowing lines or like a line between her lips." John was scared, showed his friend
who became scared as well, and they both jumped back in the car and turned back on the lights. They
• turned the lights off again and noticed that the statue was glowing more, and so decided that it must be
glow-in-the-dark paint or something on the statue.
I believe John told this story for the same reasons he told the first. He wanted to let the hearer of
the story (me) know that there was a possibility that this statue really cries, and he never really clears
that up. He justifies it as not being so scary because the statue was just painted and the stains were from
rain. I believe he told this story to indicate that he believes that supernatural things do occur, but that he
either doesn't believe in them, or has never experienced them himself. All three of his stories dealt with
why things were scary, even if there really was no "proof' of why it should be so (i.e. no supernatural
happenings at those locations).
I next collected stories from Kevin. He had three first hand accounts of the Alumni House on
campus and then just a retelling of the legend of the Caine Lyric Theatre ghost. The way Kevin told his
• stories is dramatically different than the way that John told his. Kevin's stories were not told to impress,
3
rationalize, or anything like that. They were told as fact, not as something to scare others.
• His first experience in the Alumni House, dealt with his computer. He was working in a room
that had two computers. While working on one computer the other started playing music, when he wen
to turn it off it turned offby itself and then turned on again after he had returned to his seat. It turned
off shortly after. All Kevin said of the experience was "kinda weird." He has no explanation of why this
happened except that, maybe, there might be a ghost in the Alumni House, but he wasn't sure. The way
Kevin leaves out all dramatics and fantastical words in his story, allows the listener to believe
everything he says. Nothing is said in a way to make the story feel scary, it simply is by the way he tells
it nonchalantly.
Kevin's second experience in the Alumni House, for many, is more terrifying than the first. For
many believers this story would be proof of a ghost (if not ghosts) in the Alumni House. Kevin tells of
hearing voices upstairs while working downstairs. When he went up the stairs the voices stopped. He
• looked in the office where the voices had come from and then heard them move into another office,
where he checked and once again found nothing. He said it sounded like two people having a
conversation, but at a distance. Once again his explanation for the happenings, nothing but that "it was
kinda weird."
His last experience in the Alumni House also dealt with things acting out of the ordinary. The
shredder in the office next to his started running while no one was in there. He went into the office and
it stopped. He looked around for someone, but there was no one there. He went back into the office
with the paper shredder and it started going again. This story is also told with little terrifying emotion
and almost as if it's not strange for things like that to be happening. In fact he calls the events "weird
disturbances", not hauntings or any of the like.
So why did Kevin tell this stories? And why did he tell them in the way he did? First off, I
• believe that Kevin, like John, was putting himself in his place in the world and trying to find some sort
4
of organization for the past events (Jackson, 188). Kevin had no explanation for why things happened
• as they did at the Alumni House. He did, however, characterize himself by indicating that these things
didn't scare him; almost as if he acknowledges them happening but disproving that they were caused by
a ghost because he doesn't believe in them (although he never states his beliefs on the paranormal).
Next Kevin told me the legend of the ghost at the Caine Lyric Theatre. The story is that a
traveling acting company came to the theater and during the play Hamlet, one grave digger gets more
laughs than the other. According to legend, the funnier grave digger never shows up for work the next
day and is never heard from again. It is believed that this actor was murdered and his ghost now resides
at the theater. He is a picky ghost and when someone sits in his seat he makes all things go wrong with
the performances that night.
This story is popular in Logan, and I have heard it told from many different people. Many
people tell it in a way that makes the theater less inviting to go to. Others tell it with more skepticism in
• their tale. I found that Kevin, however, told it just like he did his first hand accounts; as if nothing was
strange about a ghost in a theater.
The legend itself has much potential for study. It is very popular in Logan, and could be
classified as an urban legend. Similar to many of the vanishing hitchhiker stories, the ghost in the Caine
Lyric Theatre is always in the same location, experienced by many different people, and is protecting
something that is important to him. Many of the vanishing hitchhikers just want to make it home, or
complete the task they had set out to do. So too does the ghost in the Caine Theatre want to complete
his task. He wants to be in control of the stage, hold the audience in his hand, and he does (Brunvand,
24-46).
One interesting side note about the Caine Lyric Theatre legend is that of the play that the actor
was in. The ghost that resides in the theater was playing a gravedigger in the Shakespeare play of
• Hamlet. The story of Hamlet is about a man who is murdered, who comes back as a ghost, to avenge
5
his own death. The ghost in the Caine Theatre was supposedly murdered, who has come back and who
• will avenge his death on any unsuspecting audience, by ruining their show when someone sits in his
seat. Could this legend just be drawing motifs from Hamlet, or are the two stories coincidentally nearly
identical? Kevin, nor anyone else who has told me the legend, has ever mentioned anything about it.
The last person I collected stories from was Ryan. Neither one of his stories were first hand
accounts, but rather second hand accounts; he knew the person it had happened to. Although this kind
of legend telling is different than the last two legend tellers, it is equally as affective in telling the story
and getting its meaning across.
The first story Ryan told was of how the Junction eatery on campus has a haunted basement.
According to Ryan a lady died in the basement and haunts it. He claims to have had a coworker who
refused to go in the basement alone because he was so afraid of it. Although Ryan never stated if he
believed the story was true or not, the way he describes his coworker as being, there is an indication
• that he believes that his coworker, at least, experienced something strange enough in the basement for
the legend to have some basis, and to pass it on.
The next story he told was that of an experience of some friends of his. Apparently one night
they took a trip up to the Nunnery (another famous legend in Logan) to check out the area. They were
playing in the empty pool when they claim to have seen, in the dark shadows of the deep end, a baby
crawling or walking around. They were more scared, when they came back, than Ryan had ever seen
them. He indicated that they weren't the type of people to "show fear or anything like that", implying
that their experience must have happened.
So why did Ryan tell these stories? Why not tell one of his own? Jackson discusses why people
tell other peoples stories, and I believe Ryan was following just as Jackson says. Ryan "populated an
event [he] knew little about with sufficient detail to make it more affective and dramatic so it would do
• what {he] wanted or needed it to do" (Jackson, 24). Ryan was telling his friends account so that he
6
could prove that the Nunnery really is a scary place. There was no need for a back story in this case;
• most everyone in Logan knows the story of the Nunnery. So the strange event that took place there
simple added to the intensity of the legend.
•
•
All in all these three men told stories that helped them locate themselves, and their believes, in
the world. They indicated to the listener, who was a believer in ghosts and the paranormal, and who
was not. They included stories about going to a certain location (legend tripping) and legends about
locations that they may not have been to themselves, but each story had a location attached to it.
Legend tripping and telling of legend tripping will continue for years to come. Each time
something new or strange happens at a legend location that legend becomes more alive and it continues
to grow in the area. This living legends become a part of everyday life for those who have experienced
them. They are a conduit for story telling and belief rationalizing. And they will live on forever.
