Mary Ellen MacDonald & The Haunting of Caledonia Mills

Dark Histories

Ben Cutmore

History

4.8 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 8 August 2023

⏱️ 64 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the winter of 1922, a bizarre series of events fell across an isolated Nova Scotian farmhouse, leaving the locals grappling with a set of mysteries that were as terrifying as they were exciting. Unseen forces braided horses' tails and moved livestock, while bluish lights danced eerily around the property and soon, the situation escalated to a series of unexplained fires igniting within the farmhouse, forcing the occupants to flee their home amidst the harsh Canadian winter. As the press descended onto the farm, a series of investigations sought to dig deeper into the events, hoping to find answers for the phenomena and exonerate the occupants in the eyes of the locals, though their successes were mixed in their results and the answers given would prove to be inconclusive for many, leaving Canadian folklore with a new mystery. SOURCES Prince, Walter F. (1922) An Investigation of Poltergeist & Other Phenomena Near Antigonish. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research. Volume 16. pp.422-441. ASPR. NY, USA. Whidden, Harold B. (1922) Statement of Fact of My Experiences at the MacDonald Homestead. Self Published. Canada Graham, Monica (2013) Fire Spook: The Mysterious Nova Scotia Haunting. Nimbus Publishing, Canada. Colombo, John Robert (2000) Ghost Stories of Canada. Dundurn Press, Toronto, Canada. Whidden, David Graham (1930) Genealogical Record of the Antigonish Whiddens. NS, Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Antigonish Farming Community Is Aroused By Mysterious Actions Believed To Be The Work Of Spooks. The Evening Mail, 19 Jan 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Story Of Spooks Setting Fires In Antigonish Farmers Home Confirmed. The Evening Mail, 24 Jan 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Eye Witnesses Tell Of Mysterious Fires In Home Of Antigonish Farmer. The Evening Mail, 25 Jan 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Antigonish Chief Of Police Puzzled Over Mysterious Fires. The Evening Mail, 03 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Where Detective And Reporter Will Live Until Mystery Is Solved. The Evening Mail, 04 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Detective Carroll Becomes More Mystified Over Mysterious Fires At Caledonia Mills. The Evening Mail, 06 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Detective And Reporter Leave For House Of Mystery As New Rumours Of FIre Origin Open Up. The Evening Mail, 07 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Detective And Reporter Are Mystified As They Probe Mysterious Fires And Play Forty-Fives In House Of Mystery. The Evening Mail, 11 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Mystery At Caledonia Mills Deepens As Detective And Reporter Get Slap. The Evening Mail, 13 Feb 1922. Canada. The Evening Mail (1922) Detective And Reporter Driven From House Of Mystery And Move To Barn To Start Probe Into Strange Antics There. The Evening Mail, 14 Feb 1922. Canada. The New York Times (1922) Scientist To Seek Antigonish Ghost. The New York Times, 26 Feb 1922. NY, USA.------------- For almost anything, head over to the podcasts hub at darkhistories.com Support the show by using our link when you sign up to Audible: http://audibletrial.com/darkhistories or visit our Patreon for bonus episodes and Early Access: https://www.patreon.com/darkhistories The Dark Histories books are available to buy here: http://author.to/darkhistories Dark Histories merch is available here: https://bit.ly/3GChjk9 Connect with us on Facebook: http://facebook.com/darkhistoriespodcast Or find us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/darkhistories & Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dark_histories/ Or you can contact us directly via email at [email protected] or join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/cmGcBFf The Dark Histories Butterfly was drawn by Courtney, who you can find on Instagram @bewildereye Music was recorded by me © Ben Cutmore 2017 Other Outro music was Paul Whiteman & his orchestra with Mildred Bailey - All of me (1931). It's out of copyright now, but i

Transcript

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0:00.0	In the winter of 1922, a bizarre series of events fell across an isolated Nova Scotian
0:06.2	farmhouse, leaving the locals grappling with a set of mysteries that were as terrifying
0:11.2	as they were exciting. Unseen forces, braided horses' tails, and moved livestock, while
0:17.4	bluish lights dumped eerily around the property. And soon, the situation escalated to a series
0:22.9	of unexplained fires igniting within the farmhouse, forcing the occupants to flee their home
0:28.5	amidst a harsh Canadian winter. As the press descended onto the farm, a series of investigations
0:34.8	sought to dig deeper into the events, hoping to find answers for the phenomena and exonerate
0:39.9	the occupants in the eyes of the locals. Though their successes were mixed in their results,
0:45.4	and the answers given would prove to be inconclusive for many, leaving Canadian folklore with
0:51.2	a new mystery. Hello and welcome to Dark History, season 7, episode 16. I'm your host
1:05.0	as always, Ben. It's good to be back. Before we get started, I do want to just give a quick
1:10.4	heads up, anyone that listens on Spotify. That whole saga has finally come to an end, and
1:15.6	I believe you should be able to find the entire back catalogue is back on Spotify, all
1:20.0	the episodes back on Spotify. If you don't know what I'm talking about and you don't
1:23.0	listen on Spotify, don't worry about it. It was just an issue that, like a technical issue,
1:27.5	we had that seemed to affect all the Spotify episodes. For a while, the podcast was
1:33.0	disappeared and then it was back, but missing about 150 episodes. But now we're all back.
1:40.3	Everything's there, so hopefully that can put an end to that little saga. Anyway, let's
1:44.8	just move on. This week's episode is called Mary Ellen McDonald and the haunting of
1:50.7	Caledonia Meals. Lying in the northeastern area of Canada's Nova Scotia, Antigonish County
1:58.8	has a long history of human settlement with evidence of an indigenous population that
2:03.0	dates back almost 9,000 years. Acadian French and Irish made up much of the early European
	...

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