All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Haunted Houses
I rather like Longfellow’s idea that all our houses are haunted by the harmless phantoms of their previous inhabitants. It makes ghosts seem not scary but rather people like ourselves, long gone but having left their mark upon our homes.
When we stayed in Ferndale in northern California in late September the town was already going mad for Halloween. As we walked along the one main street decorators were out adorning shop fronts with orange bunting, placing numerous skeletons on all the buildings, and chatting to business owners about their own additions to the town’s displays. Of course it was all in fun, not to scare!
It’s as much fun to scare as to be scared
Vincent Price
It certainly added to our enjoyment of our brief stay in the town. I’ve already shared a couple of black and white edits of photos taken there in my black and white Halloween gallery. And now here, for Natalie’s Photographing Public Art challenge, are more of my favourites, this time in their full colours.
The Victorian Village
And for Jo’s Monday Walk, I’ll add some more images from our walk around the town. Ferndale promotes itself as the ‘Victorian Village’, and certainly buildings from that era dominate the main street. The town was founded in the mid nineteenth century and grew thanks to dairy farming in the surrounding area, which still dominates the landscape around the town. There is a strong sense of small-town Americana here, where everyone knows everyone else, and the pace of life is slow.
The architectural styles are a mishmash of Victoriana, from the humble to the ornate, including Gothic Revival, Italianate, Eastlake and Queen Anne styles. I noted quite a few false fronts to the buildings, so it seems those early inhabitants were keen to impress! Some of the most elaborate homes have been dubbed ‘Butterfat Palaces’ because they were built on the wealth of that dairy industry.
I visited Ferndale in September 2024
27 Comments
thehungrytravellers.blog
They do love to go OTT, don’t they. Quick question, have you had any trouble with WP this week. Our whole site has changed…our entire menu has vanished and our visitor numbers have plummeted…?!!
Sarah Wilkie
No, nothing like that. I still have the issue with the freeze on ‘submitting comment’ here and on a couple of other sites (yours included) – Jetpack are on the case and testing, but they tell me (as of yesterday) that it’s a complex issue and they haven’t yet found the root cause. But my stats look normal and the menu is still there. I changed from the Ashe theme when trying to isolate the other problem (it didn’t help, needless to say) so it’s possible the disappearing menu is linked to your theme settings having mysteriously altered? But that wouldn’t account for visitor numbers.
thehungrytravellers.blog
Thanks Sarah, we’ll keep investigating, although numbers seem to be back up after two strange days
Anabel @ The Glasgow Gallivanter
The monk skeleton in the red robe is hilariously scary!
Sarah Wilkie
Even more so than it looks 😁 The eyes were lit up at night and the head turned!
Anabel @ The Glasgow Gallivanter
😱
Anonymous
Well! They certainly have a thing for Halloween in the US of A!
Sarah Wilkie
They do indeed!
grandmisadventures
Victorian village and over the top Halloween decorations- Ferndale absolutely sounds like my kind of place 🙂
Sarah Wilkie
I suspect they go over the top for other holidays too! I’d love to see it at Christmas 🙂
grandmisadventures
I bet it is really beautiful at Christmas 🙂
margaret21
You possibly can have too many skeletons in town! Though these are quite fun. I enjoyed the Butterfat Palaces more. Strange that they call that period Victorian, just as we do. After all, she wasn’t THEIR queen!
Sarah Wilkie
Yes, I’ve always found that strange! Glad you enjoyed the ‘palaces’ – thank you 🙂
Monkey's Tale
Thanks for more Halloween! 🎃 Maggie
Sarah Wilkie
Glad you enjoyed it Maggie 😄
Easymalc
It’s not just San Francisco’s Tenderloin that has the living dead amongst them then 😊
Sarah Wilkie
I guess not!
Alli Templeton
Wow, they really do go in for Halloween in a big way over there, don’t they? I bet it’s a fun place for kids to go around trick or treating! 🙂
A great crop of photos from Ferndale, but I have to say my favourite is that priceless sign commemorating nothing happening there in 1897 – made me laugh out loud! I’ve never seen a sign like that before, and now I want one!! 😀
Sarah Wilkie
Thank you Alli. Oh yes, I’m sure they go all out for trick or treat! As for that sign, we actually have a similar one in London! I’m sure I have a photo somewhere, I’ll have to dig it out 😄
Alli Templeton
Oh please do – we all found your picture hilarious! 😀
Natalie
Hi Sarah, Looks like Ferndale really was into Halloween with the skeletons on lamp posts and roof tops. Thank you for your PPAC contribution. Have a great week!
Sarah Wilkie
Thanks Natalie, and thank you too for keeping this challenge going 😃
restlessjo
True confessions time- I hate skellies, Sarah! So I skipped quickly to your pretty houses. Looking forward to Yosemite. Your photos of that look superb. Have a good week!
Sarah Wilkie
I do know what you mean Jo, although these were quite fun in a way, perhaps because we could see the enthusiasm with which the whole town was embracing the decorative efforts. There will be an overload of Yosemite in due course but I’ll probably post chronologically now Halloween is behind us so it may take me a while to get there. Hopefully you’ll enjoy some of the other walks along the way 😃
restlessjo
Of course! I know it’ll be a while before you get there, Sarah. It’s a place I always wanted to go.
Anne Sandler
Now that’s a town that has spirit–many of them! Well done Sarah. We have small towns in the Gold Country that look exactly like Ferndale.
Sarah Wilkie
Haha yes Anne, many spirits! We liked Ferndale and also Nevada City which seemed to have a similar selection of older buildings – but fewer skeletons!