Sunday April 28, 2024 began when Tom’s alarm rang at 5:45am. On that particular morning, my companions didn’t wake up in a hotel room, but instead had spent the night in the Melbourne, Florida home of my photographer’s good friend Tom McGrew.
As Tom and Vicki got ready to take on the day, the smell of bacon filled the air. It turned out McGrew was also an early riser and had prepared breakfast for my two travel mates. For the next hour or so, those three sat and talked while they enjoyed McGrew’s homecooked breakfast. It had been an amazing reunion for my two companions and Rhino, and I enjoyed seeing McGrew for the third time as well. Since Tom had accepted a new job near Akron, Ohio, which was set to begin in late June, our next encounter with him will likely be in the Buckeye State. McGrew’s relocation was exciting news to me because his new digs will be centered between the tombs of James Garfield and William McKinley – and those are two of my Top Five favorite Presidential gravesites.
After a warm and heartfelt farewell to our gracious host, the three of us departed McGrew’s neighborhood at 8:15am and headed north towards St. Augustine, which was only 125 miles away. The primary reason for our visit to the Nation’s Oldest City was Tom had purchased tickets for the ‘Dark of the Moon Ghost Tour’, which was scheduled to begin at 8:30pm. In addition to the tour to visit the paranormal, which made me nervous just thinking about, there were a handful of Presidential sites located in the city as well.
Roughly halfway to our St. Augustine destination, Tom decided he wanted to make a detour – one that he knew his wife would enjoy. Since Vicki was a huge fan of NASCAR, my photographer navigated the three of us to perhaps the most recognized and celebrated racetrack in motor sports – the Daytona International Speedway. At first, Tom’s objective was to photograph the exterior of the track and then continue the journey northward. But once we arrived at 9:45am, my camera guy wasn’t satisfied with just seeing the outside of the grandstands; Tom wanted his wife to see the fabled track as well. And the only way that would be possible was for the three of us to take a tour, which my companions did. After Tom shelled out $52 for two tickets, I heard him say to Vicki, “We have tickets for the ten-thirty tour. I don’t know what to expect, or where they’ll take us on the tour, but my goal is to stand on the start/finish line, plus I want to see Turn 4 where Dale Earnhardt was killed.”
Our tour group consisted of roughly 15 people, and one bobble head, all of whom boarded a tram that was hooked to the back of a Chevy pickup truck. The guide for our tour group was an elderly gentleman who talked to us over a speaker system while he drove the truck. After he took us on a long journey past the exterior of the grandstands, we entered the track via a tunnel beneath Turn 1. For the next twenty-five minutes or so, he drove around the infield where we saw absolutely nothing of interest. At one point, near the end of our infield tour, the guide took us to Victory Lane where all of us posed for photos. When my photographer asked the man if we were going to be able to stand on the start/finish line, he said that was out of the question because of the ongoing cleanup from the weekend’s motocross event. I knew Tom was disappointed, but his disappointment turned to anger when the guide scolded him for standing on the roadway with an approaching vehicle in the distance. My photographer shot back after he was told to get off the road when cars were coming, “Look it, I’m not a five-year-old – I know how to cross the road and watch for cars. I’m just trying to see Pit Road since we’re not allowed to get close to the track. Give me a break.” Vicki rolled her eyes after his outburst, but I understood his angst. We had been on the tour for over a half hour, and we hadn’t experienced anything very good at all.
The rest of the tour wasn’t any better. After we went back through the tunnel without ever going onto the track, the tour guide led us through a gate where our entire group crowded into an elevator that took us to the top of the grandstands. From the nosebleed seating area, we got our track experience – albeit from a long distance away. It was at that moment as well when my photographer was afforded the opportunity to see Turn 4 where Dale Earnhardt was killed. But once again, he saw the spot from about five hundred yards away.
When our tour finally ended around 11:30, we were dropped off in front of the Motorsports Hall of Fame of America, which the three of us explored for another thirty minutes or so. The highlight, at least for me, was seeing William Byron’s car that he drove to win the 2024 Daytona 500.
Please take a moment and enjoy Tom’s images from our tour of Daytona International Speedway.
The clock struck noon as the three of us left Daytona International Speedway and walked back to the Jeep. For me, it was a good stop where I had the chance to pay tribute to Dale Earnhardt. But for my photographer, however, he couldn’t have been more vocal about his dismay. “That was the worst tour I’ve ever been on. We didn’t get to go on the track, either on foot or in the tram; I got yelled at for trying to snap a picture of Pit Road; and I thought the fifty-two bucks I paid to get us on that crappy tour was a waste of money.” Vicki, who obviously enjoyed the tour more than her husband, replied, “Well, now we can say we’ve been to Daytona.” My COBS infected camera guy shot back, “I could’ve said that and saved fifty-two bucks.”
