ITEMS
Legends of Logan Canyon
Dublin Core
Title
Legends of Logan Canyon
Description
Folklore fieldwork assignment presenting several accounts of Witch Hecate in Logan Canyon.
LEGENDS OF LOGAN CANYON
Tammy Durtschi
Utah State University
Fife Folklore Archives
Logan, Utah
Honors 336
Instructor: Wilson
Winter 1981
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LEGENDS OF LOGAN CANYON
Tannny Durtschi
Logan, Utah 84321
Utah State University
Mormon Folklore
Honors 336
Winter Quarter, 1981
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Cover Essay ......................................... o •••••••••• ii
Autobiographical Sketch •..•....•....•.••.•...••.••••..•...••••.• v
List of Informants ............................................. vi
Witch Hecida
Title Informant Item
How Witch Hecida Came Into Being ..• Lutz .•• ltem #l •..• Page # 1
Witch Hecida •.........•.•.....••.• Siler •.. Item #2 ••.• Page # 2
Witch Hecida ..•..................• Gates .•. Item 11=3 .... Page # 3
Personal Experience with Hecida .•.• Lutz .•• ltem #4 •... Page # 4
Saint Anne's Retreat
-Ti-tl-e Informant Item
St. Anne's Retreat .•••..•....•....• Lutz .•• ltem # 5 ... Page
St. Anne's Retreat .•.•....•..••... Siler .•• Item 11= 6 .•• Page
St. Anne's Retreat ••.•..•.•......• Hugie ... Item 11= 7 ••• Page
St. Anne's Retreat •.•..•.•......•• Gates •.. ltem # 8 ... Page
Personal Experience at St. Anne's.Hugie ••• ltem # 9 .•. Page
The "Real" Story of St. Anne's ..... Lutz ••• Item 11=10 ••• Page
Miscellaneous Legends <"
-Ti-tl-e
# 6
# 8
11= 9
11=10
11=11
#14
A fresence in Logan Canyon .•.•..•• Siler .•• ltem #ll ••• Page #15
The Man of Logan Canyon ••.......••. Ward •.• ltem #12 ••. Page #16
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COVER ESSAY
This has been an intriguing project to undertake. People's
reaction when asked to be interviewed varied from one extreme
to another. The great diversity in the version of the story from
one person to the next was remarkable. In the following essay
I will attempt to explain these statements as well as make some
additional assertions.
The topic I chose for my paper is the Ledgends of Logan Canyon.
I concentrate most on Saint Anne's Retreat and Witch Hecida.
Items 11 and 12 are just miscellaneous stories about Logan Canyon
that I chose to include because I wanted to illustrate that
there are many, many other ledgends about Logan Canyon other than
the two main stories of St. Anne's and Witch Hecida.
St. Anne's is located about five miles up Logan Canyon.
There are many people who are sure that they know the "real"
story about what happened there, but they all disagree about it.
One of the "real" stories that I heard indicated that nuns were
never at St. Anne's Retreat. (Item 1fl0) Another "real" story
said that a family built ~he retreat, but then they decided to
donate it to Utah State University. The University was too slow
in accepting it so the family decided to donate it to the
Catholic church.
I was only able to obtain a very limited amount of facts
about St. Anne's. It was built sometime during the 1930's and it
eventually burned down. The ledgends are built around the demise
of the retreat. The stories range from a hermit coming down out
of the hills and killing all of the nuns to a story where it is
actually the Mother Superior who does the killing. There is alot
of diversity in who was really killed. One story states that
all of the nuns got killed, whereas another story tells of
babies that belonged to the nuns were drown in the swimming
pool.
The most detailed description of St. Anne's is found in
Item #9. All that is now left of the original retreat is a
swimming pool and the cement foundation of the original building.
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The only logical reason that I can come up with as to why
all of these stories began circulating is because up until
the 1930's there were virtually no other churches in Logan.
besides the Mormon church. When the Catholic church began
prospering in the valley the Mormons resented it. When St. Anne's
actually did burn the locals probably seized upon this as a chance
to exploit the Catholic church and point out that this would
never have happened if the Catholics were not wicked.
Once it was a generally accepted fact that something Rad been
going on at St. Anne's that shouldn't have been going on, the
stories probably had free rein of the imagination. Stories
began circulating that one of the nuns had gone crazy and killed
her sister nuns. Other stories say that a 15 year old girl that
the nuns had been taking care of had killed the nuns.
There are two details that are included in most versions
of the St. Anne's story. One detail is that there are generally
dogs somewhere in the story. No one seems to know where the
dogs came from, but they are there all the same. In most of the
stories the do.gs play the part of being a guardian over the
retreat.
The second detail is the ~wimming pool. The swimming pool
is always used as a means by which someone is murdered. Someone
is thrown in the pool by someone else and drown. The swimming
pool is still there today and is the factor that convinces alot
of people of the validity of these stories.
Witch Hecida stories offer even a greater variation between
versions than doe ,; the St. Anne's stories. In each story Witch
Hecida is in an entirely different location.
up at Third Dam in Logan Canyon. (Item #1).
One story puts her
Another ledgend
says that Witch Hecida resides in a cave in Logan Canyon. (Item #20
Still another story says that Witch Hecida comes down at Spring
Hollow in the form of fog. (Item #3). But the most amazing
story is that Witch Hecida came from St. Anne's Retreat. She
was supposedly the Mother Superior that murdered all of the babies,
and her original name was Saint Hecida •
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Some of the people I talked with were anxious to share
their stories with me. A couple of people I talked to told me
that they knew the stories of St. Anne's and Witch Hecida, but
they refused when I told them that their stories were going to
be included in the Archives. Generally once people started
talking and began telling me their stories they loosened up and
would tell me anything I wanted to know.
I recorded my interviews with my informants and then I
typed them up exact~y as they were told. I would ask my informants
questions to help draw similarities between the different versions.
Theyonly editing of their original versdions was by eliminating
repeated segments of their tales and dropping the unnecessary lIand ll s i
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AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
I was born in Logan, Utah and I have lived here in Cache
V~lley all of my life. I attended Sky View High School and Lam
now a Freshman at Utah State University.
My father is an Economics professor here at USU.
a housewife and has dedicated her life to her family.
My mother is
My parents
are the best anyone could ever ask for. I am the sixth out of
seven children in our family . We have very strong family ties.
I wouldn't trade my family experiences for anything.
The reason I chose to do my paper on the legends of Logan
Canyon is because I have lived here my entire life and I h.have
heard these stories ever since I can remember. I was interested
to see what other people thought of these stories and I was
interested in collecting different versions of the same story.
I am fascinated by people, and I enjoy doing projects that
allow me to gain a better understanding of people and why they
function like they do. This paper has given me an opportunity
to get some insights that I otherwise would never have been able
to gain.