7
•
•
•
Bibliography
Brunvand, Jan Harold. The Vanishing Hitchhiker: American Urban Legends & Their Meanings. W. W.
Norton & Company: New York, London. 1981.
Goldstein, Diane E. Haunting Experiences: Ghosts in Contemponuy Folklore. Utah State University
Press: Logan, Utah.
Jackson, Bruce. The Story Is True: The Art and Meaning of Telling Stories. Temple University Press:
Phi Ii delphia. 2007.
•
•
•
My name is Holly Williams, I'm here with Ryan Kimball, it is May 4, 2010 .
My name is Ryan Kimball, I am 29 and I was born July 17th 1980. I'm a computer engineer. And I am
roommates with Holly's fiancee.
C9 This story was told to me by a coworker. So I worked with a guy at the Junstion up on campus and he
claims that there was a lady that haunts the basement of the Junction where the coolers and freezers are.
And he was so convinced of that that he was afraid to go down there by himself and so he was one of
the chefs there. And we would go down and get stuff for him and accompany him to the basement
when he had to go down there. And I guess the story is that this lady died down there or something and
haunts it.
And this other one I was, actually some friends of mine went up to the nunnerY to check it out. And I
guess there's a pool there, at the nunnery. And they were playing around in the pool, it was empty of
course. And they looked at one of, the opposite end, I guess as it got deeper and kind of in the shadows
down there, they saw, it looked a baby kind of crawling around or something. Anyway, I don't know
exactly kinda what the baby or whatever they saw was doing. They like came back, and they were like
scared out of their minds the rest of the night. Like they were like really scared, I haven't seen them like
that, ever, because they're pretty, I don't know, not the type to show fear or anything like that. So they
were pretty scared .
•
•
•
My name is Holly Williams today is May 4,2010 and I am here speaking with Kevin Crouch.
My name is Kevin Crouch. I am 26 borne on March 30th 1984. I'm a student. I know Holly from work
and I am roommates with her fiance.
Well the first one, because it happened to me. I work at th~lumni House on campus and there's been
several occasions where I've been there working late at night. And I had kind of unusual things happen.
I've never been able to determine if there's a ghost, like if there's any kind of back story, but I wouldn't
be surprised if there is some kind of paranormal things going on. One night I was there working late
and I had, in my office there are two computers, and I was working on one, and I had the other up with
Pandora running and I had paused that to concentrate on something on the other computer. And in
doing so, I went back and was working on the other computer, and the other computer had gone into
like a sleep mode. And all of the sudden I heard a noise and turned around and the computer had come
out of sleep mode and had started to play music again off of Pandora. And when I got up and walked
over to the computer, it paused again and went back into sleep mode. And then, when I went to sit
down again it ~ame ba~k up and started playing musi~ again. And then went ba~k into sleep mode
again, kinda weird. Another experience, I was there late and had gone downstairs for something. When
I was coming back up the stairs, in the office I work in, it sounded like I could hear voices talking. And
I came upstairs and I didn't have, none of the computers were on or anything, but I could here these
voices. And when I came upstairs, the voices kind of stopped for a minute but then they went into
another office and so I went over to that office and looked and nothing, and then the voices
disappeared. It just sounded like two people having a conversation, kinda, it sounded like at a distance.
But it was kinda weird. And the last experience I had, I was working, and we have a paper shredder in
another office, next to mine, by where the copier is. And I was working, and I thought I was there
working by myself, and all of the sudden the paper shredder starts going. And I thought, oh maybe
someone else is here, so I got up and I went in. And no one was in the room but the paper shredder was
going and then it stopped. And so I looked around the comer to see if anyone was there, no one was in
the building. And then when I came back into that office, the paper shredder started going again. So
just kind of weird disturbances kind of things. I don't know. I'm still trying to figure out if there is any
kind of story, per say, of there being a ghost that presides at the Alumni House. So that's story one.
The ~t story I've heard from friends that have worked down at the Caine Theatre. They say that there
was, that there's a ghost there. And the story behind that was a traveling acting group that would come
through. And one year they came and they were doing Hamlet. And in Hamlet there's the grave digger
scene. And the two grave diggers are kind of this comic relief duo. And one of the grave diggers was
getting a lot more laughs than the other grave digger. And the story that I've heard is that there were
kind ofjeleousy issues going on with that. And the next day the grave digger that was getting more
laughs the night before didn't show up for work and supposedly no one saw this person again. And it's
was believed that maybe this individual was murdered and their ghost now haunts the theatre. And the
ghost has a certain seat he likes to sit in, in the balcony and they leave that seat open for him Because
when someone sits in his seat, performances that go on have a lot of issues that arise. Lights that
become unplugged, sound systems that don't work, a lot of unusual technical issues that arise. And so
they try and leave that seat open for this ghost that apparently resides at the Caine Theatre and
apparently likes watching shows in his favorite seat.
So those are kind of two stories I have. ----
•
•
•
My name is Holly Williams it is May 4,2010 and I am talking to John Reynolds
Hi I'm John Reynolds I am 28. I was born on January 16th of 1982 and I am self empolyed and I am
Holly's fiancee. I am also from Logan, and so I know several stories. I'm going to start with a story r, ~
about the Logan High old boys gym. V
There used to be a gym at Logan High that had a label on the front that said Brigham Young College.
And it was built inlike 1820, no not that early, like 1890 or something like that. Anyway, the gym,
when I went to high school was actually haunted. It had a pool underneath that had a big crack going
through it and so it was not working anymore, obviously. And it used to work when I was little. I used
to go swimming in it a lot, my dad was a teacher at Logan High, and he would take us and I was always
so scared because there were all this scary paintings of like clown faces in the bathrooms and stuff and
it's just the freakiest place with all these bare pipes everywhere and just like rusty cement walls and
everything. Probably the scariest place you could ever find yourself in. Not to mention it's underground
and so it's completely pitch black, really scary. And there were all these stories about people seeing
ghosts down there because students had drowned in the pool. I don't exactly know the story about the
drowning but I just know a lot of people would talk about how they heard voices or sounds from that
basement. So anyway, one day me and my friends we decided to go watch a scary movie in the old
boy's gym, we didn't watch it downstairs, we watched it in the gym part and we're sitting there
watching the movie in this gym and we start hearing all these creaking noises coming from like the
back where it was all dark. And everybody was freaking out. And I was just thinking "it's probably just
the heater ducts moving" because the heaters would turn on and you know how metal expands when it
heats up and it makes noises. So I didn't think anything of it, I wasn't scared at all. But then all the
sudden we heard this loud crash noise of metal and everybody just dispersed and ran right out the door,
wetting their pants. And my friend and I we were like "oh no the TV's still in there" so we went back in
and grabbed the TV and brought the TV out and everyone was just like "I'm out of here" because we
were so freaked out. Even I like, my heart was just like, that was not the heater making noises, it was
like something moved in the back in the dark and made this loud noise and we were freaking out. And
we're sitting outside in front of the school wondering what to do and it turns out that these guys were
setting up for like a school dance downstairs in the pool to have like their dinner in the pool downstairs
for the school dance or something and they were just trying to get in the door and stuff. But that was
really scary. I'll never forget that. The old boy's gym is torn down now and it doesn't exist anymore so I
was pretty lucky to be able to experience the haunted old gym, old boy's gym before they tore it down.
