Summerwind

Summerwind is one of the most haunted locations in Wisconsin. Back in the 1900s it was called Lamont Mansion and a man called Robert Lamont lived there with his wife.

Lamont lived in Summerwind for approximately 15 years, during which time the maids told Lamont that the mansion was haunted, but he did not believe them. However, one evening, he and his wife were eating dessert in the kitchen, when the door to the basement started to shake open, revealing the ghostly form of a man.

Robert Lamont took one look at the ghost, and pulled out a pistol. The ghost swung the door shut and Lamont squeezed off two shots in its direction, before fleeing the residence with his wife. The Lamonts abandoned the property that night and never returned.

After remaining vacant for some time, the house became the residence of Arnold and Ginger Hinshaw and their six children, who moved in during the early 1970s. The Hinshaws, and their children, immediately started to report vague shapes and shadows flickering down the hallways. They also claimed to hear mumbled voices in darkened, empty rooms. When they would walk inside, the sounds would quickly stop.

Windows and doors would open and close on their own. Eventually, Arnold had to resort to nailing all the windows shut. On one occasion, Arnold walked out to his car to go to work and the vehicle suddenly burst into flames.

Most alarming was the ghostly shape of a black-haired woman who was often seen floating back and forth behind the French doors that led off from the dining room.

During renovations on the house, Arnold Hinshaw removed a drawer from a fitted closest and discovered a hidden recess behind it. Shining a flashlight into the recess, he could see what appeared to be the skeletal remains of an animal.

The hole was too small for him to fit through, so when his children came home from school, he convinced his daughter Mary to crawl into the recess to see what was lurking inside. Poor Mary started to scream in horror. She had discovered it was actually a human skull and found strands of dirty black hair still attached to it. The grisly remains also contained an arm and a portion of a leg.

Shortly after the discovery of the body in the hidden compartment, things started to take a turn for the worse at Summerwind. Arnold began to slowly lose his mind, staying up all night long, playing haunting organ music. His wife, Ginger, pleaded with him to stop but Arnold claimed the demons in his head demanded that he play. He often crashed the keys on the organ until dawn, frightening his wife and children so badly that they often huddled together in one bedroom, crying and cowering in fear.

Within six months of moving into Summerwind, Arnold suffered a complete breakdown and Ginger attempted suicide. Arnold was sent to a mental hospital and his wife and children moved in with her parents in Granton, Wisconsin. The mansion, once again, was left unoccupied.

Ginger’s parents, Henry and Marie Bober, decided to buy the house and planned to turn it into a restaurant. Ginger begged them not to do it, but they refused to listen.

Bober’s attempts to renovate the house suffered from many problems. Every time they tried to measure the rooms, the dimensions changed drastically. After hearing strange voices and seeing apparitions, builders refused to work on the property.

One day Mr Bober was in the house on his own when he heard gunshots coming from the kitchen. He rushed downstairs and threw open the kitchen door but it was empty. He smelled gunpowder in the air but the only bullet holes he could find were the ones in the basement door, lodged there years before.

Bober was forced to abandon his plans to convert Summerwind and instead sold the building. In 1988 Summerwind was struck by lightning several times, resulting in a fire that destroyed much of the mansion. Today, only the house’s chimney stacks, foundations, and stone steps remain.

Summerwind Mansion had finally succeeded in destroying itself.