My hobbies include reading, being with and observing people,
and sports. I could watch professional football forever! I also
like participating in almost all sports.
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• Gates, Larry.
Hugie, Bryon
Lutz, Chris
• Siler, Jon
Ward, Bruce
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LIST OF INFORMANTS
Larry was raised in Logan and attended Logan High.
He is presently a Senior at Utah State University
and is majoring in Pre-Med. He is the presently
the president of the Honors Program at U.S.U.
He has served an LDS mission. He contributed
items 3 and 8 in this paper.
Bryon is a Freshman at Utah State University. He
was born in Logan and was raised in College Ward,
Utah. He is currently waiting for his mission call.
Bryon does not play with ouija boards since his
experiences at St. Anne's. He took those events
seriously and will have nothing to do with ouija
boards or St. Anne's Retreat now. He contributed
items 7 and 9.
Chris was the most anxious to tell her stories of
the people I interviewed. She is a Freshman at
Utah State University. She is a non-mormon, but
is ver~ knowledgable about our culture. She
was by far the most cofrorful story teller I talked
to. Items 1,4,5 and 10 belong to her.
Jon is a Pre-Med major at Utah State University.
He has lived in Cache Valley allt of his life.
He is preparing for an LDS mission and will leave
in June of this year. He enjoys skiing and playing
racquetball. He contributed items 2,6and 11.
Bruce was raised in southeastern Idaho. He was
active in the Boy Scout program in Cache Valley.
He served a mission in Alabama. He is currentJy
a student at Utah State University studying Biology.
His hobbies include snow skiing and reading. He
contributed items number 12.
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Chris Lutz
"How Witch Hecida Came Into Being"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item iH
Chris told me this story when I asked her if she knew anything
about Witch Hecida. Chris honestly believes that there is such
a person as Witch Hecida. Her personal experience with Hecida
is recounted in a later item.
There was a camping excersion. She (Witch Hecida) was just
a young girl and they all went up the canyon partying that night.
up at Third Dam in Logan Canyon. They were all partying around
and evidently one of the guys got rough and they took advantage
of her and she was really upsec and really mad. She went after
them and they were all drunk and laughing at her and she said,
"don't do that" and she tried to fight them off, but they jumped
her. She felt really bad, and they were all still so drunk and
afterwards she was just kinda mad at them. She went after them
with a club and they were all laughing and they pushed her into
the water. She was drunk in the place and she drown, a young
girl drown. The guys didn't know what to do. If they went back
to town and were asked how she drown, well, what could they say?
So she died there and thats how come she is in the water
and she comes across like a ball. They call her a witch because
anybody caught drinking or messing around up at Third Dam s~e
will come and get.
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Jon Siler
"Witch Hecida"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item in
Jon didn't know the people that actually had this experience. He
heard this story from some of his friends when they were driving
up Logan Canyon one night.
This was told to me by a friend. It didn't happen to him,
but he heard it from somebody else who heard it from somebody els~.
Witch Hecida is suppose to be in Logan Canyon. She is suppose
to have seven white mice and seven dogs. These guys were going
through the cave one time and they smelled something and then they
started to hear dogs barking and they thought that was really
strange to hear dogs barking and they thought maybe a dog went in
there and got caught or something. They kept going in there and
they came to a big pit. They looked down there and sawall these
mice and it ended up that there was seven mice and then they
saw some dogs After they saw the dogs they left because they started
getting really scared because they knew about Witch Hecida.
They left and never went back.
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Larry Gates
"Witch Hecida"
February, 1981
UEU Campus
Item if3
Larry couldn't remember the story very well. It had been a long
time since he had heard it. The following is the story of Witch
Hecida that he recall hearing from some of his friends in high
school. He said that his friends didn't actually believe in
~~ci~a, it was just a good story to tell •
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All I know is that a friend of mine, Steve Peterson, who
is now in the Theatre Department used to go up there and do a
little routine. I'm not even sure what it was, I was never with
them. They would go up and call down Hecida in Spring Hollow
and do a little chant and they had a little ritual they would do.
Then the fog was suppose to come down, rolling down the mountain.
You could see this blanket of white fog. It would move down
through the trees toward the hollow. As far as I know they didn't
ever stay around there to see what happened when the fog got down.
I was never there when they did it.
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February ~ 1981
USU Ca!llpus
Chris Lutz Item #4
"PersonaUExperience with Witch Hecida"
Chris swears to this day that she saw Witch Hecida. She refuses
to go up the canyon any more and tell ghose stories. She claims
to have only been up the canyon once since her experience with
Hecida.
This is my Witch Hecida story~ this honestly happened to me.
I'm really scared about things like that and they always told
me that if you go up on Third Dam bridge in Logan Canyon and you
stand there at midnight~ turn around three times and saY'tlWithh
Hecida~ Witch Hecida~ Witch Hecida" and look over the water she
will come to you.
She'll come to you in a little golden ball~ like the good
fairy. She comes across the water in this little golden ball
and she comes to you and stands on the bridge.
I figured it all out because it scared me. But it was
nothing~ we all knew these stories. So one night~ me and my
girlfriend--I guess we were juniors--were going out on a double
date with these two guys and one guy had his brother's new 240Z.
We went to Smithfield and we went to see the Love Bug. Afterwards
we were driving into town and we said "Let's go driving up
the canyon and tell ghost stories".
So we drove up the canyon and my friend was telling us about
if you stand on the bridge and turn around three times Witch
Hecida will come to you. We turned to gon onto the bridge and I
said, "I'm scared, you guys, I just have this awful feeling"--it
scared me real bad. So we went to tu~n the car around and we
went to flip a "u" and thats a pretty big place up there, but
the car would only go half way so we were wedged between the
bridge and the road and it was just like in the Love Bug--this
sounds really stupid--I ~; said, "Oh my gosh we are going to . • . "
in the Love Bug we had just saw an hour earlier he went to flip a
"u" and he didn't quite make it and he turned into the hill and
the hill fell down on him. I said, "the hill is going to fall
down on us". We all started screaming and we hurried and backed
up and flipped around and started driving out of there as fast
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as we could. We were hauling "A", going 90 miles, no kidding. I
lobked over at the speedometer. I said, "slow down, slow down,
there is a car in front of us". It was an old beat up Falcon job.
I said, "Oh my gosh, it's Witch Hecida". The two in the back
were screamJng and laughing, kinda joking. I lOOked forward and there
in the car it looked like her hair was just glowing. It looked
like an old lady with one of those puffy hairdos. It was just
kind oa like hazy-blue, like it radiated from her head.
I said,"It's Witch Hecida, I know it, she knows that we are
here". So we started slowing down and she started slowing down.