Another story I have is one that I learned in, probably about 2004. I have a friend of mine who was (9
really into ghost stories around here and he was like, "John", he went to high school with me also but I
was in college at the time. And one day in the student center he was like "John I have this new place."
He started telling me about all these other new stories that he knew about, but he was like "there is this
one that is the ultimate scariest place I've ever been to in this area." And so he told me the story and he
told me where it was and so here's the story:
On the west side of the Valley in PetersboIDugb there is this house that kind of stands alone and it
belonged to the family, the Chase family. And there was a father and a mother and their children had
already moved out, they were older, and they had already moved out. And the father was a working
man still and one day, Mary his wife, his name was John and his wife's name was Mary, Mary
disappeared one day mysteriously. And they couldn't find her anywhere. They searched and searched
and they even looked through, you know, through, they looked everywhere they couldn't find her. And
so after years, they just, she remained on the missing persons list and to this day she is still on the
missing persons list. This was probably about in the 70s I think. So they didn't know, they never found
•
•
•
her. Then one day, John, the father, he started like talking to himself and kind oflost his mind over
time. And his coworkers talked about how they'd heard him talking to himself sometimes and they
could hear him talking to himself inside of his house. They thought that was kind of weird. And then
one day at work John told his coworker that he was going to go join his wife, that he knew where she
was and he was going to go join her. But he was kind of acting weird and he didn't know what to think
of it and then he disappeared. They couldn't find him anywhere. So they looked everywhere and they
found his EI Camino crashed into the Benson Marina, which is a body of water, it's not very deep,
maybe like 4 feet deep max. And so they combed the Marina looking through the water for a body and
they couldn't find a body anywhere. So they couldn't really close the case, so to this day, John also
remains on the missing persons list. And they took the car and dragged it back on the property and the
car is still up there on the property.
So my friend told me, you know, just go up there, and you'll be, everyone will be freaked out because
it's the scariest place ever. So I told them this story, there aren't really any ghost stories, this is just the
story of what happened, very real story. And we, so I took some people up there and I didn't really
know how to get there so I went there in the middle of the day to try to find it, like at noon. And just so
that I wouldn't ruin the whole feeling when I'm like fumbling around trying to find this house at night
time because it's harder to fmd. So my friend gave me the directions, he said that if you're going west,
just past the train tracks you take a right on this road and then you take the second left and go up this
hill. And about part way up the hill on your right side you'll see this lone house, that's kind of nestled
against some trees and it's this really old house made of stone. And so I went up there and it really was
pretty easy to find. And I saw this house and I started driving up the drive way through this alfalfa field
and I got up next to the house and I was going to get out and maybe walk around, check it out. But my
heart was just racing. Mid-day, I couldn't stay there more than two minutes, no more than a minute. Just
immediately I put into reverse and drove away as fast as I could because the house looked so scary .
And so that night I took my friends there. One of my friends started crying as soon as the car lights like
shined on the house, she started crying and people were freaking out, no one would get out of the car.
Usually when I took people there nobody would get out of the car, let alone go inside of the house.
Once in a while I would get a daring group that would go inside of the house. And inside of the house
you'll fmd clothes allover the floors, upstairs and downstairs, really old clothes like old timey
suspenders and stuff. There are like dishes on the counters. There are like beds. It's as if they just left
the house as is and and took off. There weren't any couches there, I assume people took the couches,
but the beds are still there. There was even dishes on the counter. The fridge is like, you can tell it's
from the 70s, trying to all futuristic, you know those round fridges? You go upstairs and there are beds.
And upstairs in one of the rooms there's this creepy children's wallpaper that's like half tom off the wall
with these like paintings of children with empty eyes and stuff, really scary. All the windows are
boarded up so it's completely dark inside. Anyway, it's the scariest house ever. ~
The other story, I have this other experience. The same friend that told me about this house told me
about, we decided to go check out the Weeping Wj.Q.ow one day, and this was when I was in high school
also. So we went up to the Weeping Widow and the story, there are a lot of stories behind the Weeping
Widow, but the one that we were kind of focusing on was how basically she just had several children
that died in their infancy and they were all buried. And then when she was buried with the children,
they had this statue put up of this lady crying, and so hence she's called the Weeping Widow. The story
goes that on a full moon, I think it's just every full moon you can look and see her crying, from her
eyes. Or maybe it's, yeah I'll just go with that, every full moon you go up to her and you can see her
crying from her eyes that are carved out of the granite. So we went up there and we had car lights
shining on the statue and everything and we're looking at the statue, in the Logan Cemetery, and you
know she's not crying or anything. But you could see streaks down her face from her eyes, where the
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stone is stained from like water. So clearly the water runs down that part of her face. So we're like
"that's kind of spooky, I wonder if rain just runs down that part of her face" or whatnot, I don't, you
know, very speculative, not believing. And so I'm looking at the face really carefully and I noticed that
her eyes are kind of glowing and her mouth is glowing a little bit too, as if it had, as if it was like
stitched shut or something, these like glowing lines or like a line between her lips. They were like
glowing and I was like, I like jumped back a little bit and like shuddered, and I was like "oh my gosh"
and so I kind of looked to see if it was like the stone was reflecting somehow off of the lights in the
background down the street. And I looked and they weren't, it was like truly glowing, it wasn't a
reflection. So I like grab my friend and I was like "come over here", my hearts like racing, I was like
"what is this? Do you see this?" and he like looked and he was like, and he jumped back, and he was
like "oh my gosh!" and he got so scared. And we went and turned the lights back on from the car,
because during the time the lights were off. We went, got back in the car, turned the lights back on for a
while, and freaked out a little bit. And then we decided to go look at it again. And then we turned the
lights off again and it was glowing even more after that. And so we think that maybe someone put some
glow in the dark stuff on her face. But who knows, we'll never know. Anyway that's my story .]]> Digitized by : Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> Digitized by: Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> legends (folk tales);]]> application/pdf;]]> 6345470 Bytes]]> eng]]> Text;]]> Logan Canyon (Utah); Cache County (Utah); United States;]]> 1970-1979; 1980-1989; 1990-1999; 20th century; 2000-2001; 2000-2009; 2010-2019; 21st century;]]> Legends;]]> legend-tripping;]]> St. Anne's Retreat Legends
Russell Jones
English/History 5700
Professor Gabbert
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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RJ 1 • There's Been a Scandal, Here Are The Facts
"Why do history books divide time up according to wars instead of the periods of peace?
