Dolgner delves into Dahlonega's haunted history

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Dolgner delves into Dahlonega's haunted history
August 5, 2009
by Matt Aiken
The Dahlonega Nugget

The empty white house on the corner of South Park and Choice streets may have been on the market for more than two years, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it's been unoccupied.

In fact, according to author Beth Dolgner, it's far from empty.

“This house,” says Dolgner, while sitting on the steps of the aging wooden porch. “seems like it was probably the most active as far as ghosts actually showing up.”

Dolgner should know a haunted haunt when she sees one. She's spent the last year delving into the world of the suspected supernatural while writing her newly released first book, “Georgia Spirits and Specters.”

Her work is a glimpse at ghostly gathering sites throughout Georgia. And while she details the spooky haunted houses of anywhere from Cumming to Convington, Dahlonega was one of the few cities which warranted an entire chapter dedicated to its thriving non-living population

“I just knew Dahlonega had a lot of ghost stories,” says the Atlanta resident.

Last Thursday she returned to the South Park home, and the former site of Rick's restaurant, to recall her tales of local ghost hunting with Mechelle Singletary of Dahlonega Ghost Tours and the members of the Dahlonega Paranormal Investigators, including Holly Prince and Casey Couch.

“It looks different in the day,” she remarks while walking through the front yard.

It was last October when Dolgner first learned of the history of the nearly 100-year-old home and the several spooks that are supposed to occupy it.

She writes of the curly headed boy who was spotted by several restaurant staffers, as well as the former-North Georgia professor who still packs up his ghostly belongings and heads to work each day.

In the book Dolgner wittily notes that Coldwell Banker doesn't seem to mention the possibly inclusion of a bonus spirit to go along with the bonus room. In fact, she adds that one couple decided to take their house hunting elsewhere after feeling a stranger presence in the attic.

“Maybe the ghosts are just waiting for someone who doesn't mind sharing their dream home with a few extra roommates,” writes Dolgner.

This supposed spectral site was just one stop on a ghostly tour through town.

Throughout the evening Dolgner visited the Hall Block building, where a playful spirit has been known to tinker with the wind-chimes at Hummingbird Lane while messing with the stereo of business owner Amy Strickland. “Affectionately known as Bethy, she seems content where she is, and she's become a welcome part of the art gallery,” writes Dolgner. “ ... Bethy is also fond of the song ‘You are My Sunshine.' Whenever a certain Carly Simon CD that has that song on it is playing in the shop's stereo, it will inevitably begin playing Bethy's tune over and over again.”

Then there's the Corkscrew Cafe, which might not look too spooky from the outside, but hides a strange abandoned jail cell downstairs.

“There was a weird energy in there and I don't claim to be that intuitive, but the hair on my arms started to raise,” she said. “It was a creepy feeling and I know some other people in our group were kind of feeling the same way. Almost like we didn't belong there.”

Dolgner says that, prior to writing this book, she never considered herself all that sensitive to specters.

“I didn't disbelieve but I'd never had anything happen to me that convinced me of the existence of ghosts,” she says.

And now?

“It's turned me into a believer,” she says with a laugh.

In particular there was one night in an abandoned mill in Whitesburg where the spirits swayed her.

“It was with a group called Ghost Rider Investigations Team,” she said. “There were so many different things that happened during the course of the night, there was no other explanation I could come up with than it was paranormal. It was a fun experience though.”

Dolgner gives a thorough account of that night which included a mysterious knock on the door and the strange whimpering of an alleged ghost dog.

Despite her choice of spooky subject matter, Dolgner admits that she's always been afraid of the dark. Yet she said she was surprised to find that she was never actually frightened during her otherworldly investigations.

“I really expected to be scared because I'm a wimp,” she said. “ ... But it was quite the opposite. It was very exciting, kind of thrilling, when anything paranormal happened.”

Unless you count the one goosebump-inducing day when she momentarily feared that her work might have followed her home.

“All of the sudden the speakers from my husband's computer in his office just started blaring music,” she said. “So I figured that this would be the great time to go out and check the mail.”

Once outside, Dolgner decided to continue to “check the mail” until her husband returned. It was then, after further investigation, that she decided to assign blame to a more substantial source.

	John M says:	2009-11-17 07:17:22
	Computer Speakers can and do "play music" if there is damage to the amplifier. They often then pickup local radio stations which is rather annoying but not at all paranormal. BTW, I do believe in ghosts as I once witnessed them levitating and moving objects. Now THAT convinced me that they really do exist - whatever they are.