There was just one person in the car. We were going 20 miles
and hour. 20. After going 80. So we started slowing down and it::
(her hair) seemed to grow more brilliant, just like cotton candy,
kind of fluffy and mysterious and I was just freaking out.
So we slowed down and we thought that we would just let her
go into town. She slowed down too. We were creeping along 20
miles an:~ hour. When we hit first dam we were going 5. She was
going 5 and we were going 5 miles an hour. I said, "hit it!" and
Vrooooooom •... we went right around her. We hightailed it up that
hill. She started racing us! I said, "she is trying to catch us,
she is trying to catch us." We hauled "A" into town. We were going
90 down Fourth North. We ran a red light at Fourth DNorth
cause we were so scared. She was right behind us, On Main Street
we turned left and we went into that gas station and we turned
around to watch, she was right behind us on that block, but she
never came down to Main Street. We sat there and we just shook
and shook and I said, "why didn't she come after us?" They told
me that she can't come out of the canyon. Fourth North is still
considered part of the canyon because of the slope. She cant turn
onto Main Street. She just disappeared.
To this day I swear that was Witch Hecida. I've never gone
up the canyon and told ghost stories since. I won't. I believe
in it •
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Chris Lutz
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item 115
Chris heard this story at her Senior class party that was held
at St Anne's Retreat which is located up Logan Canyon. She doesn't
believe this story, but she was anxious to tell it to me.
St. Anne's used to be a retreat for nuns. In the Catholic
church they believe in taking care of their welfare program.
There was this one girl who was living up there because
evidently she didn't have any parenti. The nuns were taking care
of her while an adoption was goin~ through. She was about four-teen
or fifteen years of age. ',.' ~ ';
She was a gorgeous girl, but ·she had a few mental problems
because she thought no one wanted her. She was living up there
because she was so old and no one had adopted her.
While she was living up there with the nuns she really took
good care of herself. She had this long beautiful hair and everyone
told her how beautiful they thought she was. They would tell
her not to worry and that someone would want someone·'as beautiful
as her.
She goes out on this date one night and she is traveling
through the canyon and they wreck and her face went through :. the
windshield. He died, he got thrown out of the car when the car
started to roll. Her face went through the windshield. It
severed all her hair off. She was lucky to make it. She broke
her arm. Her other arm went through the windshield with her and
it got cut off. And they found her there. She was about half
crazy because she couldn't get out of the windshield. She was
stuck, just like that. He was dead and she was just hysterical
and half crazy when they found her, but she did survive. They
had to shave off all her hair because of the head lacerations.
They had to sew up her scalp again. She had a hook arm because
all the nerves in her ar~were so badly damaged that they couldn't
put it back on.
She was having a lot of trouble adjusting. They took her
back up to the convent and told her not to worry. All of the nuns
were sweet to her, but she was never the same. She would have
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fits and tremors.
On the first anniversary of the accident was the ending of
St. Anne's. They went up there the next day and every single nun
had been hacked to death with a hooken arm and that girl was gone.
They never found her. That's when they closed St. Anne's.
If you go there at midnight you can see her face looking
into the swimming pool looking at her hair gone because that is
what triggered it off. It was her anniversary, her hair was gone,
and she wasn't the same. She was out walking in the moonlight
and looked in the pool and saw her reflection of her with her long
hair. She was all nice and normal. Then it turned midnight when
it happened and she looked back and she was standing there saying,
"oh ye s, someone wi 11 want me, I'm so great. II
Then it turned midnight and she saw herself as she really was,
all scarred and deformed. Her hair was short and hacked off. And
her arms .•. 0 She went crazy and turned around and ran into the
house and slashed everybody up.
They found hook marks in the door where she tried to claw in.
She broke her way in and killed them and cut off al1 their hair.
Then she ran away in to the hills. They say that if you go back
there at midnight and look into the pool she will appear to you.
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Jon Siler
" Saint Anne~ s Retreat"
Fe bruary, 1981
USU Campus
Item ~f~
Jon first heard this story while he was driving up Logan Canyon
on his way to Saint Anne's with some friends. He doesrrt personally
believe this story, but he admits that it did make for a frightening
experience at St. Anne's.
I heard that St. Anne's was at first built and owned by the Catholic
church. They would send nuns up there. First I heard that it was
a place where they would send nuns that got pregnant. I heard
that there was this guy that lived up there in the hills that was
a hermit. He would come down and really hassle all the Catholics
there. He would tell them to leave and they never would. So
he started getting physical and violent. It ended up that he
came down and killed these nuns. He killed all the nuns in
different places. There's a shack down lower and one got
hatched there. One got drown in the ~wimming pool.
I have also heard that one nun got pregnant and went and drown
herself in the swimming pool. People have told me that they have
gone up there and they had been walking up the road and there was
a noose hanging from a tree that was swinging back and forth.
They have also sworn to have seen dogs up there.
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Bryon Hugie
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item #7
Bryon first heard this story from his grandmother. He doesn't
know where she heard it from. He has heard this story more than
once and from different people so he figures there is a good chance
some of it is true.
It (St. Anne's) used to be an old nunnery. It was a sin
for the nuns to have kids. Well there was a camp up there and
there was a couple of nuns that did have kids. The mother nun,
I don't know what they call them, found out about the babies so
she stole the kids one night and threw them in the swimming pool
and drown them.
There is a big swimming pool up there and a bunch of old
buildings. The main nunnery where they used to hold their meetings
burned down and all there is is an old building place. The cement
foundation is still there and that is about all.
She threw the babies in the pool and they drown and that same
night the whola place burned down. It all happened in one day and
one night. From what I hear, the nuns aren't permitted up there
any more. They aren't suppose to go up there and they closed it
all down. I don't know if they (the nuns) all left of if they are
still here in the valley.
The original name of that mother nun was Saint Hecida.
There is suppose to be some dogs sitting there watching the place
for Witch Hecida. When ever you go up there you are suppose to
be able to hear their chains or hear them bark.
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Larry Gates
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item #8
Larry wasn't too sure on the details, but the main ideas are
included in the story. .He heard the story from some of his
friends quite a few years ago.
It's just a typical maniac nun story. The nun with the
hook, she lost one hand. There were two kids up the canyon
going at it in the back of the car. They heard something
russtling in the bushes. They got real nervous and drove home.
When they got home there was a hook hanging in the door handle.
(The person with the hook was suppose to be a nun from St. Anne's)
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Bryon Hugie
February, 1981
USU Campus
'Item 119
"Personal Experience with Saint Anne's Retreat"
At first Bryon was a little reluctant to talk about this after
I told him it would be typed up and recorded in the Archives.
Once I got him talking though, he told me everything I wanted to
know.
It all started one night up Logan Canyon. Me and a bunch
of my friends had a big brain storm idea. We would cruise up to
St. Anne's and have a little fun. We had heard a bunch about the
place so we decided to go up and check it out by ourselves.
