Carson City's ghosts are just stories ... right?

If you go on the Ghost Walk on Saturday, it is best to remember that it is all in fun.

It is best to go to sleep at night comfortable in the notion that ghosts are not real, that they are merely characters in Halloween stories told to frighten children.

It's best not to think about the story I'm about to tell you.

This tale was shared with me by a Carson City woman who moved here in 1994. She began to look for a home to purchase, a house with history and character. Her real estate agent took her to a very old home on the city's west side, and she was instantly charmed.

She was not disappointed when she went inside. As she walked through the home, she noticed an old picture on the wall. It was, she learned later, James W. Nye, Nevada's first governor and second U.S. senator, who had once lived in the home.

She returned a few days later to the Minnesota Street home she intended to live in to do a more thorough walk-through. She opened a door she hadn't seen before, turned on the light and peered down into the basement.

She still remembers vividly what she saw.

"There was that man in the picture, standing at the bottom of the stairs, and he had an angry look on his face. His left hand was on the banister. He had a blue suit and a blue fedora hat," she said. "He was angry, I guess, that I disturbed him down there."

The woman lurched back and shut the door quickly. She rushed outside, her agent in tow.

"Why didn't you tell me there was a ghost in the house," she asked.

Her agent did not seem astonished by the question. She told her client that most people who visit the house do not see the ghost.

"I can't live there with him there," she said.

I told this story on Thursday to the current owner of the building, Paul Taggart. He listened with great interest.

And then he began to speak, his tone serious, "I can only relate a story that was told to me ..."

It was a story told by people who knew nothing of the woman I had spoken to, nor the tale she told. But so similar ...

It was in the 1980s, well before Paul and Sonia Taggart moved their law practice into the house.

It was a church rectory. One day, the priest who lived there was having a conversation with a deacon after church. Suddenly, they realized there was a man standing next to them. They looked again and the man was gone.

"They both saw the same thing," he said.

A few weeks later, the same deacon was at the rectory visiting with the nuns when he saw an old picture of Nye. He knew immediately " that was the man that had stood next to them that day in the hallway.

Two sightings in the same building of the same apparition by people unknown to each other.

Journalists and historians are skeptical people and so I, the first, called Robert Nylen, the latter, for an explanation. Instead, Robert, the curator of the Nevada State Museum, gave me several pages listing accounts of ghost sightings in Carson City. It is not even a complete account ... the sightings in this home are not listed among them.

"Do you believe?" I asked, expecting to take comfort in his answer.

"I don't know ... we've had so many sightings I guess maybe there's something to it."

I know little of Nye, only what I can read on the Internet " that he spent a good part of his life in New York, where he was born, and died on Christmas day in 1876. He married and had two children, supported civil rights and opposed gambling ... nothing that would offer a clue to any unresolved business on earth.

The Taggarts, who purchased the home about six years ago, have not seen this ghost. There were times he glanced quickly because he thought he saw someone standing nearby, but who can say they have not experienced that?

He has felt a presence in the home. It has been so strong that, for a time, he avoided working there at night.

But the presence in the home does not feel angry.

"I tend to think we're accepted by whatever lives here and he doesn't bother us," he said. The Taggarts have worked hard to restore the house, and perhaps this is a reason. They are lawyers, too, just as was Gov. Nye.

As for the woman who called me, she agrees that this apparition has found suitable boarders and our former governor and senator must be at peace.

"He's gotten to know them. They have not interrupted his domain."

So have fun on Saturday, and believe what you must to sleep at night. Perhaps what I have related are merely stories told for amusement. Forget the words this woman said with such certainty.

"He's there ..."

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The Ghost Walk is indeed a fun experience, with actors playing ghosts. It is from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., Saturday, with tours departing every 30 minutes from the corner of Third and Carson streets. The cost is $15. Call 687-7410 for more information.

Barry Ginter is editor of the Appeal. You can reach him at 881-1221 or via e-mail at bginter@nevadaappeal.com