Because it's interesting, and because, on some level, people like seeing big things fall apart."
Michael Garibaldi, Babylon 5
I first heard of the nunnery in fifth or sixth grade myself. I didn't even know the name of
it until I began this project. It was always just "the nunnery up in Logan Canyon." I'd been
told it several times and the story was ,~lways pretty close to the same. Some nuns had gotten
pregnant up there and drowned their babies in a pool to cover it up. On a certain night -
whether it was a full moon, or a night without a moon, that part always changed - you could go
up there and you'd see the pool filled with water and dead babies floating in it. I never gave it
much thought, honestly. People rarely do when it comes to local legends. • The nunnery, St. Ann's retreat, has been a part oflocallegend for a long time. One of
the sources I interviewed stated that people had been going up there on legend trips since before
he'd been patrolling the area as a police officer. His estimate was forty years. Recently, razor
wire was set up around the place and security guards were hired to keep trespassers out. This
didn't stop trespassers, though; at least, not until a security guard caught a group of students and
tied them up and threw them in the empty pool to scare them. This case was well documented
and became quite a scandal. It brought the nunnery back into the public mind, which seemed to
have forgotten about it.
Thinking on this event was part of the reason why I chose St. Ann's retreat for my
project. The other part of the reason was that I thought it was a common legend that everybody
knew and that it would be simple. Naturally, I expected some variation from one story to the
• next, but I never expected just how much variation I would get, or that it would be so hard to find
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people who knew of it. Of the fifty different people I asked in my initial excursion, only five
actually knew the legend. Oh, everybody knew the haunted nunnery existed, because of the
recent scandal, but nobody would admit to knowing exactly why people would go up their in the
first place. This was quite frustrating at first, but as I continued my quest to find people who
knew the legend, a common element showed itself in people's hesitation: they didn't have the
Facts.
You'll notice this immediately in the story I collected from Greg Nielsen, who was the
most willing person I collected from. He prefaces his story with an explanation of how he
knows about the place: his grandfather helped build it. He then gave a disclaimer that the story
is as he "understood it," not necessarily according to the Facts. Facts were so important to him
that he even stopped by my home later to correct a mistake; his wife had informed him that the
uranium tycoon built the place first and the Catholic church acquired it later.
This disclaimer was another common element. People would stress that what they were
telling me was a story. As I did my collecting, I noticed that I had to emphasize this as well in
order to get them to tell it. If I opened up my interview by asking what people know about St.
Ann's retreat, they clammed up instantly and no amount of prodding could convince them to talk.
If, however, I asked them to tell me what others had told them about it, I had a much greater
chance of getting them to speak. This happened with Jeff in the most dramatic way. When I
first told myoid friend I was collecting performances of the legend, he insisted that he'd be a bad
source because he didn't know that much about it. I had to keep asking for several days and
eventually got him to open up by asking him to tell me specifically what he'd been told by others.
Even after I'd completed the interview and moved on, he would continue to remind me
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RJ 3
afterward that what he said probably wasn't the Facts. When I confronted him about this and
said that the real facts, what little I had, suggested that the story never actually happened,
however, he quickly became defensive and looked for ways to justify it. From his own mouth,
"well, you can't really know for sure that it didn't happen. I mean, the Catholic church is always
trying to cover up things like this." Interesting, that someone so unwilling to talk without the
Facts would have such a strong reaction against the suggestion that Facts seemed to say the event
never happened at all.
This point about the Catholic church covering things up came back again when I
interviewed my mother. "But I guess I always kind of believed that because when we went to
Rome with our family that was the story there too, that a lot of the nuns, that they found babies
cemented into the walls of the underground tunnels throughout the city of Rome." I think this
may be one of the keys to explaining why there would be a legend surrounding an abandoned
Catholic retreat. While all the stories have some pretty wild variation - some say the ghost is of
the babies, some say its of the nun who drowned a baby, etc. - but aside from an obsession with
facts, they all have one element in common: scandal.
It is well known that members of the Catholic clergy cover up scandals because they have
been caught in it. Stories of Catholic priests involved in illicit sexual acts have been hanging
around them for centuries because it's such a taboo. People love scandal and will look for it
wherever they can. The fact that there have been stories of this confirmed in the public mind
through news media have probably served to increase these stories. That the date of the event
involving the security guard and the kids, October 15, 1997 (Herald Journal), seems to coincide
with the trial, sentencing and death of one of the priests involved in the sex scandal lends a bit of
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credence to this conclusion. According to BBC news, Brendan Smyth pled guilty 96 counts of
child molestation in 1997 and died one month into serving his sentence (BBC Online). A search
of website dedicated to holding priests involved in sex scandals accountable for their actions also
yielded a considerable number of priests exposed or tried in 1997
(http://www.bishop-accountability.orglirishpriestsinus/).Itis important to note that
these are internet sources and therefor may not be entirely reliable. Although there are plenty of
articles about Brendan Smyth easily available, time constraints made it impossible for me to go
through and verify every priest tied to a scandal in 1997 for this assignment, but the correlation is
strong enough that it's probably worth a followup study to confirm it at a later time.
The interest in a scandal also comes up in the version I collected from Josh Mecham. He
said, "I know that it was a place for nuns to go up that were pregnant and would kill their
babies." One of the only ones I collected that didn't need to be coaxed into talking by reminding
him that I was only looking for how it was told, Josh specifically says he "knows" how things
happened. His story is also the most gruesome in its implications, suggesting that not only did a
baby drowning happen there, but that St. Ann's retreat existed specifically for that purpose. You
see scandalous details emphasized in other stories as well. In Jeffs, the nuns drown a baby born
from a woman who was not a member ofthe clergy and in Danielle's the Mother Superior
drowns the baby for the nun to cover up the truth. In Tawny's version, the first thing she makes
known is that nuns aren't allowed to have babies. Like Josh, she also said that St. Ann's Retreat
was a place where nuns were supposed to drown the babies, but the way she said it was off-hand,
as if she didn't see the implications ofthat, but the fact that nuns weren't supposed to have
babies was very important. This was also emphasized in the story told by Nathan. "You know
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RJ 5
the nuns can't have sex, or aren't supposed to. To cover it up, they would drown the babies in a
pool."
This is very interesting to me in light of earlier studies I did on "The Hook" and
information I've picked out from other urban legends. I made a special point in my report about
how the people being punished in the urban legend were people who broke the taboo of
pre-marital sex. In the story ofthe kidney heist, it's a man out looking to pick up women in a
bar who gets his organs stolen. There are even urban legends about children swearing on live
broadcasts of kid shows, such as "Bozo, the Clown," or that Mr. Rogers was secretly a child
molester, which was the reason why children were never seen on his show. (Brunvand)
Scandal seems to be a very important element to urban legends and the more fervently the taboo
is preached, the more emphasis is placed on the breaking of it in the telling of the story .