There was me and three other guys the very first time we
went up there. We got up there and it was pretty quiet and there
was a full moon. We got up there and we started walking up in there.
We thought we heard a bunch of stuff •••
We got up there and we went into the swimming pool. (there
is no water in the pool now.) My friends like playing with ouija
boards. I thought this was going to be super that we would be
playing with a ouija board at the bottom of the swimming pool.
We didn't have one with us that night so we figured that we
would bring one up next time we came.
We looked through all the old buildings and that was pretty
scary. We saw a lot of mounds of dirt with crosses on top of them
with weeds over the crosses. It was pretty weird because they
were allover. They were around the houses, and they were on the
side hills.
We looked around a little bit longer but we didn't stay too
long.
The next night we got a bunch more of people. I think
there was about six, seven of us, maybe eight of us up there.
We took a ouija board and we got up there and played with it at
the bottom of the swimming pool. It was a full moon again. The
board was working super. I swear that I heard dogs chains that
night and so do my buddies. It was weird the way it happened.
We told everybody about it. The next night we went up there
with quite a few more friends. We took a couple car loads up.
When we got up there nobody dared to go in there. There was a
weird feeling there. There is a bridge there before you go in
and it is all locked up. The whole place is chained up and nobody
wanted to go in. 11
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I finally told them that I would go in if somebody would
come with me. So me and two other guys went in there and we got
way back in there and there was some people up in there.
It is summer homes up in there now. We knocked on their door,
but nobody answered. So we left.
We went and rumaged through a bunch of old junk that is underneath
the cabins and looked through it and found a bunch of old
beds and dressers and junk like that.
My mom and a few people that I have asked about the place
don't really care for us to go up there. For a while we were
going up about every night. It was for about three weeks straight.
It was a big thing. We'd take everybody up there and show them
around and show them the things that we had found.
St. Anne's is a weird place. We went up there some nights
and there was no way we could find it. It's in a corner. It's
just off the side of the road and it has a bunch of trees around
the road. It'~ all grown in the there is an old bridge that is chained
up and there is no way you could break that chain.
St. Anne's is pretty neat looking. There is a bridge and
then there is an upper road or a lower road you can go on. It
forks off and right in the center of that fork is where the
swimming pool sits. It sits up on a great big high mound of
grass. It's got a diving board off of it. After that the
right road dies and the left one goes up a canyon. The nuns used
to go up this canyon to do their meditating and being with the
Lord.
It's got a big gate going across the bridge. Some nights we
have gone up there and we have combed that canyon. It's down
from the Girl's Camp and we have combed the right side of the
road fifty times and there was no way we could find that road. We
have all but walked up and down there. We've gone about 5 miles
an hour in the car and there is no way we have been able to find
it. But on some nights we've been able to drive right to it.
I remember one special night. We all jumped in the car and
went way off the side of the road just as slow as we could, but
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we thought we might have missed it so we went up and down that
road about 10 times and we never did find it. There was a bunch
of us looking, so it's not just a matter of one of us missing it.
There was just no way it was there •
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Chris Lutz
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item iHO
"The 'Real' Story of Saint Anne's Retreat"
Chris told me that the following story is the real story of St.
Anne's Retreat. I have no reason to believe that this is not
the real story, but on the other hand, I have no proof to back
this story up. She did not tell me where she heard this story.
There is a Catholic church on Fraternity Row. Some people owned
this church--it was their house. They were Catholic and they
wanted to hold masses and there was no other churches except the
Mormon church. So the Catholics built on that chapel part of it.
They named it Saint John's, because they always name everything
after saints.
~Ci,e!:1 Then it started becoming big and lots of Catholic families
started moving in so they converted their whole house into a
church. You know, with a place for the Father to sleep. And
then they built St. Anne's for themselves as a home.
And it was a home, it was not a retreat for nuns. Nuns were never
there. It has a swimming pool up there. It's a really nice plaee
with a family room and a kitchen and bedrooms and a little deck to
overlook the swimming pool. It's just a house .
--------------------------- ------------
•
•
•
Jon Siler
"A Presence in Logan Canyon"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item tfoll
This story happened to the brother of one of Jon's friends. He
believes it to be true because it happened to someone he knew
that swears that it actually happened. Jon said this experience
was instrumental in the reason the boy involved in the story
served a mission.
The person this story happened to is the brother of a friend
of mine. He was a pretty rowdy guy.[,:,He was driving through
Logan Canyon by himself one night and all of a sudden he felt
a type of presence or something and so he looked in his rear
view mirror. In the back seat there was two red eyes looking
at him. He drove through the canyon because he didn't know what
would happened if he stopped.
Then all of a sudden somebody started rattling in his 8-track
tapes in the back seat. Then some tapes started flipping around
in the back of his car. He kept driving all the way home and nothing
ever really happened, but he kept looking in the rear view mirror
and those red eyes were right there all the way down the canyon.
When he got home after that he straightened up and went on a
mission.
15
•
•
•
Bruce Ward
"The Man of Logan Canyonll
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item 1112
Bruce heard this story while he was at a scout camp. He doesn't
believe the story himself, but he thinks that some of the people
at the camp did.
The story is about a guy who is suppose to live in the
Logan mountains. He worked in a mine. His foreman for some
reason ended up falling in love with this guy's wife. So the
foreman set a charge that had a delayed fuse on it. They set it
off and it didn't go off and it didn't go off so the foreman sent
Hyrum in after it ti see what was going wrong with the charge in
the mine. Just as Hyrum got in there it blew up.
They thought it had killed him and it really didn't. It just
burned one side of his face real bad. He didn't dare go home
cause he looked so awful, and it made him sick. So he just
lived in the mountains for a long time. He went back and he
killed this. foreman and no one could never figure out how he
had died.
Hyrum was suppose to have been seen by some people, but
he would always run away. No one ever got a good look at him.
Some forest ranger were up there in the mountains one day and they
say they saw this guy that was doing something, but they couldn't
figure out what it was so they got up real close and he turned
around and one side of his face was a11bblack and he had filed his
teeth pointy.
~He started coming after the forest rangers so they ran, and
they got in their truck and the story is suppose to go that
he was so strong that he ripped the door off as they drove away.
They found some old cabins up there that had human ske1tons
hanging on hooks. The story has it that he would go around and
kill people and that he would take them back up to his cabin.
