Halloween traditions – dressing up in costumes, trick or treating and telling ghost stories. San Antonio is full of urban legends like the ghost tracks on the southside. The Legend says that if you park your car near the railroad tracks, pour baby powder over it and place the car in neutral, a group of ghost children will come to push your vehicle up and over the tracks. After the vehicle makes it over the tracks, people say they find fingerprints left in the baby powder. It is said the children are from a fatal school bus crash that occurred in the 1900s on the tracks. A bus carrying kids stalled on the tracks and a train came along and killed them all.
There is the story about The Crockett Hotel that sits just across from the haunted Alamo. This is one the most haunted hotels in the city which was once the site of Texas’ bloodiest battle. The site of the hotel is actually where all of that bloodshed took place. Ghosts are often seen here.
Or what about Victoria’s Black Swan Inn. This is considered one of the most haunted places in the U.S. The site served as a Native American encampment, with many visitors saying they’ve seen their spirits in the woods. A couple, Jolene Woods and Park Street previously lived here. Jolene died of cancer and Park later killed himself. Jolene can be seen walking to the gazebo in the front yard, while a girl named Sarah is said to communicate via Ouija board.
There is also Mary Howell, the original owner of the Grey Moss Inn, who died more than 30 years ago. Employees say they’ve smelled her signature rose-scented perfume. Others have seen a vision of an older woman they say looked like Howell.Sometimes, when employees made decisions or do things that Howell wouldn’t have liked, weird things happen. Items will swing, glasses will fall to the floor or tables will overturn on their own.
What about Bigfoot at Kelly Air Force Base in the ‘70s? He was reportedly seen numerous times in the San Antonio area from November 1974 to August 1976. Supposedly two sightings happened near Kelly AFB; one witness saw a seven-foot-tall brown figure run out of his backyard, a few days later his neighbor saw a creature sitting outside her home. What are the best ghost stories you heard or told growing up? Let’s talk about it…
Gene A. Gomez: “The story of El Camaroncito. The night El Diablo went to Dance on the west side. Legend has it a handsome stranger who appeared at the El Camaroncito NightClub, on Old Highway 90, on Halloween of 1975. He was a fabulous dancer that mesmerized the ladies. During the night, one of his dance partners looked down at his feet and started screaming. They his feet had transformed into clawed chicken feet while others claim it was goat’s hooves (you know, like the devil). He ran into the bathroom where he escaped out a window, but left a cloud of smoke smelling of sulfur. Employees years later said there is a lingering smell now and then.”
Norma Sanchez Martinez: “Donkey Lady Bridge. Legend says that there was a woman who raised donkeys. One day, one bit a child. The father of the child and other men on a bridge, attacked the lady and she fell (or was pushed) into the river below and drowned .It is said that if you stop on that bridge on Applewhite Road at night, you may hear the heehaw of a donkey or feel the back of the vehicle dip, as if a donkey jumped on. It is the woman with her hoof-life hands and feet ready to pounce on her victims, ripping them apart.”
Feliz Flores: “My time there was no money so we made our own costumes.”
Theresa Morales Acuna: “The story I tell my kids is of when my ex boyfriend came looking for me again on Halloween night, and 35 years later he’s still here. He gave me four little goblins.”
Angelica Rico: “Red eyes in the window and the Black hand.”
Frances Potter : “La llorona the weeping woman.. She was a person. A wife. A daughter. A mother of two. She was one of us. It so happened that the father, her one true love, had abandoned her for another woman, breaking her heart and her mind, making her an outcast in her own community. She became determined to get revenge, paying him back in the most horrific way imaginable—leading their children down to the water and drowning them both, one after the other. She was disgusted at the sight of what she had done, she took her own life in those very same waters. Her spirit, trapped for eternity, now roams the, crying, wailing, searching desperately for her lost children, or any other unfortunate person who happens to cross her path. She is seen at night, dressed all in white with long black hair falling over her face. .She finds children that are alone , making promises, luring them toward the water, replaying over and over what she did to her children.”
Alice Rodriguez: “La Lechuza, the Spanish word for owl is about an old woman or witch who transforms into a giant barn owl, sometimes with the head of a witch, and swoops down on misbehaving children or drunk adults and screeches. That screech is said to be a bad omen.”
Denise G: “The Menger Hotel is said to be haunted by Sallie White, a young maid who was shot outside the hotel on March 28, 1876, by her jealous husband. White died two days later, and has since allegedly been seen walking through the Menger halls and walls as if still on the job. And by King Ranch founder Richard King. The former steamboat captain famous for his sprawling ranch south of San Antonio in Kingsville always stayed at the Menger when he visited the Alamo City. He died at the Menger in 1885 and even had his funeral service in the front parlor. It is said his spirit is seen wandering the hotel.”
Raymon Guiterrez: “ Bloody Mary…All you have to do is stand in a dimly lit bathroom, stare into the mirror, and chant her name 13 times. “Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary…” Then, a ghostly woman should appear in the mirror. Bloody Mary is sometimes alone and other times holding a dead baby. Often, legend states, she’ll do nothing but stare. But occasionally, she’ll leap from the glass and scratch the person who called her name.”
