Tilford Scaredly

Happy Halloween!! Today we all decided that there would be no better way to get into the Halloween spirit than to dress up like a bunch of Tilford Dudleys. So this afternoon, just before Dr. Reid's Material Culture class, we all painted mascara mustaches on our faces--just like Tilford used to have. Dr. Reid thought it was hilarious, and everybody we ran into in the history department appreciated the humor of it all. Then the next two pictures are from our scary cemetery adventures this evening. We started out at Shiloh Cemetery, where Thomas Lincoln is buried, and heard ghost stories from Matt about how "Tom" still checks up on his farm every now and then. After that we went looking for Tilford Dudley's grave in this random cemetery out by the train tracks in town, but it was to no avail. We kind of creeped ourselves out though, by being out there after it got really dark. But we had flashlights and each other, so we were okay. It was a very fun Halloween adventure! After that we got some pizzas and went back to our classroom to watch "Dracula." That is a seriously messed-up movie, and I wasn't too disappointed when Laurie and I had to leave to work on our presentation about Marshall's Main Street in Historic Preservation tomorrow. Earlier today we had more fun Halloween times at the Dudley House. We met there this morning to get our picture taken for Mattoon Journal-Gazette. The man who will be writing the feature story on us this Sunday interviewed Catherine and me about Tilford's career. He said that it's going to be a pretty extensive article, so we're all quite excited. After the pictures and interviews, we walked around the Dudley House looking for the angry ghost. Paul Bauman, the guy from church who used to be in the HA program, had told us before that he swears he encountered the ghost when he was at the Dud's house one night. He was working up in the archive room, and then he heard the downstairs door open, footsteps come up the stairs and walk down the hall, and head into the back bedroom where Dr. Dudley (T-Dud's dad) had his office. Paul heard things being thrown around in the bedroom (which he had locked earlier), and then he heard the footsteps go back downstairs and leave--but he never saw anyone. Paul went and checked out the bedroom, which was still locked, and found it in complete disarray--but he had just organized everything in there earlier in the day. Yikes! So we went looking for the mad ghost today, but did not find it. We even opened the door to the attic, but no one was up there. After the T-Dud House, we all went and had a Halloween breakfast at the South Side Cafe. I had a delicious omelet. After breakfast I went and got a flu shot, then it was off to school for class this afternoon. It has been a very fun and spoooooky day! I saw a lot of funny costumes today, but my favorites were those that I saw pictures of Camden, Riley, Sidney, and Eliza wearing!! One year ago today, Mom and I had the funnest Halloween ever at the Myrtles Plantation in St. Francisville, Louisiana!! That was a Halloween I will surely never forget. It's not every day that you get to spend Halloween at THE most haunted house in America!