At first, I thought that the correlation to stories in the news was the cause of the obsession
with Facts in the tellings and that may very well have something to do with it, but the more I've
gone over the tellings, the more I think that the scandal is at fault. It is more a interesting and
juicy story to tell if Facts seem to back it up. Facts mean that it Actually Happened, that it
wasn't just a story somebody Made Up to scare us all. It's important that the story be true,
because the possibility of a scandal isn't as interesting as one that actually happened. It would
be particularly interesting to see if the way Catholics tell the story is different from how the LDS
sample I collected from tell it. I would bet that if they would be willing to tell it at all, there
would be a lot less emphasis placed on the taboos broken. They might be more inclined to tell
the version of the story in which it was just one nun who got pregnant to minimize the scandal.
As interesting as all this speculation is, it's nothing but speculation, because I did not find any
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RJ 6
Catholics to ask. Still, this would be another interesting area to follow up on.
When I first started this project, I expected a simple essay. I thought I'd make some
points about the gender roles like Tatar did in OjfWith Their Heads, and say a few things about
the common elements of urban legends brought up by Brunvand and possibly make a few
statements about a legend in an LDS area laying blame on the Catholic church. I believed it
would just be another small project for me to demonstrate a large amount of information I'd been
spoon-fed in class, but as I collected the stories and examined them in detail, new things came to
the surface that were of far greater interest. The importance on Facts, the emphasis on scandal
and the correlation of the documented legend trip that went bad to the arrest and trial of several
Catholic priests caught in sex scandals; I hadn't predicted any of this. It's given me a lot of
interesting areas for myself and others to look into in future research projects on the subject, as
well as given me a new perspective to examine urban legends from. And, above all, this
experience has hammered home the importance of keeping an open mind and not going into a
collection project with to many specific ideas in mind .
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RJ
Allen, Paul (October 14,2000). Thrillseekers Steer Clear of Canyon. Harold Journal.
Retrieved from:
http://news.hjnews.com/article6aS07c12-eSb4-Se22-S77c-a6cdaSfOf929.html
Anonymous (2004). Bishop Accountability. Retrieved from:
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/irish priests in usl
7
BBC Online - No Author Given (2010, March 15). Profile of Brendan Smyth. BBe News
Online. Retrieved from:
http://news.bbc.co.ukl2/hi/uk news/northern ireland/8567868.stm
Brunvand, Jan Harold (1981). The Vanishing Hitchhiker. New York, NY: W.W. Norton and
Company.
Reily, Jerome (2008, April 6). Abbey For Sale, With Pervert Priest's Grave Included.
Independent National News. Retrieved from:
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/abbey-for-sale-with-pervert-priest
s-grave-included-1339709.html
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Infonnation:
JeffJohnson
Logan, Utah
April, 2010
Jeff is an old friend of mine. We've known each other since before grade school and he
was raised her in Logan all his life. He is an active LDS church goer, returned missionary and
currently a student at USU majoring in exercise science.
Context:
I recorded this in my basement for a project. It was difficult to get him to agree to the
recording because he "didn't have all the facts." I had to coax him into telling it by infonning
him that I wasn't interested in the facts, just the telling of the story.
Text
Me: Where did you first hear the legend of the nunnery?
Jeff: I heard it when I was actually in fifth grade, was the first time.
Me: Okay. Who told it to you.
Jeff: A friend of mine in my class.
Me: Okay, now go ahead and tell me what the legend is as you heard it.
Jeff: The way I heard it is that there used to be a nunnery up in Logan Canyon and a
pregnant woman for some reason, I guess she was running away from an abusive husband went
up to the nunnery for shelter. The nuns took her in; she was fine for a while, but the nuns started
doing really odd stuff, started to kind of act creepy. Then she had her child, but she was afraid
of what the nuns were doing, so she hid the child and went to go find a way to get away. Find a
place to live, or something like that. Then she came back and everywhere in the nunnery there
was blood and stuff and her baby was missing and the nuns were missing away. The woman
ended up going crazy grieving for her child and I guess ended up killing herself. They say that
around the nunnery now around Logan River, they say you can hear her screaming for her baby.
That's how I heard it.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
. ,.
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Information:
Greg Nielsen
Logan, Ut
April, 2010
Greg Nielsen is one of the stake leaders for the LDS student ward I go to. He works at
Thikol as an engineer. He regularly goes to Florida to supervise rocket assembly and considers
himself an active outdoorsman.
Context:
This sample was recorded at an LDS activity. Greg volunteered to be interviewed
because he said he had a family member who'd worked on building the nunnery and had heard I
was having trouble finding people who knew the story.
Text:
Greg: My grandpa did a lot of the rock work up there for the Catholic church in the
1930s. As I understood it, one of the nuns went crazy up there and killed herself up there and
then the church sold it to a guy that had a uranium mine, had a lot of money. He put a
swimming pool in and some billies (?) up there, but as far as I know, because the girl killed
herself there, that's what drove the catholic church to sell it. They didn't put the pool in there, it
was this uranium tycoon that installed the pool and used it like a summer camp.
Me: What have you heard said about the haunting? What is the manifestation?
Greg: The haunting is that you go up there at night time and on certain nights you can
hear her screaming. (Unclear due to background noise) She still haunted the place because she
went crazy. The ghost has always been up there in the mountains above the lodgings. Some
people say it's the wind, but everybody else say it's not the wind that makes that noise, it's
actually the screaming. She screams up there.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
2
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Information:
Josh Meacham
Logan, Utah
April, 2010
Josh Meacham is an undeclared major at USU. He is 22 years old and recently just
returned from an LDS mission. He lived in California until he was 14, at which point he moved
here to Logan, where he's lived ever since.
Context:
This was recorded at a large gathering in Elk Ridge park. It was an LDS activity for our
ward.
Text:
Me: What do you know about St. Ann's retreat?
Josh: What?
Me: St. Ann's retreat. That's the nunnery.
Josh: Oh. I know that it was a place for nuns to go up that were pregnant and would kill
their babies. I've had some friends actually go up there, I did not attend with them, but I have
heard that on the full moon in the middle room or cabin, I guess there's some sort oflittle pool, it
fills up with blood on a full moon and there's chains hanging on the wall and there's blood seen
around there and it's kind of crazy.
Me: And this is what you were told by your friends?
Josh: Yes, that have gone up there.
Me: Any other times you've heard it told or just that?
Josh: I've heard of kids going up there and some getting possessed and getting attacked
by spirits, I guess you could say. Just rumors, basically. I haven't heard them first-hand from
anyone.
Me: That's awesome, thank you very much.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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Joe Yonk
Mendon, Utah
April, 2010
Information:
Joe Yonk is a retired police officer currently serving as a stake leader for the LDS
University student wards. He was involved in a lot of operations involving trespassers to St.
