The Villisca axe murders

I spent the first ten years of my life in Taylor County, Iowa.  During those years my parents and I moved at least 3 times, but our address was always Villisca.  My parents were switchboard operators, back when you had to call "Central" even if you only wanted to talk to your neighbors down the road... unless they were on your party line.  Our house was where you went to pay your bill; we were "Central".  For a brief time my parents were switchboard operators in Villisca, but the place I remember best was Guss, a small, unincorporated town with a blacksmith shop, our switchboard house and a general store; our mailing address was still Villisca.

It was on the Internet that I learned about the famous axe-murders in Villisca, and a grisly tale it is.  When I first read about it, I asked my mother if she'd heard the story.  She had not.  More recently, I asked my sister who is 14 years my senior if she was familiar with the axe murders.  Nope, she wasn't.  I understand the reason, of course:  those murders took place in 1912.  Just Google "villisca axe murders" and you'll find enough to keep you reading all day long.  I'll share a link here just to get you started; it's one of the shorter accounts, and you'll find it HERE.

Of course there are ghost stories; you can pay $10 and tour the place, or spend the night there for a minimum of $428 for up to six people.  Cliff and I have gone right past Villisca a time or two in the past;  I wish we had done the tour.  

There have been several stories about the house on some of those ghost-chaser television shows.  In my opinion, ghosts are like Santa:  If you don't believe in them, you'll never see them.  Cliff and I toured the Stanley Hotel once; the tour guide wanted a volunteer to stand in a certain place where some people in the past had "felt something weird" going on.  I volunteered, but told him I didn't believe in ghosts, so he was probably wasting his time.  I felt nothing.