"Moonville was originally a small mining and railroad community with only a couple of families residing in the town proper. However, it was part of a much bigger picture. Due to its location in an area with limited roads and the presence of a railway, the town became interconnected with other communities along the train route. Both miners and their families utilized the railway as a means of traveling from one town to the next, solidifying Moonville's role in the larger network of towns along the railroad. Just outside town, the railway forged a path through a large hill and put in a tunnel known as Moonville Tunnel 'for the way the moon shines over the hillside on certain nights.'" The number of trains going both eastbound and westbound on a single track, rock falls on the sheer walls, and people using the tracks as a path because of the lack of roads made for many deaths.
Want to know more? Buy the newest book on Moonville! More ghosts! More stories!
What is the history and mystery of Moonville? Find out through its ghost stories. Author Jannette Quackenbush shares the real history and ghost stories passed along from locals who lived in Moonville and the communities along the Moonville Rail Trail. You won't believe how many ghosts lurk every mile of the Moonville Rail Trail!
The tunnel became fodder for much gossip over the last 140 years for the ghost of an engineer who was killed in a train wreck nearby was seen by engineers traveling the route!
You can visit Moonville-It is along the Vinton County Rail Trail which is tucked into Zaleski State Forest. It is only about a forty-minute drive from Old Man’s Cave. The main road is paved, but the last mile is a raggedy dirt and gravel and, in some places, only wide enough for one car. There are a couple areas that run along a high cliff edge along Raccoon Creek. And during the winter, at times, the icy or snow-covered road can be impassable for vehicles. When you get to Moonville, there is a small parking area and you can see the tunnel across the bridge that was once a train trestle. It is only a short hike to the tunnel. A longer hike can be taken to Kings Station Tunnel.
I am amazed at the vast amount of misinformation about Moonville and its tunnel. Although the town had its share of epidemics like smallpox and cholera, there was never a plague killing all of the people there to make a large number of ghostly sightings. The lantern-wielding ghost was a train engineer killed in a crash in 1880 (and there are newspaper reports to vouch for that one), not a brakeman. There is no record of a pregnant woman struck by a train, and the eight-foot ghost haunts another tunnel. However, a train did hit an elderly woman who was deemed Lavender Lady. The town bully died along the tracks near Zaleski and Hope Furnace Station. And there are other haunting stories passed down from locals matching newspaper reports of deaths all along the path from Moonville to Mineral! Know your ghosts before you go!
There was once a small mining community along the Marietta and Cincinnati railroad tracks called Moonville, taking its name from the breathtaking way Earth’s only natural satellite showed itself above the tunnel in its many phases.
Although there were only a few homes here, mainly the Ferguson and Coe families (both had large families), people from neighboring towns like Hope Furnace, Hope Furnace Station, Ingham Station, Zaleski, and even Luhrig near Athens used the straight path of the train tracks cut through the steep hills. During the 1800s, logging companies, iron furnaces, and coal mining operations popped up in the region. When companies laid-off workers in one area, they walked or hopped a train to commute to the other communities offering jobs along the railway. Between a couple of properties in Moonville, the railroad company built two trestles over the winding Raccoon Creek and gouged a tunnel through one particularly high hill. When the railway came and the community grew, the trestle, tunnel, tracks, and trains became the perfect mix for deaths-(I have found over 21 researched through newspapers and local sources). And after that, ghosts.
What happened to Moonville Tunnel? Although the coal mining industry boomed from the 1850s to the early 1900s, it began to decline in the early 1920s leaving people without work. Many families moved away, abandoned the towns, and their homes eventually turned to ruin.
Night hike and ghost hunt at the famous Moonville Tunnel at the newest Vinton County Park District. Hikers will be walking an out-and-back section of the Moonville Rail Trail from Moonville to Ingham Station/Bear Hollow with author, folklorist and ghost hunter Jannette Quackenbush, along the way listening the local folklore leading to the ghost stories passed down by those who once lived along this particular path of the railway. After, Jannette will bring ghost hunting tools and equipment from throughout history so hikers can try and learn how to ghost hunt inside the tunnel.
Night hike and ghost hunt at the famous King HollowTunnel. Hikers will be walking an out-and-back section of the Moonville Rail Trail from King Switch to Mineral with author, folklorist and ghost hunter Jannette Quackenbush, along the way listening the local folklore leading to the ghost stories passed down by those who once lived along this particular path of the railway. After the hike, Jannette will bring ghost hunting tools and equipment from throughout history so hikers can try and learn how to ghost hunt at the tunnel.
Moonville February 2022
Or come take a hike and ghost hunt with me along the old trails of Appalachia, like those in Moonville, with ghost stories and legends attached.
Jannette Quackenbush, author, naturalist, and folklorist has written over 40 books on ghosts and hauntings from Louisiana through the Appalachians and into Northern Ohio.
Take a walk with Lucy and Jannette and see Moonville through the eyes of the Lucy Cam!
A video I took many years ago that was on "My Ghost Story" when few people ventured because you had to hike through Forestry to get there or cross the risky waters of Raccoon Creek. And no, no other people were around. . .
The Moonville Rail Trail is maintained by Moonville Rail Trail Association, established in April of 2001 in order to build and maintain the muscle-powered Moonville Rail Trail system.
Zaleski State Forest
Moonville Rail Trail
Moonville Tunnel
Ghosts
Folklore
...and much more