Ann's retreat. He currently lives in Mendon and has been in Utah for most of his life.
Context:
This was recorded at an LDS social gathering. He was hesitant to say much at first
because he claimed not to know the details of the legend, despite having been involved in a lot of
cases surrounding it.
Text:
Me: What do you know about St. Ann's retreat?
Joe: Well, I know that it's supposed to be haunted up there. I don't remember all the
background on it, but I've been up there on several incidences involving young people going up
there at night, trying to stay there. Most ofthem get in trouble doing one thing or another.
Me: Do you have any knowledge of the story that people tell about why it's haunted.
Joe: I don't.
Me: Have you heard anything, any stories about what people are supposed to see?
Joe: I know it's supposed to be people that used to live there. I can't remember ifit was
the way that they die, or, I don't know. Their spirits or their ghosts are supposed to still be
around there. That's about all I remember.
Me: About how often did people go up there when you were on duty?
Joe: In the spring and summer, every weekend.
Me: Every weekend?
Joe: Every weekend, there was somebody up there.
Me: You're serious?
Joe: Yeah, they had to finally put up No Trespassing signs up there. They've been going
up there for, oh, I was a cop for thirty years and they went the whole time I was there and they
were going up there before I was even a cop, so they've been going up there for forty years.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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Danielle Grunig
Smithfield, Utah
April, 2010
Information:
Danielle Grunig is 21 years old and an active member of the LDS church. She was
raised in Utah her whole life and is currently a student at USU majoring in English.
Context:
This was recorded at an LDS social event. She voluneered to be interviewed for this
project because she heard I was having trouble finding people to tell the story.
Text:
Me: You've been here in Logan, or here in Utah, this area?
Danielle: I've lived her my whole life, in Smithfield, which is right next to Logan, so ...
Me: Alright, tell me what others have told you about St. Ann's retreat.
Danielle: The nunnery is up Logan Canyon, I've seen it. Basically, the story is that a nun
had a baby and the Mother Superior there drowned it in a pool because nuns aren't allowed to
have babies, or something to that effect. That's all I know. It's technically (?) haunted by the
baby.
Me: By the baby?
Danielle: Yeah.
Me: Okay, what are the conditions under which you can see the baby?
Danielle: I don't know because I've never had the desire to go up there. I just know the
story because my parents told it to me.
Me: Have any of them ever actually told you how it is that the ghost is supposed to
appear?
Danielle: My brother told me that they can hear a baby crying from the pool area
sometimes.
Me: So, you saw it (the nunnery) what was the situation you saw it? Were you just
driving by?
Danielle: Yes. We were just driving by and I'd heard of the nunnery, but I'd never seen
it. I asked my parents about it and they drove slowly by it so I could see it through the trees.
Me: What kind of an impression did you get from looking at it?
Danielle: It looks like a haunted house, definitely.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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Dawn Jones
Logan, Utah
May, 2010
Infonnation:
Dawn Jones is a homemaker. She also works part time at K-mart and as a substitute
teacher. She graduated from Logan High in 1976 and has lived in Utah her whole life.
Context:
This perfonnance was recorded in my home. It was hesitantly given because she didn't
feel she had much to say about it. She told it with a bit of sarcasm and she was teasing me as
she told it. That's our relationship, though, so it may be nothing.
Text:
Me: So, I've been collecting these stories of the nunnery. I want to get just see what do
you know about it? Have you been told this story before?
Dawn: Oh, yes, around the campfire, years and years.
Me: Okay. How has it been told to you?
Dawn: It was told to me that there was a nunnery up there and one of the nuns had a baby.
She didn't want anybody to find out about it. It would be a secret. She'd been raped by one of
the fathers there, or priests or whatever. So, when the baby was born, she and the other nuns
that were there helping her smothered the baby. Somehow there was a tunnel or a basement
there, I don't know. It was buried inside the cement somewhere. Now when you go up there
it's haunted. The nun did such a terrible deed that she's not allowed to go to heaven, so she
haunts the nunnery. She's a spirit that wanders around there at night.
night.
Me: Alright. And, of course, everybody's heard about people going up to the nunnery at
Dawn: Oh, yes.
Me: Have you heard any stories about what people say is supposed to be up there?
Dawn: Oh, they say the black cloak floating around in the air, things like that. She
moans and wanders around. It's worth a thrill, but when I was a kid, all the kids going up there
for a thrill.
Me: So you say the nun was raped by a priest up there?
Dawn: That was the story, yeah.
Me (with malicious twinkle in my eye): So he was both a father and the father.
Dawn: *laughs* Yes, yes, I guess. Don't make fun of that. But I guess I always kind of
believed that because when we went to Rome with our family that was the story there too, that a
lot of the nuns, that they found babies cemented into the walls of the underground tunnels
throughout the city of Rome. So it sounds pretty believable to me.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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Tawny Jones
Logan, Utah
May, 2010
Information:
Tawny is my sister and she is a senior student at Sky View High School, age 18. She
enjoys dancing and singing and is member of the LDS church. She currently works at a local
restaurant.
Context:
This performance was collected at my home, in the kitchen, in front of my mother and a
friend of hers from Sweeden. She was very nervous as she gave the performance.
Text:
Me: So, sitting here in the comfort of my own home, I am asking you to tell me the story
of St. Ann's retreat as you have heard it.
Tawny: Well, I heard that the nuns weren't allowed to have kids or something, so the
nunnery retreat was a place where they had nuns and there was a pool that they would drown the
babies in. That's the story that mostly everyone hears and so that's what I've heard that they do.
Me: And you of course know that people go up there, or that they used to before they
surrounded it in razor wire and crazy security guards. Have you heard stories from people
who've gone up there, or say they've gone up there.
Tawny: Yes .
Me: What do they say goes on up there?
Tawny: Well, the person that I talked to who said went up there trashed the place.
Me: Okay.
Tawny: They just said it was really scary. That it felt weird.
Me: What were they expecting to happen.
Tawny: I don't know. I think they thought it was haunted.
Me: So what were they supposed to see? What sort of ghost was supposed to appear?
Tawny: Babies.
Me: Babies?
Tawny: The ones that were drowned, but they're in their older years.
Me: Really?
Tawny: Yeah.
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010
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Infonnation:
Nathan "Nate" Jones
Logan, Utah
May, 2010
Nathan is a member of the LDS church who recently returned from his mission to North
Dakota. He has lived in Utah his whole life and currently works at a Camp Chef warehouse
unloading trucks.
Context:
Nathan insisted on being interviewed when he heard that I was doing this project It was
collected in my basement and he was particularly enthusiastic.
Text:
Me: St Ann's retreat; what's the story?
Nate: Well, what I've heard is that's where the nuns and the priests would go to take it
easy_ Somehow, the nuns got pregnant and you know the nuns can't have sex, or aren't
supposed to. To cover it up they would drown the babies and then they would throw their babies
in the well. I've been there. There's a pool and there is a well, but it's all blocked off. That's
what I know of the nunnery_
Me: So you went up there, did you see any ghosts or anything, or was this after the razor
wire?
