One of my favorite television shows right now is the Canadian police drama Murdoch Mysteries based on the novels by Maureen Jennings.

The show focuses on police detective/inventor William Murdoch and his work in Toronto, Ontario, at the turn of the twentieth century.

I find the show to be very entertaining, and I adore the characters. Another reason I love the show is because I’m always learning some fascinating tidbit of information that I want to research further.

Recently, an episode focused on ghosts haunting the Ontario Legislative Building at Queen’s Park. Naturally, I was intrigued and researched a bit further.

One of the ghosts I read about that is reported to haunt the building is that of Capt. Charles Rutherford, a distinguished veteran of WWI who died in 1989.

There are several female spirits haunting the area that are believed to have been residents of the University Lunatic Asylum for females that stood on the grounds from 1849 to the late 1860s, when it was moved to another location.

A ghost has been seen coming down the grand staircase of the Legislative Building.

One of the lady ghosts dressed in white has long white hair and walks the third floor crying and moaning, another wears a checked dress or, perhaps an apron, that she throw up over her head to hide her face; and, a third supposedly hanged herself in the basement of the building and is found hanging from a hook in the tunnel of the basement.

According to Dan Bogart, a communications officer with the Legislative Assembly’s parliamentary protocol office, a female spirit considered to be quite “vengeful” is said to inhabit the fourth floor attic.

The specter of a tall man in a dark suit leaving the vice-regal washroom was seen in the office of Lt. Gov. James Bartleman. One of the workers in the building identified the spirit as that of a man in one of the portraits of former lieutenant governors that hang in the suite.

One of the most interesting and unexplainable reports of hauntings that I’ve read about is that of a
ghost horse that walks down the main staircase of the building.

References and additional information:

http://www.torontoghosts.org/index.php?/2008081596/The-Former-City-Of-Toronto-Public-Buildings/Queen-s-Park.html

http://www.torontolife.com/daily-dish/2003/12/01/urban-decoder-history-5/

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2011/10/28/getting_to_know_the_ghosts_of_queens_park.htm

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474976787567