Edhat Staff
By the edhat staff
Halloween is mostly about two things, costumes and candy. But once you’re dressed up and cruising on a sugar high, the spooky and haunting stories tend to come out. We want to hear yours!
Every town has stories of ghosts and hauntings, but what are Santa Barbara’s?
We’ve heard rumors about distant voices in Old Mission Santa Barbara, flickering lights on nearly every house on Brinkerhoff Ave, the historic trolley crash, and the lingering presence at Summerland’s Big Yellow House.
But… what have you heard or experienced? Share your stories in the comment section.
Now this isn’t my story, but a friend of mine told me this and he’s not one to lie or believe in the supernatural. Me either, but I believe him. My buddy, a retired Marine, is a no nonsense kinda guy, quiet, but a real straight shooter. Anyway, he took his wife to eat at the Big Yellow House. This was years ago when they were still open serving food. They sat at a table and not many other people were around them in that section. He started to get a weird feeling, couldn’t describe it but just said he felt off all of a sudden and it wouldn’t go away. He didn’t say anything to his wife but excused himself and walked outside to see if he was going to be sick, but as soon as he walked out the door he felt ok. So he thought it passed and went back in. As soon as he entered the dining room, it hit him again. He thought it was weird but pushed through it.
They get their food and while he looks down to start eating, he feels pressure on his shoulders, as if they’re large hands. He’s sitting with his back facing a wall so there’s no way anyone would be behind him but he shakes it off and turns around. Nothing there. He still doesn’t say anything to his wife who thinks he’s acting odd.
A little while later he sees this large guy at the far end of the dining room, standing in the corner just glaring at him. He doesn’t look at him directly but can see him in the corner of his eye. Tall, big guy, arms crossed, dark skin. He asked his wife if she could see the guy in the corner, she turns around and says no. So my buddy gets up and walks outside and has never been back.
~Bob on the Scanner
The Big Yellow House has a longtime reputation for ghosts.
People are so gullible.
This happened to me;
While working at a friends house doing landscaping..(goleta)
I was in the back yard raking..
From my peripheral, I detected motion.
I never just react to things quickly, so I carefully turned my head..
And watched, as an old lady walked past me, without looking, & dissipated into the ivy-covered fence separating the yards.
Ok, I said, & finished work.
When I asked the homeowner “Who’s the old lady in the back yard”?, she feigned ignorance, but eventually asked “You saw her”?!..
Yes, I said..
I was informed that they had purchased the home from an elderly man, whore deceased wife was buried in the yard.
Only saw her the 1 time I was working near her grave.
Years ago I lived in an old Victorian house a few blocks off State. The house was chopped into a few different apartments and all my neighbors were relatively quiet and we were all friendly. One Thanksgiving weekend the place was completely empty except for me. I had the front window so I knew who was coming and going and anyone who came over (landlords or maintenance) would park in the back lot. The sun had just set, I was reading a book and getting ready for bed and I hear these big heavy boots walking around in the floor above me.
An older lady lived there, rarely any visitors, she was at her daughters house for the weekend. I kept hearing it, like someone was walking around and dragging a trunk or something heavy over the floorboards. I called her and she said no one should be there but she hid a key if I wanted to check. So I found the key and used a flashlight, went up to her apartment and looked around. Nothing was out of place, everything looked fine. All the windows were closed, I checked closets in case there was an intruder, nothing. I locked it up and went back into my apartment. Ten minutes later, the same sounds again. So I ran up as soon as I heard it and opened her door, again nothing. It went on and on that night and I did my best to ignore it.
The next day I called the landlord and asked if there was any work being done or pipe issue or anything. They said no but would send their handyman who had worked at the property for years. I meet with him and explain what I heard and he just laughs and heads back to his truck.
“Well what was it?” I asked.
“Oh that’s just George,” he said. “The former owner of the house. The apartment above yours was his bedroom. He likes to move things around from time to time.”
Then he left…
I told my neighbor and she said she’s never heard anything but it still weirds me out.
Years ago in the late 90s, a friend who I had just recently met at the time was moving out of town and asked if I’d be interested in renting her apartment. When I came to check out the place – the top half of an 1880s Victorian a few blocks off State Street, I was instantly smitten.
It had an ocean view, and the rent was cheap (imagine that). Granted, it was run down and drafty with no screens on the windows, but at the time, I was a punky, artsy 20-something. Who cared when there was a large one-bedroom apartment with an ocean view to be had!
My friend asked if I wanted to come over on the day she was moving to see if there were some things in the house I wanted to keep that she didn’t want to take with her.
Some items in question were a few spirit balls (they looked like large metallic Christmas ball ornaments) hanging from the pitched ceiling. At the time, I didn’t know what they were. She said they warded off bad energy, and because I loved how cheery and funky they looked, I said sure, I’ll keep them.
The other thing I agreed to keep for her in the house was a wooden cross above the bedroom door. Because she was fairly religious, I just thought this was another nice blessing she wanted to leave me with.
A few months later, my boyfriend moved in with me.
One night, I was playing my keyboard through headphones in the bedroom because I didn’t want to bother my boyfriend who was watching tv at the time. At one point, I felt the floor give and move like someone had walked across the carpet and was standing right behind me. I even felt the air move. Thinking it was my boyfriend, I became embarrassed and turned around to ask him, “Why are you watching me?”
But as I turned around, there was no one there. I yanked off my headphones and ran out of the room, my heart racing. My boyfriend was at the other end of the apartment, sitting on the couch in the living room, still watching tv. There. Was. Someone. In. The. Bedroom. I couldn’t shake it, and it took me half an hour to venture back into the room.