16
Tammy Durtschi
Utah State University
Fife Folklore Archives
Logan, Utah
Honors 336
Instructor: Wilson
Winter 1981
•
•
•
LEGENDS OF LOGAN CANYON
Tannny Durtschi
Logan, Utah 84321
Utah State University
Mormon Folklore
Honors 336
Winter Quarter, 1981
•
•
•
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Cover Essay ......................................... o •••••••••• ii
Autobiographical Sketch •..•....•....•.••.•...••.••••..•...••••.• v
List of Informants ............................................. vi
Witch Hecida
Title Informant Item
How Witch Hecida Came Into Being ..• Lutz .•• ltem #l •..• Page # 1
Witch Hecida •.........•.•.....••.• Siler •.. Item #2 ••.• Page # 2
Witch Hecida ..•..................• Gates .•. Item 11=3 .... Page # 3
Personal Experience with Hecida .•.• Lutz .•• ltem #4 •... Page # 4
Saint Anne's Retreat
-Ti-tl-e Informant Item
St. Anne's Retreat .•••..•....•....• Lutz .•• ltem # 5 ... Page
St. Anne's Retreat .•.•....•..••... Siler .•• Item 11= 6 .•• Page
St. Anne's Retreat ••.•..•.•......• Hugie ... Item 11= 7 ••• Page
St. Anne's Retreat •.•..•.•......•• Gates •.. ltem # 8 ... Page
Personal Experience at St. Anne's.Hugie ••• ltem # 9 .•. Page
The "Real" Story of St. Anne's ..... Lutz ••• Item 11=10 ••• Page
Miscellaneous Legends <"
-Ti-tl-e
# 6
# 8
11= 9
11=10
11=11
#14
A fresence in Logan Canyon .•.•..•• Siler .•• ltem #ll ••• Page #15
The Man of Logan Canyon ••.......••. Ward •.• ltem #12 ••. Page #16
i
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COVER ESSAY
This has been an intriguing project to undertake. People's
reaction when asked to be interviewed varied from one extreme
to another. The great diversity in the version of the story from
one person to the next was remarkable. In the following essay
I will attempt to explain these statements as well as make some
additional assertions.
The topic I chose for my paper is the Ledgends of Logan Canyon.
I concentrate most on Saint Anne's Retreat and Witch Hecida.
Items 11 and 12 are just miscellaneous stories about Logan Canyon
that I chose to include because I wanted to illustrate that
there are many, many other ledgends about Logan Canyon other than
the two main stories of St. Anne's and Witch Hecida.
St. Anne's is located about five miles up Logan Canyon.
There are many people who are sure that they know the "real"
story about what happened there, but they all disagree about it.
One of the "real" stories that I heard indicated that nuns were
never at St. Anne's Retreat. (Item 1fl0) Another "real" story
said that a family built ~he retreat, but then they decided to
donate it to Utah State University. The University was too slow
in accepting it so the family decided to donate it to the
Catholic church.
I was only able to obtain a very limited amount of facts
about St. Anne's. It was built sometime during the 1930's and it
eventually burned down. The ledgends are built around the demise
of the retreat. The stories range from a hermit coming down out
of the hills and killing all of the nuns to a story where it is
actually the Mother Superior who does the killing. There is alot
of diversity in who was really killed. One story states that
all of the nuns got killed, whereas another story tells of
babies that belonged to the nuns were drown in the swimming
pool.
The most detailed description of St. Anne's is found in
Item #9. All that is now left of the original retreat is a
swimming pool and the cement foundation of the original building.
ii
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•
The only logical reason that I can come up with as to why
all of these stories began circulating is because up until
the 1930's there were virtually no other churches in Logan.
besides the Mormon church. When the Catholic church began
prospering in the valley the Mormons resented it. When St. Anne's
actually did burn the locals probably seized upon this as a chance
to exploit the Catholic church and point out that this would
never have happened if the Catholics were not wicked.
Once it was a generally accepted fact that something Rad been
going on at St. Anne's that shouldn't have been going on, the
stories probably had free rein of the imagination. Stories
began circulating that one of the nuns had gone crazy and killed
her sister nuns. Other stories say that a 15 year old girl that
the nuns had been taking care of had killed the nuns.
There are two details that are included in most versions
of the St. Anne's story. One detail is that there are generally
dogs somewhere in the story. No one seems to know where the
dogs came from, but they are there all the same. In most of the
stories the do.gs play the part of being a guardian over the
retreat.
The second detail is the ~wimming pool. The swimming pool
is always used as a means by which someone is murdered. Someone
is thrown in the pool by someone else and drown. The swimming
pool is still there today and is the factor that convinces alot
of people of the validity of these stories.
Witch Hecida stories offer even a greater variation between
versions than doe ,; the St. Anne's stories. In each story Witch
Hecida is in an entirely different location.
up at Third Dam in Logan Canyon. (Item #1).
One story puts her
Another ledgend
says that Witch Hecida resides in a cave in Logan Canyon. (Item #20
Still another story says that Witch Hecida comes down at Spring
Hollow in the form of fog. (Item #3). But the most amazing
story is that Witch Hecida came from St. Anne's Retreat. She
was supposedly the Mother Superior that murdered all of the babies,
and her original name was Saint Hecida •
iii
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•
Some of the people I talked with were anxious to share
their stories with me. A couple of people I talked to told me
that they knew the stories of St. Anne's and Witch Hecida, but
they refused when I told them that their stories were going to
be included in the Archives. Generally once people started
talking and began telling me their stories they loosened up and
would tell me anything I wanted to know.
I recorded my interviews with my informants and then I
typed them up exact~y as they were told. I would ask my informants
questions to help draw similarities between the different versions.
Theyonly editing of their original versdions was by eliminating
repeated segments of their tales and dropping the unnecessary lIand ll s i
•
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AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH
I was born in Logan, Utah and I have lived here in Cache
V~lley all of my life. I attended Sky View High School and Lam
now a Freshman at Utah State University.
My father is an Economics professor here at USU.
a housewife and has dedicated her life to her family.
My mother is
My parents
are the best anyone could ever ask for. I am the sixth out of
seven children in our family . We have very strong family ties.
I wouldn't trade my family experiences for anything.
The reason I chose to do my paper on the legends of Logan
Canyon is because I have lived here my entire life and I h.have
heard these stories ever since I can remember. I was interested
to see what other people thought of these stories and I was
interested in collecting different versions of the same story.
I am fascinated by people, and I enjoy doing projects that
allow me to gain a better understanding of people and why they
function like they do. This paper has given me an opportunity
to get some insights that I otherwise would never have been able
to gain.
My hobbies include reading, being with and observing people,
and sports. I could watch professional football forever! I also
like participating in almost all sports.
v
• Gates, Larry.
Hugie, Bryon
Lutz, Chris
• Siler, Jon
Ward, Bruce
•
LIST OF INFORMANTS
Larry was raised in Logan and attended Logan High.
He is presently a Senior at Utah State University
and is majoring in Pre-Med. He is the presently
the president of the Honors Program at U.S.U.
He has served an LDS mission. He contributed
items 3 and 8 in this paper.