Nate: No, the razor wire was still up .
Me: Did you actually get into the nunnery?
Nate: Oh, yeah.
Me: So you didn't see any crazy security guards or anything.
Nate: No, but we did hear weird stuff.
Me: Such as?
Nate: Such as doors moving, not like voices or anything, but we did hear growling. Who
knows, maybe it was a large cat, I don't know. But maybe it was a ghost
Me: Maybe. So you didn't hear any crying babies or anything.
Nate: No, they wouldn't cry, they were being drowned.
Me: Oh, that is a good point
Russell Jones
North Logan, Ut
Utah State University
Spring 2010]]> Digitized by : Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> Digitized by: Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> legends (folk tales);]]> application/pdf;]]> 5848968 Bytes]]> eng]]> Text;]]> Logan Canyon (Utah); Cache County (Utah); United States;]]> 1970-1979; 1980-1989; 1990-1999; 20th century; 2000-2001; 2000-2009; 2010-2019; 21st century;]]> Legends;]]> legend-tripping;]]> St. Anne's Retreat
Anne Christensen
History 5700
Professor Gabbert
Utah State University
Spring 2010
•
The Nunnery
Anne Christensen
HIST 5700
5/6/2010
Folk Narrative is so much a part of life that on an almost daily basis people retell stories,
of one shape or form, to each other. We tell stories to relay life's most difficult and most
wonderful of times. If we're late for work, the reason is often related as a story, retelling the
events as they unfolded to provide an adequate and vivid excuse for our tardiness. As Bruce
Jackson says in The Story is True, "We organize the events of our lives in the form of
narrative ... Every story we tell, specifically or by implication, includes a theory about what
happened and what matters" (Jackson, 8). Legends are a part of this wide storytelling tradition.
In Cache Valley, Utah the story of St. Anne's Retreat is one of the most commonly retold
• Legends. By examining the different "Rules of Legend," the content, style, structure, and
function of several versions of St. Anne's Retreat we can come to a greater understanding of
whey the legend's popularity continues.
The story of The Nunnery, or St. Anne's Retreat, as I heard it when I was in high school,
was that the Catholic Church owned a lodge in Logan Canyon and whenever a nun got pregnant
she was sent there to have an abortion. When the babies were born, they were all drowned in a
well that was located in the middle of the lodge area and if you go there today you'll hear the
sound of babies cries coming from the well. This is just one of the many versions of liThe
Nunnery," but it contains some of the elements that almost all of the collected versions
contain; the Nuns, the death of a baby, and the presence of some sort of spirit that remains • 1
• today. It is these three elements that seem to compose of the majority of the content for this
Legend, but each legend to varying degrees.
The localization of "The Nunnery" plays a huge part in its retelling of the suspicious
events and origins of its haunted nature. While trying to find people I could interview, most
people had at least heard of the Nunnery, but many didn't know the story behind it. When
asked ffDoes everyone you know, know the story? Do most people you know, know about it?
Benjy, a seventeen year old high school student from Bear River High School replied that, "Most
people that have gone up logan Canyon," know the story (Transcription 3). The location of the
story is of vital importance in its retelling, even in the minds of those who told the story. Style
also plays a role in who the story was first collected from.
Callista Christopher began her telling of the story by saying that, "So what I heard from
• my mom when I was little was that .... "(Transcription 6) She begins her story by using the "friend
•
of a friend," rhetorical device. Jan Harold Brunvand says, "In the world of modern urban
legends there is usually no geographical or generational gap between teller and event. The
story is true; it really occurred, and recently, and always to someone else who is quite close to
the narrator, or at least "a friend of a friend" (Brunvand, 4). Callista's use of reference, who she
heard the story from, helps lay claim to the reliability of the source, it being her mom, and thus
the believability of the story. While no one expressed implicit belief in the story of the nunnery,
everyone I interviewed expressed some amount of belief in the supernatural and spiritual
occurrences that made the nunnery a haunted place.
The structure of each story differs slightly as does the content of each story. Almost the
entire story encompasses a bizarre plot twist. Pregnant nuns, which are two things that are in
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• direct opposition to each other, still function within the realm of believability, the true twist
comes at the point in which the nuns give birth and murder their children. Callista's story differs
slightly from the others because the nuns are portrayed in a positive light; rather it is only the
priest that is a wicked murderer. She says after the nun gives birth to the baby and hides it
away, lithe priest guy found out and he went, followed them up there, and he killed the baby in
the swimming pool," and then he kills the nun (Transcription 6). Though Callista's story is only
one instance, the fact that her mother was telling the story to a young girl, makes a gender
. differentiation visible. In this instance, the man, not the women are at fault. While sex is
something that anyone can be tempted by, and religiously speaking, it's forgivable, murder is
not. The murdering of children contradicts everything that a nun, or a priest, should represent.
As noted earlier, Brunvand says the story has often happened to someone who is quite close to
• the narrator. While no one character in the story is known by any of the tellers of the story, the
•
use of the Nunnery site in Logan Canyon as a place to go legend tripping helps lend the story
credibility.
All throughout high school I remember hearing stories of other teenagers going to the
Nunnery in Logan Canyon and being scared out of their mind. As I searched for people to
interview, I couldn't find anyone who had actually been. I went to my brother, whom I had
heard the story from numerous times. He recalled that, iii have known people who have gone
there. And have said they heard things, not necessarily babies crying, but they said it's freaky.
One of the most freakiest places they have ever been" (Transcription 2). He told me to call one
of his friends that he thought had been there, but that was a dead end. He hadn't ever been
there and he couldn't think of a specific person who had either. Hoping that the story still
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• resonated with teenagers today I went to my younger brother and after asking him if any of his
friends had gone up there, he said that one of them had but he didn't know what his friend had
said of the experience (Transcription 3). Ca"ista grew up in Logan and she didn't know anyone
that had actually been there. I called a few male friends from high school, thinking that if
anyone had been, they most certainly would have, and not a single person had actually been to
the Nunnery. They only knew vague stories of people they had heard about going up the
Canyon. Benjy, the only one still in high school, expressed an adamant desire to go up there and
had hoped when I first asked him about the story that I had the same thing in mind. Other than
the increased security measures taken to keep trespassers out of the grounds, I don't know why
so few people have actually been
While legend tripping may serve as one function of the story of the Nunnery, enforcing a
• belief or value is another function ofthe story. Both Kylie and Josh's recollection ofthe story
•
skirted over the sexual issue with veiled references, rather than outright statements. Kylie said,
somewhat comically, that the nunnery was, "actually an abortion clinic for nuns who weren't
really, um, standing by their vows of being a virgin" (Transcription 5). Josh said that, "Um,
apparently they were attractive nuns or locals frequented the area and the nuns got pregnant.
