Ghost Stories

Uncle Tom

For severalconsecutive summers, my friend (the co-worker, let's call himTristan, shall we?) worked in a summer camp in upstate New York.The camp catered to children with disabilities, mental andotherwise. There were also some non-disabled children there. Onenight, while Tristan was chatting with some of the oldercounselors, they began talking about a counselor he'd never met-- they called him Uncle Tom. Uncle Tom had worked as a counselorduring the late 70's. He was much-loved by the children there,but very eccentric. He was known for wearing pajamas all day,bathrobes, even a graduation gown (complete with hat and tassel).At first they thought he did it to amuse the kids, but laterfound out that he dressed this way year-round. He was also anamazingly talented Cellist. A charcoal portrait of Uncle Tom,done by one of the children, still hung at the camp when Tristanwas there.

Unfortunately, Uncle Tom had emotional problems that no one knewabout. One summer, just before all the children were about toleave, he attempted suicide in one of the cabins. Luckily,someone came looking for him, and got him medical help before itwas too late. That Winter, Uncle Tom was in and out ofpsychiatric institutions. By Summer, however, he seemed to havereally gotten his act together, and was allowed to return to camp.His recovery was short-lived. At the end of the summer, heattempted suicide again. This time, he succeeded, hanging himselfin the same cabin he had used the year before. The children werescheduled to leave the following day, and the other counselorsmanaged to cover-up what had happened.

By the time Tristan began working at camp, the head director hadfirmly told all the counselors that they were not to speak of theincident, or of Uncle Tom, in general -- as it would scare thechildren. That year, they started out with a fresh crop ofchildren, who knew nothing about Uncle Tom. The summer went welluntil just before it was time to leave. The night before (nokidding, on the exact anniversary of Uncle Tom's death) an entirecabin full of girls (ages 13-15) began to scream hysterically.There was a female counselor in the cabin with them at the time.Some were sobbing uncontrollably and saying they'd seen a man inthe cabin. A man they didn't know. These were non-disabledchildren, if that makes any difference. Tristan was one of thefirst to get there, and was comforting the female counselor, whowas also crying. He remembers her saying over and over again"it looked like Tom...he looked just like Tom!!!!"After a thorough search, no intruder was found on the grounds.Nobody had been seen leaving the cabin.

The next year that Tristan was there, the camp was having a"dress up day." The kids got to search through boxes ofold clothing and costumes and wear anything they liked for theentire day. One boy found a black graduation gown which hadbelonged to Uncle Tom. I'd like to mention at this point that theboy suffered severe mental retardation, and was classified as"low functioning" -- i.e. -- barely able to talk.Tristan said he had never known the boy to speak at all, unlessspoken to. Even then, not more than a few short words. Well, theboy put on the black gown and began to run around in circles,flapping his arms, calling "I'm Uncle Tom...I'm Uncle Tom...."over and over. Tristan said that there was no way this particularchild could have associated the gown with Uncle Tom, or evenunderstood the whole story if someone told it to him. Suffice tosay, the counselors were a little freaked.

The next year, some of the counselors decided to get together andhave a "jam session" (as it was so affectionatelycalled in the '80s!) One guy had a guitar, another a piano. Themusic room still housed Uncle Tom's cello, so they thought itmight be cool to add that in as well. They asked a thirdcounselor, who'd had a *little* experience playing the violin toplay the cello. He reluctantly agreed, warning them that hewasn't very good. No sooner did they start playing when theyrealized that their cellist was incredible! They said he wasplaying the thing like one of the old masters! After it was over,they all asked him why he'd been holding out on them about howtalented he was. He couldn't remember anything about playing theCello...he'd blacked out the whole time. All the older counselorscommented that they'd only heard one other person play like that...andguess who it was?

Those were the only three incidents that Tristan experienced. Hesaid he suspected there were more, but the counselors reallyweren't supposed to talk about it. Tristan, and a lot of theother counselors seemed to share the feeling that the reasonUncle Tom was making himself known was because he WANTED hisstory to be told. Tristan thinks that if the head director hadnever forbidden the counselors to talk about Tom, then hewouldn't need to manifest. The camp has since closed down.

Sorry about the colossal length of this...hope you enjoyed. :)

Deena