Bryon is a Freshman at Utah State University. He
was born in Logan and was raised in College Ward,
Utah. He is currently waiting for his mission call.
Bryon does not play with ouija boards since his
experiences at St. Anne's. He took those events
seriously and will have nothing to do with ouija
boards or St. Anne's Retreat now. He contributed
items 7 and 9.
Chris was the most anxious to tell her stories of
the people I interviewed. She is a Freshman at
Utah State University. She is a non-mormon, but
is ver~ knowledgable about our culture. She
was by far the most cofrorful story teller I talked
to. Items 1,4,5 and 10 belong to her.
Jon is a Pre-Med major at Utah State University.
He has lived in Cache Valley allt of his life.
He is preparing for an LDS mission and will leave
in June of this year. He enjoys skiing and playing
racquetball. He contributed items 2,6and 11.
Bruce was raised in southeastern Idaho. He was
active in the Boy Scout program in Cache Valley.
He served a mission in Alabama. He is currentJy
a student at Utah State University studying Biology.
His hobbies include snow skiing and reading. He
contributed items number 12.
vi
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i
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Chris Lutz
"How Witch Hecida Came Into Being"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item iH
Chris told me this story when I asked her if she knew anything
about Witch Hecida. Chris honestly believes that there is such
a person as Witch Hecida. Her personal experience with Hecida
is recounted in a later item.
There was a camping excersion. She (Witch Hecida) was just
a young girl and they all went up the canyon partying that night.
up at Third Dam in Logan Canyon. They were all partying around
and evidently one of the guys got rough and they took advantage
of her and she was really upsec and really mad. She went after
them and they were all drunk and laughing at her and she said,
"don't do that" and she tried to fight them off, but they jumped
her. She felt really bad, and they were all still so drunk and
afterwards she was just kinda mad at them. She went after them
with a club and they were all laughing and they pushed her into
the water. She was drunk in the place and she drown, a young
girl drown. The guys didn't know what to do. If they went back
to town and were asked how she drown, well, what could they say?
So she died there and thats how come she is in the water
and she comes across like a ball. They call her a witch because
anybody caught drinking or messing around up at Third Dam s~e
will come and get.
1
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Jon Siler
"Witch Hecida"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item in
Jon didn't know the people that actually had this experience. He
heard this story from some of his friends when they were driving
up Logan Canyon one night.
This was told to me by a friend. It didn't happen to him,
but he heard it from somebody else who heard it from somebody els~.
Witch Hecida is suppose to be in Logan Canyon. She is suppose
to have seven white mice and seven dogs. These guys were going
through the cave one time and they smelled something and then they
started to hear dogs barking and they thought that was really
strange to hear dogs barking and they thought maybe a dog went in
there and got caught or something. They kept going in there and
they came to a big pit. They looked down there and sawall these
mice and it ended up that there was seven mice and then they
saw some dogs After they saw the dogs they left because they started
getting really scared because they knew about Witch Hecida.
They left and never went back.
,2
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Larry Gates
"Witch Hecida"
February, 1981
UEU Campus
Item if3
Larry couldn't remember the story very well. It had been a long
time since he had heard it. The following is the story of Witch
Hecida that he recall hearing from some of his friends in high
school. He said that his friends didn't actually believe in
~~ci~a, it was just a good story to tell •
. -. l . -u
All I know is that a friend of mine, Steve Peterson, who
is now in the Theatre Department used to go up there and do a
little routine. I'm not even sure what it was, I was never with
them. They would go up and call down Hecida in Spring Hollow
and do a little chant and they had a little ritual they would do.
Then the fog was suppose to come down, rolling down the mountain.
You could see this blanket of white fog. It would move down
through the trees toward the hollow. As far as I know they didn't
ever stay around there to see what happened when the fog got down.
I was never there when they did it.
3
•
e
,e
February ~ 1981
USU Ca!llpus
Chris Lutz Item #4
"PersonaUExperience with Witch Hecida"
Chris swears to this day that she saw Witch Hecida. She refuses
to go up the canyon any more and tell ghose stories. She claims
to have only been up the canyon once since her experience with
Hecida.
This is my Witch Hecida story~ this honestly happened to me.
I'm really scared about things like that and they always told
me that if you go up on Third Dam bridge in Logan Canyon and you
stand there at midnight~ turn around three times and saY'tlWithh
Hecida~ Witch Hecida~ Witch Hecida" and look over the water she
will come to you.
She'll come to you in a little golden ball~ like the good
fairy. She comes across the water in this little golden ball
and she comes to you and stands on the bridge.
I figured it all out because it scared me. But it was
nothing~ we all knew these stories. So one night~ me and my
girlfriend--I guess we were juniors--were going out on a double
date with these two guys and one guy had his brother's new 240Z.
We went to Smithfield and we went to see the Love Bug. Afterwards
we were driving into town and we said "Let's go driving up
the canyon and tell ghost stories".
So we drove up the canyon and my friend was telling us about
if you stand on the bridge and turn around three times Witch
Hecida will come to you. We turned to gon onto the bridge and I
said, "I'm scared, you guys, I just have this awful feeling"--it
scared me real bad. So we went to tu~n the car around and we
went to flip a "u" and thats a pretty big place up there, but
the car would only go half way so we were wedged between the
bridge and the road and it was just like in the Love Bug--this
sounds really stupid--I ~; said, "Oh my gosh we are going to . • . "
in the Love Bug we had just saw an hour earlier he went to flip a
"u" and he didn't quite make it and he turned into the hill and
the hill fell down on him. I said, "the hill is going to fall
down on us". We all started screaming and we hurried and backed
up and flipped around and started driving out of there as fast
4
•
•
•
as we could. We were hauling "A", going 90 miles, no kidding. I
lobked over at the speedometer. I said, "slow down, slow down,
there is a car in front of us". It was an old beat up Falcon job.
I said, "Oh my gosh, it's Witch Hecida". The two in the back
were screamJng and laughing, kinda joking. I lOOked forward and there
in the car it looked like her hair was just glowing. It looked
like an old lady with one of those puffy hairdos. It was just
kind oa like hazy-blue, like it radiated from her head.
I said,"It's Witch Hecida, I know it, she knows that we are
here". So we started slowing down and she started slowing down.
There was just one person in the car. We were going 20 miles
and hour. 20. After going 80. So we started slowing down and it::
(her hair) seemed to grow more brilliant, just like cotton candy,
kind of fluffy and mysterious and I was just freaking out.
