It is the perfect place for a ghost story, an enormous house built at the turn of the century in Arcata. It sits on the corner of 14 th and I streets and has certainly seen its share of history. By the time O’Rourk Swinney bought the house in 1977 many people had passed through its doors. He would soon realize that one person might have never left.

Swinney, the current landlord for the 19 tenants who occupy the house, tells the ghost story like it happened yesterday. “That was really an interesting time,” he said with a laugh.

A young woman sleeping in a downstairs bedroom of the house awoke suddenly in the middle of the night to see a man standing at the foot of her bed. Her first thought was that she had forgotten to lock her door. Her second was the realization that she had. As terror began to take over, she blinked. In that brief second of total darkness, the man disappeared. As she peered through the darkness she was only able to make out a smoky haze where a solid-looking man had stood only a moment before.

Her scream was bloodcurdling. She leapt out of bed, threw open her door and ran, shaking and white. Two men standing in the kitchen witnessed her terror and calmed her down. Later Swinney spoke with one of the men who comforted the terrified girl. The man said to Swinney, “I don’t believe in ghosts at all, but I believe she saw a ghost.”

The girl who lived in the room next door shared a similar frightening experience that same night. After hearing the scream of her neighbor, she ran from her room to see what had happened. Upon returning to her room, she noticed a book open on her desk. The book was “The Awakening.” When she left the room it had been closed on her bookshelf, not open on her desk. She had never touched that book.

Obviously, no one in the big house slept too easily that night. Swinney decided to take action. He remembers thinking, “Man we’ve got to do something about this.” The renters were quite shaken by the mysterious events.

Swinney decided to consult a local psychic named Melanie Tolley. She claims to be clairvoyant and teaches metaphysical classes in Arcata. “We share our world with spirits all the time,” she said. “For most people that’s a pretty unnoticed experience.”

The possibility of a ghost was definitely attracting the notice of the tenants, and Tolley consented to perform a cleansing of the house. Her only requirement was that the renters not be present. She worried that the high emotions of the young people would interfere with her attempt to remove the ghost.

Upon arriving at the house, Tolley put herself in a trance. She woke after a few minutes and told Swinney that the ghost’s name was Robert Winton or Winters; she hadn’t heard it clearly. He had died aboard a ship at sea while traveling with three other people, although the ship had made it to shore safely with the other passengers.

After revealing this information, Tolley produced a crystal hanging from a beaded string. She explained to Swinney that she would communicate to the ghost through the crystal. Swinney remembers watching her hand to make sure it did not move as she established contact with the ghost. She asked the ghost how it would communicate the word “yes” to her.

“That crystal started moving. It went in a clockwise fashion,” said Swinney, with a hint of incredulity still in his voice after all these years. Swinney saw no evidence that Tolley was moving the string, but that crystal was moving. Next, Tolley asked the ghost to show how it would communicate the word “no.” According to Swinney, that crystal stopped immediately and began to move in the opposite direction.

The psychic and homeowner then went into the room where the ghostly encounter had taken place. The ghost communicated to Tolley that this room was the last place he had known his daughter to be before he died. He had returned to the room to search for her.

When asked if Tolley or the girl who lived in the room could help the ghost, it spun the crystal in a fashion that indicated no. Tolley informed Swinney that as owner of the house, he could give the ghost permission to stay. “I wasn’t sure I wanted it to stay,” said Swinney. Nevertheless, he granted the ghost permission as long as it did not disturb the tenants. The other condition was that it must remain in the attic.

Tolley began the process of moving the ghost to the attic. She cleansed each room by chanting and burning sage in an abalone shell. Tolley moved through the house, finally cleansing the last room and closing the ghost in the attic.

Swinney said he never saw or felt anything throughout the process.

He does remember that the residents were still edgy. “That night everyone on the second floor was restless,” he said. One man sleeping in an upstairs bedroom woke in the middle of the night unable to move his body. He fell back asleep but told his housemates about the incident in the morning.