For the next hour, as Vicki drove the 54 miles to St. Augustine, I listened as my photographer complained about the Daytona track tour. But what my angry friend didn’t realize, his plans were about to take a turn for the worse. As soon as we arrived in the “Nation’s Oldest City”, Tom navigated his wife towards the first site on his agenda – the Castillo de San Marcos, which is the oldest masonry fort in the continental United States. This was also a Presidential site as Theodore Roosevelt had been in that fort twice – the first time was in 1898 when TR was headed to Cuba with his Rough Riders; and the second visit came in 1905 while he was President.
On that Sunday afternoon, the streets and sidewalks of St. Augustine were packed with tourists. Not only did the traffic congestion make it difficult for Vicki to drive into the downtown section of the city, but once we arrived at the fort, there was no place for my photographer’s wife to park the Jeep. With her anxiety levels rising to a boiling point, Tom suggested we attempt to park near another Presidential site located about a mile away. However, as soon as the majestic Memorial Presbyterian Church came into view, it quickly became obvious the parking situation wasn’t any better; unless my companions wanted to fork-over $40 to park in a lot next to the church. Since Tom had planned on spending roughly ten minutes while he photographed the exterior of the historic church, there was no way he was going to be “robbed” of forty bucks. Instead, Vicki pulled the Jeep up onto a sidewalk across the street from Flagler College and about a block from the church. The last thing I heard Vicki say as we closed the Jeep’s door and departed on foot towards the church, “Make this quick before I get a ticket.”
When Tom carried to the front of Memorial Presbyterian Church, I was stunned by the majestic beauty of the architecture. I couldn’t believe my painted eyes – this was the most amazing church I had ever seen. And the cherry on top of the sundae was the fact President Theodore Roosevelt worshipped inside that very church on October 22, 1905. Not only did the President occupy the pew typically used by Henry Flagler himself, but the Bull Moose reportedly sang heartily along with the hymns played that morning.
The Memorial Presbyterian Church was constructed by Flagler in 1889 and dedicated a year later on March 16, 1890. The dedication ceremony was attended by First Lady Caroline Harrison, as well as her husband’s Vice President Levi Morton. But it was the Theodore Roosevelt connection that led us to the historic church.
With no time to waste as Vicki waited patiently in the Jeep parked on the sidewalk, Tom carried me to several locations around the exterior of the church. Here are my photographer’s images of the Memorial Presbyterian Church, which has been listed as number four of the top eight religious wonders to visit in the United States.
When Tom and I returned to the Jeep, the first thing out of Vicki’s mouth was, “What the heck took you so long, I thought you said you’d be gone for only ten minutes. I sweated bullets the entire time wondering if a cop would go past. The last thing I needed was a parking ticket.” While my photographer didn’t say anything, I thought about the handful of speeding and parking tickets he’s acquired over the years during our trips. It was probably a good thing Tom didn’t open his yap.
It was only one-thirty in the afternoon, but my two companions were tired – tired of not having any legal places to park without paying a ton of money; and tired of being around a lot of people. While there were a few more Presidential sites located within a short distance of the church, Tom and Vic decided to drive out to the St. Augustine Lighthouse where they hoped to find some shade and free parking.
After Vicki pulled away from her sidewalk parking place, she zig-zagged through the heart of St. Augustine on a route towards the historic lighthouse, which was just over two miles away. Suddenly, I heard my photographer’s wife say out loud, “Are you kidding me right now? I’m beginning to hate this city.” I looked out from an opening in the camera case and saw the Bridge of Lions, which is a drawbridge that spans the Matanzas River, was open to let boats and other watercraft pass through. The line of traffic waiting to get over the bridge was horrible, and the bridge seemed to take an eternity to close.
Once we had made it onto Anastasia Island, the traffic was slow but steady all the way to the historic lighthouse. And with good fortune finally on our side, Vicki found a parking space not too far from the Lighthouse Museum. With me in Tom’s hand, the three of us walked the short distance to the museum, only to discover the price to get onto the grounds was thirteen bucks apiece. When my cheap photographer asked if his Dark of the Moon Ghost Tour pass would get us onto the site that early in the day, he was told “No, you’ll have to come back at eight-thirty for that.” Having already paid $60 for the ghost tour tickets, which would give us an up-close view of the Lighthouse and the Keeper’s House, Tom chose to keep his wallet shut.
