Haunted Legends of Oregon Coast - Part II

Published 10/25/21 at 11:26 PM PDT
By Oregon Coast Beach Connection staff

(Lincoln City, Oregon) – Part one of this ectoplasmic tour of the Oregon coast (That Which Haunts the Oregon Coast, Part I ) covered the upper third of the region, from Astoria down through Nehalem Bay. In part two, witness now the spine-tingling kookiness of the central and south coast: Lincoln City, Depoe Bay, Newport, Florence, Bandon and Coos Bay. (Above: Newport)

Lurky in Lincoln City

The whole town seems steeped in ethereal legends, sometimes stretching back a century. Such as the geist tale of Siletz Bay, where a phantom ship has supposedly appeared periodically and then poofed out of existence. See Ghosts of Siletz Bay: Oregon Coast Shipwreck Appeared Sometimes

Lending some credence to this is the fact there are the skeletal remains of a ship lodged in those mudflats, an old vessel named the Blanco stranded here in 1865. By the 1930s, its beams were starting to disappear during some seasons, and by the ‘70s or ‘80s it was completely gone from sight.

At least one of the fire stations has a presence lurking, which is sort of documented in a video taken by the Lincoln City Visitors Center back in the ‘90s. It is reportedly still for sale at the visitor center.

Local cameraman and now-retired fire department spokesman Jim Kusz told Oregon Coast Beach Connection something weird happened when he and the crew were filming a group of ghost hunters at the Oceanlake firehouse. He felt the presence there and had a pain in his chest. This was particularly striking to him as he knew from previous historical research that a firefighter died of a heart attack in one of the old engines back in the ‘30s or so.

The Wildflower Grill in town has been a fave restaurant for decades, and back in the early 2000s they told one publication (which was the precursor to Oregon Coast Beach Connection) that the ghost there is a friendly one, sometimes patting people affectionately on the butt.

Nearby, in Depoe Bay, there's also footage available in the video about a creepy ghost upstairs in what was then the Spouting Horn Restaurant – now a brewpub.

Startling at Newport

This town has two lighthouses and lots of creepy tales, although both legends of the lighthouses have been thoroughly debunked.

One is of the southern lighthouse, the smaller Yaquina Bay light, where the ghost of a teen girl supposedly ran loose there and on the beach. That turned out to be from a fictional story in the local newspaper in the 1910s, but somehow got ingrained in local culture until the ‘80s.

The taller Yaquina Head Lighthouse once had a legend of a wispy Mr. Higgins, who purportedly died of dubious circumstances on the spiral stairway. That turned out to be bunk as well, as around '99 or 2000 the Bureau of Land Management (that runs the structure) received a letter from a descendent of Higgins who said he left the place for Portland to become a dock worker, eventually passing away in Portland in the ‘30s.

Depoe Bay

However, some say a former lighthouse keeper and his daughter haunt the beaches and bars, looking for each other, after they both died on a stormy night in separate places.

Spooks of the South Coast

Down near Florence, the famed Heceta Head Lighthouse has a long-standing story about a ghost that haunts the BnB that was made out of the keeper's quarters. She's supposedly a sweetheart though - just lacking in substance. You're welcome for the pun.

On the southern coast, purportedly there's a secret “haunted” graveyard at Bandon, somewhere within Bullards Beach State Park. Whether or not it's got actual spooks is – well, up in the air. But ghostie websites have claimants on the subject, and one in particular talks of a zombie there.

The story goes there are only 13 graves in the graveyard – at least those that are easily found. Somewhere deep in the brush there's a 14th grave, and that's the haunt of the zombie.

Coos Bay's Tioga Building has long been mired in spooky yarns and reports, often of a tall, shadow figure in the basement. Strange voices, footsteps and more are all part of the lore there. Now largely converted to apartments, a decade ago a group of ghost hunters went in and poked around, possibly coming up with something although it wasn't conclusive.

According to Coos Bay's The World, they did uncover more evidence nearby at Sunset Memorial Park Cemetery, including an unexplainable mist hovering in one area.

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Courtesy Newport's Lincoln County Historical Society

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