Dale Jarvis is coming ashore with his ghost stories in his most recent book, Haunted Houses of Newfoundland and Labrador.
It’s the ninth book of folklore and tales of the inexplicable on the Rock and the Big Land for Jarvis, and he’s tapped into the foundation of Canada’s youngest province.
This one is specifically more buildings,” Jarvis said, during a September phone call just outside of Gros Morne National Park. “I’ve gone into ghost ships and strange occurrences and things like that, but in this one, I really wanted to focus on properties.”
Combining his love of ghost stories with his appreciation for architecture, Haunted House gave Jarvis the perfect opportunity to explore and showcase various structures from across the province. While most of the stories involve houses, there are also tales about a haunted mine and a haunted hotel, adding to the mix.
Mind you, the mine in Jarvis’ new book is not the one of infamy found on Bell Island. This one is near Betts Cove, which is a two-hour drive north of Robert’s Arm, the home of Newfoundland’s cryptid, Cressie.
“The entire community is a ghost town now, but there are some really interesting stories about the things miners had a great fear of things that were supposedly happening in the mine,” he said, adding it’s a sunny morning where he is in Rocky Harbour.
He was visiting the province’s west coast for a conference and series of meetings with museums to talk about “spooky stories and bumps in the night”.
Connecting with people is the best way to collect spine-chilling stories about Newfoundland and Labrador, and it’s how he collected the story of hidden treasure on the shores of Quidi Vidi Lake in St. John’s.
“If you ask people today where it is, they won’t know because the area has been developed over the years,” Jarvis said with a laugh.
About 120 years ago, there was a legend of treasure buried on a particular property. As with all tales of buried treasure, there was said to be a ghostly guardian watching over it. However, this guardian was willing to reveal the treasure’s location to a woman who lived in a house near Bennetts Grove.
If that wasn’t odd enough, Jarvis added, the woman had a black cat. Every time this cat was outside, the ghost would follow it back into the house. The sightings of this pirate guardian happened through the late 1800s and into the 1930s.
“It was a very popular legend, but it’s kind of faded from memory,” he said. “That one was really fun to dig into.”
It was those forgotten stories that Jarvis enjoyed kicking up from the graveyards of memory, especially from outside of the provincial capital.
“I make sure there’s a good selection of stuff from outside of St. John’s as well,” he added. “I love finding these older ghost stories that people have forgotten about.”
One particular tale is about a spot known as Rohan’s Cottage. It was a small abode located halfway between Harbour Grace and Carbonear, in the Avalon Peninsula’s northern appendage, west of Conception Bay.
The tale focuses on a local gentleman who was a mail carrier. Tobias Leahy would regularly make the trip on his coach and he would recount his ghostly encounter with the kids of Harbour Grace. He would pass a haunted cottage on his way to Carbonear, and he would blow his bugle to announce his presence.
Well, it attracted some added attention from a ghost who would sit with him in his mail carrier. Of course, kids would be drawn in by the storytelling of Leahy, but leave a little shaken, if not stirred.
Haunted Houses is the fourth book in his Haunted series, which includes Haunted Shores, Haunted Grounds and Haunted Waters.
“This might be it for the Haunted series,” Jarvis said, with a laugh. “We’ll see.”
Haunted Houses of Newfoundland and Labrador is available at bookstores and online through Flanker Press. For those in St. John’s, Jarvis is holding his book launch at 1 p.m. on October 5 at Chapters (70 Kenmount Road).