With plenty of shaded seating all around the museum, Tom and Vic watched their grandsons play baseball on the Game Changer app on Vicki’s phone, while at the same time, I admired the lighthouse from a distance. The 164-foot-tall, black and white lighthouse looked awesome set against the backdrop of the cloudless, blue sky. As I stared at the historic beacon, the thoughts of ghosts flooded my resin head. In less than seven hours, we would be entering the unknown world of the paranormal and I wasn’t sure if I was ready for that challenge.
When the ballgame had finished, Tom and Vic decided to grab an early dinner and go the hotel for a nap. The Holiday Inn Express where we had reservations was located roughly a mile from the lighthouse, but luckily it was on the island, so the three of us didn’t have to cross the Bridge of Lions again.
While Vicki reregistered in the lobby, my photographer hauled their belongings, including me, to our home away from home for the night. Once they were unpacked, Tom set me alongside the TV set in the room before the two of them headed on foot to Mojo’s Tacos, which was located nearly in the shadow of our hotel.
By 4:00pm, Tom and Vicki had devoured their tacos, which had been highly recommended by a woman at the Lighthouse Museum. Although they had anticipated eating some of the best tacos in Florida, which is what they were told, the cuisine from Mojo’s Tacos fell way short of the rave reviews. With their stomach’s full, my photographer set his alarm for 6:45pm and my two companions fell fast asleep.
For nearly three hours, the thoughts of ghosts running rampant throughout the St. Augustine Lighthouse and its adjacent Keeper’s House filled my head. The only thing I knew in advance, and that was when I overhead my photographer’s son Tom talk about his Dark of the Moon Ghost Tour he had taken several weeks earlier, was the two-hour tour was dark, it was eerie, but there were no gimmicks. In other words, there was nothing pre-arranged by the staff to make sounds, shadows, or have the EMF meters go off on cue. While there were no guarantees anyone would experience any paranormal activity during the tour, if someone did, they knew it was legit – and time to run to the nearest phone.
As soon as Tom’s alarm on his phone rang at 6:45pm, he and his wife sprang out of bed like they had seen a ghost. Perhaps that was a good, or maybe not so good, sign of things to come. Once my companions had readied themselves for the rest of the night, both mentally and physically, we left the hotel at around 7:30pm. One of the instructions listed of Tom’s ticket was to check-in 15 to 30 minutes before the scheduled 8:30 start time.
When we pulled into the parking lot just outside of the Lighthouse Museum at 7:40pm, the last light of day was vanishing in the western sky. Shortly before eight o’clock, Tom registered us at the desk inside the museum, which was also when he rented two EMF (electromagnetic fields) meters for him and his wife to use during the tour. Tom and Vicki were also given green glow sticks to hang around their necks. The sticks were used for light, as well as for staff members to distinguish the members of our registered group from people who had not paid. For the next half hour, the three of us sat and watched others from our group as they slowly gathered around the seating area just behind the museum. Let me tell you, some of those folks looked like they could scare the dead.
At precisely 8:30pm, one of the four tour guides on duty led us down a dark, tree-lined pathway until we arrived at a spot near the back of the Lighthouse Keeper’s House. After we heard a few stories about a couple of the former keepers of the light, such as Brevet Major William Harn and Peter Rasmussen, we headed inside the building where we listened to tales about the paranormal activity within the rooms of the three-story home. Following our time in the Keeper’s House, our group met outside of the St. Augustine Lighthouse where we listened to another story; a tale that involved the Ghost Hunters and the investigation in 2006 when the members of TAPS (The Atlantic Paranormal Society) witnessed the “Shadow Man” high in the tower.
Perhaps the most heartbreaking story was centered around Hezekiah Pittee, who was the Superintendent of Lighthouse Construction in 1871 when construction on the current lighthouse began. Pittee lived on the site during construction along with his wife Mary and their children Mary Adelaide, Eliza, Edward, and Carrie. During that period, the Pittee kids were like most children, they loved to play and use the construction equipment and the site as their personal playground. On July 10, 1873, tragedy struck when the three Pittee girls, along with one of the construction worker’s daughters, used a rail car as their personal rollercoaster. As the rail car sped downhill towards the water, the brakes failed – throwing all four children into the water of Salt Run and trapping them beneath the heavy steel cart. One of the workers who had witnessed the accident rushed into the water to save the girls, but only four-year-old Carrie was saved. The other three young girls drowned but are rumored to be still having fun around the lighthouse today.