Sometime later on, my boyfriend and I broke up, and I was living in the apartment by myself.
One night I had a terrible dream, and as I woke up and rubbed my eyes, I looked at the foot of the bed to see a man staring at me. He looked like he was from a black-and-white photo with a pale green cast. He also looked to be of Asian descent with slicked-back hair, a tailored button-down shirt, and belted pants – like a well-dressed man from the 40s or 50s.
He stared at me curiously, almost in a friendly manner, as if to say, “How did you end up here?”
And then he vanished.
I woke myself up screaming – or was I already awake?
Regardless, I screamed so loud that the neighbor who lived in an apartment in the neighboring house across the driveway called 911. I heard the voice of my neighbor outside, down below my window on the street. She was looking up at my window and describing the screaming to the dispatcher on the other end. I called down to her to say everything was okay – I had a bad dream, and I was horribly sorry.
I was utterly horrified with embarrassment and just simply horrified. It had been a warm night, and I had had my window open, so my voice must have carried.
Later on, I talked to my neighbor who had called 911. She was an older woman who had lived across from my apartment for at least 20 or 30 years and had a lot of stories about the neighborhood and how it had changed. My landlord was her landlord, too. He owned the Victorian that her apartment was in.
At the time, I was too embarrassed to talk about the ghost I swore I saw, as I didn’t know exactly what had happened that night. Dream? Most likely, but me rubbing my eyes to still see a man at the end of my bed must have been one hell of a vivid dream to have me screaming that loud.
I asked her who owned our houses before our recent landlord, and she said, “Oh, it was our landlord’s parents. They had moved here from China and bought the two houses in the 40s. And then our landlord’s dad had a heart attack and died in the courtyard by this orange tree sometime in the 50s or 60s.”
About 20 years ago I was watching a friend’s house on Padaro Lane while he and his wife were on vacation. It was an old, rustic cabin that was built in the 30s I believe and it since been demolished with a new home now in its place. Anyway, one night I was on the computer and their cat was rubbing against my leg. Periodically I would reach down and pet him. All of the sudden I look down and the cat’s hair is all puffed up and he’s staring intensely into the living room behind me. I look over my shoulder to see a plant by the fireplace visibly shaking and no windows are open. It ends right after I started looking at it. Shortly after that I went to bed. Right after turning out the light, I heard what sounded like a finger tap on my door. I waited and heard it a few more times. Just a single tap and then nothing for a minute. I check the door and the rest of the house but everything is fine. Finally I decide if it’s a ghost, it can’t hurt me and I go to sleep. The tapping happens a couple more nights but I just ignore it.
On the weekend my girlfriend comes up from LA to stay with me. She had always had a big fear of ghosts, having had many bad dreams about ghosts in the past. That night she starts getting a really uneasy feeling. At one point, she swears she sees what she thinks is a mist in the hallway. I see nothing but I tell her it’s fine. If it’s a ghost it can’t hurt us. We go to bed and the tapping starts right away and it’s more frequent and intense. She’s getting more uneasy. Pretty soon it sounds like fingers rubbing or sliding along the door. It increases and it seems like the tapping and sliding is going around all four walls. It’s very unsettling and we both comment that we feel almost like we’re in a dream. Both of us feeling kind of groggy and out of it suddenly.
This bedroom has a window facing south across an old tennis court and beyond that the bluffs that lead to the beach. All of the sudden, from out of the window we see what look like beams from headlights shining across the tennis court from the neighbor’s yard to the right. Their yard is mostly grass so I assume it’s a car turning around in their driveway. Suddenly the light gets brighter and soon we see light itself. It quickly zooms into our yard, hovers for a split second about 10 feet above the ground, just beyond the tennis court. It then flashes our window twice, lighting up the room. Right after that it shoots straight up into the air and disappears from sight. I run outside full of adrenaline, with a bat in my hand, not even sure what I’m even trying to defend myself from. There’s nothing outside. We go to bed and nothing else happens that night.
The next day I get online and find a ghost message board website and I share my story. I get a few responses from what sound like experienced ghost hunters. One tells me to get a tape recorder with a mic and turn it up all the way and ask questions when I’m there alone. They say it’s possible you may hear a very faint response on the playback. So I get back to the house after work one day and bring a 4 track recorder I own, with a microphone. I’m all alone and the front gate at the street is locked. I sit down and ask a few questions that people on the website told me to ask. Outside the back door, there’s a stack of logs piled up for firewood. I ask a few questions but hear nothing. On my last question, I ask “If there’s a spirit here with me, give me a sign that you’re here. Prove to me that you’re here”. Right after I say that, I hear the unmistakable sound of a good sized log rolling down the stack of wood and hitting the side of the house. That was proof enough for me!
A few days later, the friends come back and I go home. While I was staying there, my cell phone disappeared, never to be found again. Also one day my keys disappeared. I searched the entire house for hours. I’m pulling my hair out trying to find them with no luck even though I know they have to be in the house. Finally I go in the master bedroom, where I literally haven’t been the entire time I was staying there. In this room is a small play tent set up for their toddler. I look inside the tent and there are my keys.
I had considered leaving early but I was more fascinated by the experience than truly scared for my safety.
My husband and I spent the night at the Cliff House Inn. I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. The room was cold and moist. The waves outside pounding sounded mean and strong. I walked into the bathroom, it was cold and I thought it was so grey and plain. As I sat down I looked up and in front of me, there was a young girl about 5 years old. She was dressed in a dress with multiple rows of lace and a large bow in the front. Her hair was in long tendrils. She appeared to be from the 1800’s. She spoke! “Can you help me find my Mommy?” I screamed get the F**K out of here. She vanished. I have never been back.