So we slowed down and we thought that we would just let her
go into town. She slowed down too. We were creeping along 20
miles an:~ hour. When we hit first dam we were going 5. She was
going 5 and we were going 5 miles an hour. I said, "hit it!" and
Vrooooooom •... we went right around her. We hightailed it up that
hill. She started racing us! I said, "she is trying to catch us,
she is trying to catch us." We hauled "A" into town. We were going
90 down Fourth North. We ran a red light at Fourth DNorth
cause we were so scared. She was right behind us, On Main Street
we turned left and we went into that gas station and we turned
around to watch, she was right behind us on that block, but she
never came down to Main Street. We sat there and we just shook
and shook and I said, "why didn't she come after us?" They told
me that she can't come out of the canyon. Fourth North is still
considered part of the canyon because of the slope. She cant turn
onto Main Street. She just disappeared.
To this day I swear that was Witch Hecida. I've never gone
up the canyon and told ghost stories since. I won't. I believe
in it •
5
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Chris Lutz
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item 115
Chris heard this story at her Senior class party that was held
at St Anne's Retreat which is located up Logan Canyon. She doesn't
believe this story, but she was anxious to tell it to me.
St. Anne's used to be a retreat for nuns. In the Catholic
church they believe in taking care of their welfare program.
There was this one girl who was living up there because
evidently she didn't have any parenti. The nuns were taking care
of her while an adoption was goin~ through. She was about four-teen
or fifteen years of age. ',.' ~ ';
She was a gorgeous girl, but ·she had a few mental problems
because she thought no one wanted her. She was living up there
because she was so old and no one had adopted her.
While she was living up there with the nuns she really took
good care of herself. She had this long beautiful hair and everyone
told her how beautiful they thought she was. They would tell
her not to worry and that someone would want someone·'as beautiful
as her.
She goes out on this date one night and she is traveling
through the canyon and they wreck and her face went through :. the
windshield. He died, he got thrown out of the car when the car
started to roll. Her face went through the windshield. It
severed all her hair off. She was lucky to make it. She broke
her arm. Her other arm went through the windshield with her and
it got cut off. And they found her there. She was about half
crazy because she couldn't get out of the windshield. She was
stuck, just like that. He was dead and she was just hysterical
and half crazy when they found her, but she did survive. They
had to shave off all her hair because of the head lacerations.
They had to sew up her scalp again. She had a hook arm because
all the nerves in her ar~were so badly damaged that they couldn't
put it back on.
She was having a lot of trouble adjusting. They took her
back up to the convent and told her not to worry. All of the nuns
were sweet to her, but she was never the same. She would have
6
•
•
•
fits and tremors.
On the first anniversary of the accident was the ending of
St. Anne's. They went up there the next day and every single nun
had been hacked to death with a hooken arm and that girl was gone.
They never found her. That's when they closed St. Anne's.
If you go there at midnight you can see her face looking
into the swimming pool looking at her hair gone because that is
what triggered it off. It was her anniversary, her hair was gone,
and she wasn't the same. She was out walking in the moonlight
and looked in the pool and saw her reflection of her with her long
hair. She was all nice and normal. Then it turned midnight when
it happened and she looked back and she was standing there saying,
"oh ye s, someone wi 11 want me, I'm so great. II
Then it turned midnight and she saw herself as she really was,
all scarred and deformed. Her hair was short and hacked off. And
her arms .•. 0 She went crazy and turned around and ran into the
house and slashed everybody up.
They found hook marks in the door where she tried to claw in.
She broke her way in and killed them and cut off al1 their hair.
Then she ran away in to the hills. They say that if you go back
there at midnight and look into the pool she will appear to you.
7
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•
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Jon Siler
" Saint Anne~ s Retreat"
Fe bruary, 1981
USU Campus
Item ~f~
Jon first heard this story while he was driving up Logan Canyon
on his way to Saint Anne's with some friends. He doesrrt personally
believe this story, but he admits that it did make for a frightening
experience at St. Anne's.
I heard that St. Anne's was at first built and owned by the Catholic
church. They would send nuns up there. First I heard that it was
a place where they would send nuns that got pregnant. I heard
that there was this guy that lived up there in the hills that was
a hermit. He would come down and really hassle all the Catholics
there. He would tell them to leave and they never would. So
he started getting physical and violent. It ended up that he
came down and killed these nuns. He killed all the nuns in
different places. There's a shack down lower and one got
hatched there. One got drown in the ~wimming pool.
I have also heard that one nun got pregnant and went and drown
herself in the swimming pool. People have told me that they have
gone up there and they had been walking up the road and there was
a noose hanging from a tree that was swinging back and forth.
They have also sworn to have seen dogs up there.
8
•
•
•
Bryon Hugie
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item #7
Bryon first heard this story from his grandmother. He doesn't
know where she heard it from. He has heard this story more than
once and from different people so he figures there is a good chance
some of it is true.
It (St. Anne's) used to be an old nunnery. It was a sin
for the nuns to have kids. Well there was a camp up there and
there was a couple of nuns that did have kids. The mother nun,
I don't know what they call them, found out about the babies so
she stole the kids one night and threw them in the swimming pool
and drown them.
There is a big swimming pool up there and a bunch of old
buildings. The main nunnery where they used to hold their meetings
burned down and all there is is an old building place. The cement
foundation is still there and that is about all.
She threw the babies in the pool and they drown and that same
night the whola place burned down. It all happened in one day and
one night. From what I hear, the nuns aren't permitted up there
any more. They aren't suppose to go up there and they closed it
all down. I don't know if they (the nuns) all left of if they are
still here in the valley.
The original name of that mother nun was Saint Hecida.
There is suppose to be some dogs sitting there watching the place
for Witch Hecida. When ever you go up there you are suppose to
be able to hear their chains or hear them bark.
9
•
•
•
Larry Gates
"Saint Anne's Retreat"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item #8
Larry wasn't too sure on the details, but the main ideas are
included in the story. .He heard the story from some of his
friends quite a few years ago.
It's just a typical maniac nun story. The nun with the
hook, she lost one hand. There were two kids up the canyon
going at it in the back of the car. They heard something
russtling in the bushes. They got real nervous and drove home.
When they got home there was a hook hanging in the door handle.
(The person with the hook was suppose to be a nun from St. Anne's)
10
•
•
•
Bryon Hugie
February, 1981
USU Campus
'Item 119
"Personal Experience with Saint Anne's Retreat"
At first Bryon was a little reluctant to talk about this after
I told him it would be typed up and recorded in the Archives.
Once I got him talking though, he told me everything I wanted to
know.
It all started one night up Logan Canyon. Me and a bunch
of my friends had a big brain storm idea. We would cruise up to
St. Anne's and have a little fun. We had heard a bunch about the
place so we decided to go up and check it out by ourselves.
There was me and three other guys the very first time we
went up there. We got up there and it was pretty quiet and there
was a full moon. We got up there and we started walking up in there.
