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Boothbay Opera House
Boothbay Harbour, Maine
The opera house was built in 1894, and was intended to be a nineteenth-century civic center. The building cost $14,000 and was built in seventy days. When it was completed, the Masons and Knights of Pythias occupied the upstairs, while the town office occupied the downstairs auditorium. Over the years the building has seen many organizations come and go and was almost torn down. It was once a movie theatre, a school, a YMCA, a recycling centre, a mall and it most recently the building housed a restaurant and antique shop. Since the mid 1900s there have been reports of strange activity in the second floor room that was a meeting place for the Knights of Pythias. The piano in the room is said to play on its own. Nobody is sure who the ghost is but some believe it is the ghost of a man that used to play the piano for the theatre in the early 1900s.
Seguin Island Light Station
Seguin Island, Maine
The original Seguin Island Light was built in 1797. It was replaced in1820, and again with the present structure in 1857. The light was manually monitored until it was automated in 1985. It stands approximately 186 feet above sea level making it the highest elevated lighthouse in Maine. During the winter months, the island the light house sits on becomes very desolate and lonely. It is also very cold and can be very boring. The new lighthouse keeper brought his wife with him to live on the island while he tended to the light. She would complain daily about being bored and not having anything to do. The keeper decided to buy her a piano to keep her occupied. Before the winter arrived he had the piano delivered to the island. His wife was very pleased with her gift and she played it constantly. The only problem was that she could only play from sheet music and she only had one song. Day and night she would play the same song over and over. The light keeper couldn’t take it anymore so he took an axe and destroyed the piano. He then used the axe to hack up his wife and finally turned the axe on himself. It is said that faint piano music can still be heard on the island. The apparition of a woman can be seen wandering around the island and also the apparition of a man can be seen in the lighthouse. It is also reported that objects in the house move around without any interaction from a human hand.
Biddeford City Theatre
Biddeford, Maine
The Biddeford Opera House opened in 1860 but in 1894, was destroyed by a fire. It was decided to rebuild it, and with a design by noted architect John Calvin Stevens, the new Opera House opened about a year later. Many famous people performed at the opera house including Roy Rogers, Fred Astaire and Al Jolson. In the late 1930s the opera house was transformed into a movie house and remained that way until 1965 when it was closed due to deteriorating state of the building. In 1978 the opera house was restored and reopened under the name City Theatre for live entertainment as opposed to movies. There are two ghosts that are said to haunt the theatre. This first ghost is believed to be that of a man who used to run the theatre in the thirties and forties. He has been seen throughout the theatre and he is also believed to be the one behind all the strange occurrences while the theatre was being renovated. Workmen’s tools were thrown around, and freshly painted walls were ruined. The other ghost is that of Eva Gray, an opera singer. In 1904 after her encore, Eva collapsed in her dressing room and died of a heart attack. She left behind a husband and her three year old daughter. The apparition has been seen numerous times by staff and actors alike. She is known to make the overhead stage lights swing back and forth, and turn lights off and on. People have also reported that they hear sounds of footsteps, soft whispering and the beautiful voice of a woman singing.
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