GHOSTLY CAST OF CHARACTERS:
MISS MARGARET – This graceful lady is our most frequent visitor. She’s always wearing a white, Victorian-style dress, complete with high lace collar, Ieg-o-mutton sleeves, and a full length skirt. She wears her hair swept up into a bun on top of her head. Ordinarily, we’re treated to her visits during a stage production, and she seems to focus her energies on and around the stage. This has led to speculation that in real life, our visitor was an actress who used to live near here. Miss Margaret Gething, a charming, beautiful young singer and actress, lived with her mother on Guenther Street. When a touring show came to San Antonio in the early 1900’s, Miss Gething stepped into a part vacated by an ailing actress. She toured with the show, finally winding up in New York. She stayed on to build a career on the legitimate stage. Miss Margaret died in 1975 and the lady-in-white began visiting the building one year later. We like to think it’s her. Her house is open for tours during Fiesta week and is completely filled with Victoriana.
LITTLE EDDIE – This little scamp is mischief personified. Those who have caught a glimpse of him, tell us he’s a red-head … and from the types of pranks and practical jokes he plays on the long-suffering kitchen help, we guess his age to be from eight to twelve. Like most kids, he can be a real pain and – like most kids – he settles down once he gets your attention. A local psychic told us his name, while another connects him to a child’s death on a long-since vanished playground. Another tells us that he arrived via an antique rattan wheel chair once used as a prop for a play.
THE OLD MAN AND WOMAN – Some of our more genteel visitors, they’re usually glimpsed in or near the stage or on the bell tower at the front of the building. Our psychic friends have told us that the woman is named Henrietta. She was possibly a servant or employee of Miss Margaret and did sewing. We believe her to be the cause of many of our costume appearances and disappearances.
OTHERS - We actually aren’t sure if we have one man or two (or more?). One of the men may possibly be named Alvin and have been an actor in one of our plays. Alvin, who was a partner in a gallery at Blue Star, two blocks down from the theatre, was cast in a performance of “Born Yesterday.” On opening night he thought he might have the flu. On the next evening he didn’t make the actors “call.” When the stage manager went to his home to find him, he was almost comatose. Days later he passed away in the hospital from an unknown virus. This ghost appears often after late rehearsals.
Our “visitors” have various ways of letting us know they’re around:
Cold spots suddenly develop in the air
· Lights go on and off by themselves
· Cooks are shoved into the refrigerator
· Washed and draining dishes suddenly move back into the dishwater by themselves
· Doors open and close … or lock and unlock themselves
· Unusual noises persist
Regardless of who – or what – is responsible for these occurrences, the restaurant staff just works around them. Once in awhile you’ll hear a cook shout, “Now you just stop that!” and everyone knows we’ve got a visitor in the place.
If you’re skeptical, (who isn’t?) ask to see the photos of the “lady-in-white” caught on Polaroid film by an out-of-state guest one summer day in 1990!
We can’t explain our visitors! We’re not sure we want to.
But we do know one thing for sure – our visitors are definitely Friendly spirits!