We thought we heard a bunch of stuff •••
We got up there and we went into the swimming pool. (there
is no water in the pool now.) My friends like playing with ouija
boards. I thought this was going to be super that we would be
playing with a ouija board at the bottom of the swimming pool.
We didn't have one with us that night so we figured that we
would bring one up next time we came.
We looked through all the old buildings and that was pretty
scary. We saw a lot of mounds of dirt with crosses on top of them
with weeds over the crosses. It was pretty weird because they
were allover. They were around the houses, and they were on the
side hills.
We looked around a little bit longer but we didn't stay too
long.
The next night we got a bunch more of people. I think
there was about six, seven of us, maybe eight of us up there.
We took a ouija board and we got up there and played with it at
the bottom of the swimming pool. It was a full moon again. The
board was working super. I swear that I heard dogs chains that
night and so do my buddies. It was weird the way it happened.
We told everybody about it. The next night we went up there
with quite a few more friends. We took a couple car loads up.
When we got up there nobody dared to go in there. There was a
weird feeling there. There is a bridge there before you go in
and it is all locked up. The whole place is chained up and nobody
wanted to go in. 11
•
•
•
I finally told them that I would go in if somebody would
come with me. So me and two other guys went in there and we got
way back in there and there was some people up in there.
It is summer homes up in there now. We knocked on their door,
but nobody answered. So we left.
We went and rumaged through a bunch of old junk that is underneath
the cabins and looked through it and found a bunch of old
beds and dressers and junk like that.
My mom and a few people that I have asked about the place
don't really care for us to go up there. For a while we were
going up about every night. It was for about three weeks straight.
It was a big thing. We'd take everybody up there and show them
around and show them the things that we had found.
St. Anne's is a weird place. We went up there some nights
and there was no way we could find it. It's in a corner. It's
just off the side of the road and it has a bunch of trees around
the road. It'~ all grown in the there is an old bridge that is chained
up and there is no way you could break that chain.
St. Anne's is pretty neat looking. There is a bridge and
then there is an upper road or a lower road you can go on. It
forks off and right in the center of that fork is where the
swimming pool sits. It sits up on a great big high mound of
grass. It's got a diving board off of it. After that the
right road dies and the left one goes up a canyon. The nuns used
to go up this canyon to do their meditating and being with the
Lord.
It's got a big gate going across the bridge. Some nights we
have gone up there and we have combed that canyon. It's down
from the Girl's Camp and we have combed the right side of the
road fifty times and there was no way we could find that road. We
have all but walked up and down there. We've gone about 5 miles
an hour in the car and there is no way we have been able to find
it. But on some nights we've been able to drive right to it.
I remember one special night. We all jumped in the car and
went way off the side of the road just as slow as we could, but
12
•
•
•
we thought we might have missed it so we went up and down that
road about 10 times and we never did find it. There was a bunch
of us looking, so it's not just a matter of one of us missing it.
There was just no way it was there •
•
•
•
Chris Lutz
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item iHO
"The 'Real' Story of Saint Anne's Retreat"
Chris told me that the following story is the real story of St.
Anne's Retreat. I have no reason to believe that this is not
the real story, but on the other hand, I have no proof to back
this story up. She did not tell me where she heard this story.
There is a Catholic church on Fraternity Row. Some people owned
this church--it was their house. They were Catholic and they
wanted to hold masses and there was no other churches except the
Mormon church. So the Catholics built on that chapel part of it.
They named it Saint John's, because they always name everything
after saints.
~Ci,e!:1 Then it started becoming big and lots of Catholic families
started moving in so they converted their whole house into a
church. You know, with a place for the Father to sleep. And
then they built St. Anne's for themselves as a home.
And it was a home, it was not a retreat for nuns. Nuns were never
there. It has a swimming pool up there. It's a really nice plaee
with a family room and a kitchen and bedrooms and a little deck to
overlook the swimming pool. It's just a house .
--------------------------- ------------
•
•
•
Jon Siler
"A Presence in Logan Canyon"
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item tfoll
This story happened to the brother of one of Jon's friends. He
believes it to be true because it happened to someone he knew
that swears that it actually happened. Jon said this experience
was instrumental in the reason the boy involved in the story
served a mission.
The person this story happened to is the brother of a friend
of mine. He was a pretty rowdy guy.[,:,He was driving through
Logan Canyon by himself one night and all of a sudden he felt
a type of presence or something and so he looked in his rear
view mirror. In the back seat there was two red eyes looking
at him. He drove through the canyon because he didn't know what
would happened if he stopped.
Then all of a sudden somebody started rattling in his 8-track
tapes in the back seat. Then some tapes started flipping around
in the back of his car. He kept driving all the way home and nothing
ever really happened, but he kept looking in the rear view mirror
and those red eyes were right there all the way down the canyon.
When he got home after that he straightened up and went on a
mission.
15
•
•
•
Bruce Ward
"The Man of Logan Canyonll
February, 1981
USU Campus
Item 1112
Bruce heard this story while he was at a scout camp. He doesn't
believe the story himself, but he thinks that some of the people
at the camp did.
The story is about a guy who is suppose to live in the
Logan mountains. He worked in a mine. His foreman for some
reason ended up falling in love with this guy's wife. So the
foreman set a charge that had a delayed fuse on it. They set it
off and it didn't go off and it didn't go off so the foreman sent
Hyrum in after it ti see what was going wrong with the charge in
the mine. Just as Hyrum got in there it blew up.
They thought it had killed him and it really didn't. It just
burned one side of his face real bad. He didn't dare go home
cause he looked so awful, and it made him sick. So he just
lived in the mountains for a long time. He went back and he
killed this. foreman and no one could never figure out how he
had died.
Hyrum was suppose to have been seen by some people, but
he would always run away. No one ever got a good look at him.
Some forest ranger were up there in the mountains one day and they
say they saw this guy that was doing something, but they couldn't
figure out what it was so they got up real close and he turned
around and one side of his face was a11bblack and he had filed his
teeth pointy.
~He started coming after the forest rangers so they ran, and
they got in their truck and the story is suppose to go that
he was so strong that he ripped the door off as they drove away.
They found some old cabins up there that had human ske1tons
hanging on hooks. The story has it that he would go around and
kill people and that he would take them back up to his cabin.
16
Creator
Source
Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library, Special Collections and Archives, FOLK COLL 8, 81-03
Publisher
Rights
Reproduction for publication, exhibition, web display or commercial use is only permissible with the consent of the USU Libraries Special Collections and Archives, phone (435) 797-2663.
Relation
Utah State University undergraduate student fieldwork collection, 1979-2011 FOLK COLL 8 USU
http://archiveswest.orbiscascade.org/ark:/80444/xv86462
St. Anne's Retreat
Language
Type
Identifier
http://digital.lib.usu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/p16944coll20/id/2
SCAFOLK008USUBx008-81-03.pdf
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