Once the tour guides were finished spinning their tales of the supernatural, our group of fifty “Ghostbusters” were let loose on their own to explore the buildings, grounds, and of course, the lighthouse. The one thing I noticed right away was how dark it was, especially inside the Keeper’s House, which made it impossible for Tom to take photos of me unless he used his camera’s flash.
Tom and Vicki decided to go separate ways, and as always, I stayed with my photographer. For our first exploration, the two of us went back inside the Keeper’s House. We began in the parlor, where our guide said the rocking chair had been known to rock on its own. From there, we headed down the spiral staircase and into the basement known as “The Pit to Hell”. There, as the story was told, we would find Peter’s room where the former lightkeeper sat and smoked his cherry tobacco. Peter Rasmussen began serving as the lighthouse keeper in 1901 and remained in that position for 23 consecutive years. There were two chairs positioned in the middle of the pitch-black room where paranormal activity had been allegedly known to have happened in the past.
As soon as Tom and I were finished inside the Keeper’s House, we headed back outside where we saw Vicki seated on a bench near the entrance to the lighthouse. As we slowly made our way down the dark steps of the house, I saw my photographer’s wife waving at us – it seemed as though she wanted to show or tell her husband something. When we made the short walk to where Vicki was seated, I heard her say to my camera guy, “You aren’t going to believe what I’m about to show you. Just after you went inside the Keeper’s House, I stood on the porch and took three pictures of the illuminated lighthouse. I stood in nearly the same spot and didn’t do anything different with any of the pictures – I held my phone up, centered the lighthouse on the screen, and hit the button. The first and third images turned out great, but take a look at the middle picture. Tell me what you think that looks like. I’m telling you; I didn’t do anything differently with that picture than I did with the other two – and I don’t know how in the heck that happened. I have never believed in that paranormal crap before, but now I might be having a change of heart.”
When Tom took her phone and examined the images, I saw his mouth open up in disbelief. It was obvious my photographer was as stunned as his wife was with what her phone had captured. And when I saw the image in question, I thought the same thing – there was a person in a white robe standing on the right side of the picture. Could it have been Mary Pittee? After all, she was fifteen years old when she drowned with the other two girls. With no logical explanation as to how or why the image came out like it did, I’ll let you decide for yourself. Please leave a comment below and let us know what you think it was.
An eerie feeling overcame my entire resin body after I saw Vicki’s photograph. And I think it shocked Tom as well. But before my photographer let his imagination get the best of him, he carried me into the now-empty lighthouse – or at least we believed it was empty.
For over ten minutes, the two of us stayed in the tower’s base while Tom attempted to entice a spirit to trigger his EMF meter, but the ghosts weren’t biting. The single green light meant the device was on, but it wasn’t registering any activity. We stayed completely still in total darkness and listened for any strange sounds, but again, there wasn’t anything unusual. There was a brief moment when I thought about the famous “Shadow Man” first spotted by the TAPS team in 2006, but in the total darkness, I had no chance of seeing anything except for Tom’s glow stick and the light on his meter.
When my photographer stood up and slid me back into his camera case, I thought he was about to climb the 219 steps to the top – where the giggles of young children have been heard over the years. But with his knees screaming louder than any specter, Tom left the lighthouse and the two of us met up with his wife.
The Dark of the Moon Ghost Tour ended at 10:30pm, which was when one of the guides led us along a dark pathway and out to the parking lot. Although Tom’s EMF meter never activated at any point during our tour, which was somewhat disappointing, both my photographer and his wife had experienced what they believed to be possible paranormal activity. When the floor creaked in the Keeper’s House, which made my painted resin hair stand on end for a moment, it paled in comparison to the photograph Vicki had taken around the same time. And the best part of all, our night at the light transformed my photographer’s wife into a believer in the supernatural.
After we made the short drive back to the Holiday Inn Express, my two companions didn’t seem extremely tired – even though it was past their usual bedtime. While I believe their naps helped, the fact that their senses were still on high alert played a factor as well.
When the lights were finally doused at 11:30pm, I stood next to the TV set and tried to not think about the paranormal. But after all of the unexplained encounters I’ve experienced over the past eleven years, it was tough to not have Ol’ Casper running through my mind.
“If there’s something strange, in my hotel room. Who will I call? Ghostbusters! If there’s something weird, and it’s certain doom. Who will I call? Ghostbusters! If I’m seeing things, running through my head. Who will I call? Ghostbusters! An invisible man, standing near the bed. Who will I call? Ghostbusters! I ain’t ‘fraid of no ghost; no, I ain’t ‘fraid of no ghost!”