Because it's against their lifestyle to participate in those kind ofthings ... " (Transcription 2). Both
stories refer to the misconduct implicit in the sexual act of a nun. Even Emily's recollection of
the story, with her blunt appraisal of events shows some of the apprehension about sexual
issues. She says that, "there was a nunnery and a" the nuns got really horny, along with the
priests and the priests knocked up the nuns ... " (Transcription 1). She states the facts of the
story as she has heard them in a way that sexual issues can't be overlooked, but she does so
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• while laughing throughout her recollection. Her laughter could be interpreted as discomfort in
talking about sexual issues, or that she thinks the legend itself is funny, either way the sexual
nature of the story isn't admired.
The overwhelming religious population of Cache Valley has historically lent itselfto
advocating extremely conservative views of sexual conduct. The story of the nunnery takes that
to the extreme with associating the Catholic religion, a minority religion in northern Utah, with
sexual misconduct. If the lodge itself had been an abandoned LDS retreat would such stories
have ever begun to be circulated about past inhabitants? This is a question that can never be
answered, but it seems important in understanding why the popularity of such a story exists.
The foreignness of the Catholic Religion to many in Cache Valley can't be overlooked.
The story of the Nunnery itself is creepy. It pushes the boundaries between truth and
• fiction and makes us question the believability of such a story, but its use in life and its
•
popularity make it an important part of, most especially, adolescence in Cache Valley. Both
Benjy and Kaitlyn knew little of the story about the nuns, and the murdering of children, but
they had both heard of the haunting nature of the Nunnery itself. Whether the belief that the
Nunnery is haunted or the story came first, it's apparent that it's a legend that will continue to
affect those all who have heard it and that they in turn will continue to tell it .
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•
•
•
Emily Christensen
Emily: Go?
Anne: Yeah, just tell me the story.
Emily: Okay.
Anne: What you've heard
Emily: Once upon a time, [laughing] in a dark and dreary land [laughing].. Just kidding.
Anne: Okay, tell me for real. [laughing]
Emily: Well, there was a nunnery and all the nuns got really horny, along with the priests and the
priests knocked up all the nuns and then the nuns had babies and they suffocated them and just
threw them in like the little sewer tunnel things under the nunnery and now there's creepy nun
babies that scream and crap. And that's about it. [laughing] That's all I know.
Anne: Okay
•
•
•
Josh Christensen
Anne: Alright, just tell me the story, like you've heard it.
Josh: My understanding of the nunnery in Logan Canyon, but like, I've googled stuff so I know
other things too.
Anne: That's okay, just tell me the story you've heard first.
Josh: The story is that there's a nunnery up Logan canyon. Urn, apparently they were attractive
nuns or locals frequented the area and the nuns got pregnant. Because it's against their lifestyle
to participate in those kinds of things they would have their babies in secret then they would
drown their babies in the pool that was up there. The rumor is that you can go up there at night.
And, uh, you can go towards the middle of the nunnery, and I guess they filled in the pool or
something, but if you go and stand in the middle of the places you can hear babies crying.
Anne: Did you know anyone that went up there in high school?
Josh: I have known people who have gone there. And have said they have heard things, not
necessarily babies crying, but they said that it's freaky. One of the most freakiest places they
have ever been.
Anne: Alright, thanks.
• Benjy Christensen
Anne: Okay, I'm just asking you what have you heard? What's the story you've heard?
Benjy: Urn, Just that it's haunted.
Anne: That's all you've heard?
Benjy: Well I heard one story. A kid's dad went up there and urn he said there was like scratch
marks, and urn there was a fresh loaf of bread while they were up there.
Anne: Oh really? I've never heard that.
Anne: Do you know why it's called the nunnery?
Benjy: Cause of the nuns ... [laughing] that lived there.
Anne: That's all you know about it? Just that it's haunted?
Benjy: Yeah
Anne: Have any of your friends gone there?
• Benjy: Urn, One of them.
•
Anne: Just one of them? What did he say?
Benjy: I don't know [laughing]
Anne: Urn, Does everyone you know, know the story? Do most people you know, know about
it?
Benjy: Most people that have gone up Logan Canyon I think ...
Anne: Know about it.
Benjy: Yeah, but.. .
Benjy: A lot of people are, uh, don't get out much [laughing]
. Anne: Do you believe that it's haunted?
Benjy: Yeah.
Benjy: That was intimidating .
•
•
•
Kaitlyn Faraone
Anne: Okay, what have you heard about the nunnery.
Kaitlyn: I've heard that the nunnery in Logan Canyon is haunted and if you go you can feel a
presence there. I've also heard it's especially bad at Halloween time, you have to be careful then.
Anne: See that was easy .
•
•
•
Kylie White
Anne: Okay, what have you heard?
Kylie: Well, what I've heard about the nunnery is that it's haunted because it used to be a hotel
getaway for Hollywood stars but then the Catholic Church bought it out and then it became the
nunnery where these priests and nuns would go and like escape for a little while. It was kind of
like a vacation for them. But then in reality it was just a cover-up because it was actually an
abortion clinic for nuns who weren't really, urn, standing by their vows of being a virgin. So,
instead of being condemned and having babies they would go there and have abortions. And so,
that's kinda what I heard about it. And then, somehow the children there, I don't really know if
like all the nuns had abortions so they wanted to stay there with their kids, or something, I don't
really know, it's like two different stories. The one with children there, one of the nuns went
crazy, or all of the nuns, I'm not real sure, but they killed all of these little children. Whenever
you go to the nunnery, you have to hop the fence and everything, and you can feel either the
babies that were aborted or the children that the nuns killed, you can feel like their presence and
see them playing and acting like they are real children there anyways and not being dead. It's
scary.
•
•
•
Callista Christopherson
Anne: Just tell me what you know.
Callista: Okay. So what I heard from my mom when I was little was that the nunnery was like a
normal nunnery and that the little priest man got one of the nuns pregnant. And she like kept the
baby full term and had the baby and blah blah and then she gave birth to the baby and hid it up in
the woods behind the nunnery and had all these nuns like go back and check on it every once in a
while and the priest guy found out and he went, followed them up there, and he killed the baby in
the swimming pool. And then he came back [laughing] and like killed the nun up in the woods.
And .. [laughing, He's all judging on us]. So you're supposed to be able to like feel the baby in the
swimming pool. There's supposed to be a cold spot where the baby was murdered And the nuns
like hunting, like hunting, what is that? haunting the place.
Anne: Thank you
Callista: You are so welcome.]]> Digitized by : Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> Digitized by: Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library.]]> legends (folk tales);]]> application/pdf;]]> 3708712 Bytes]]> eng]]> Text;]]> Logan Canyon (Utah); Cache County (Utah); United States;]]> 1970-1979; 1980-1989; 1990-1999; 20th century; 2000-2001; 2000-2009; 2010-2019; 21st century;]]>