The residents decided that the ghost did not like the attic. To free the ghost Swinney went to the attic door at the back of a deep closet measuring four feet across and eight feet deep. As he took off the cover to the attic door, something brushed by his back and left arm. “I absolutely felt it,” he said. “That moment I became a believer in that ghost.”

In the ten years since these incidents occurred, the house has never had any problems with the ghost; with the exception of one woman who claimed to have heard the mysterious visitor.

An interesting occurrence took place three to four months after the cleansing. A young man who rented one of the upstairs bedrooms and was house manager at the time came to Swinney with a story concerning the ghost. He described waking in the middle of the night to a tall slender bearded man standing at the end of his bed. He blinked and upon opening his eyes, realized the man had turned into smoke and was disappearing into the wall. The ghost he described perfectly matched the girl’s description, and the incident was also eerily similar to her experience. But his encounter had occurred several years before. The young man had not thought to mention it to Swinney before this time.

The house has a long history, making it a perfect place for a good ghost story. It was probably built in 1904. The original owners have been difficult to locate, but by 1924 the house belonged to a couple named Frank and Eliza Smith. They rented out at least one room to lodgers. By 1942 Julius D. Moore and his wife Meta had purchased the house from Smith and owned it until an HSU fraternity, Tau Kappa Epsilon, purchased it in 1964. The fraternity decided to sell the house after they found that fewer men were joining fraternities. “That Greek system was just fading,” said Swinney.

Swinney came to HSU in the 1970s to pursue a graduate degree in wildlife management, but ended up graduating with a second bachelor’s degree in industrial arts. He saw an opportunity to start a crew team in 1975, and thought it would be a good idea to have a house for the team, hence the house’s modern name, the Crew House.

The fraternity sold the house to Swinney for $40,000. The house came with 14 bedrooms and a city permit that allowed up to 20 people to live in it.

For years many members of the crew team lived in the house during the school year and Swinney opened the house to travelers for 18 summers. “That was a service to the community more than anything,” he said.

The house’s hostelling days ended when “we found the people we were getting weren’t European bicycle tourists anymore,” said Swinney. Instead, the hostel began attracting panhandlers and other unsavory individuals. “When the fun was gone there wasn’t any reason to do it anymore,” he said. Swinney began to rent the rooms year round, mostly to students. Currently there are a variety of students and community members who rent rooms in the house.

The possibility of a ghostly tenant does not seem to scare many of the renters in the Crew House.

“I think it’s fun to talk about. I’m not very superstitious,” said Chin Lewis. He has been managing the house for three years, and lived in the house for about four and a half years.

Swinney makes sure to warn all new renters of the possibility of a ghost, just in case. “When we go to rent we always let them know that we seem to have a non-paying guest,” he said.

Besides a possible 20 th tenant, there are many other aspects of the house that make it special to the renters.

“The house itself is really cool,” said Romeo Oberon, who has lived in the house for almost a year. “There are always new people. There’s a constant flow of energy.”

Joy Brown, a seventh-year wildlife major at HSU, said that the variety of people living in the Crew House is what she enjoys most. “You are thrown in with people you might never otherwise hang out with,” she said. “You learn to appreciate all kinds of people. It has a kick-ass backyard. And it’s a block away from Wildberries and the video store.” Brown is a four-year resident of the house.

Swinney’s favorite feature of the house is “definitely the tenants.” Over the 26 years Swinney has owned the house he has made many long-lasting friendships. “I’ve met a lot of neat people who I still keep in touch with,” he said.

“It’s certainly not for everyone,” said Swinney. “But this way you get to meet other people and still have your privacy.” Swinney also said the tenants have a sense of community and “look out for each other.”

Chris, who refused to give his last name, has lived in the house for 14 years. “Its just kind of an interesting living situation,” he said. “It sounds terrible to live with 18 people in the same house, but if you have the right 18 people it works. It’s comfortable.”

Many old houses have ghost stories. Sometimes they are simply tales told around the dinner table for entertainment. One cannot ignore those other times however, when it seems that something a little more unearthly, a little more mysterious may have taken place.