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The ghost of Margaret Ruddy

Our next adventure takes us to the Patrick C. Haley Mansion which is located on center street, in Joliet Illinois. 

The Mansion was built in 1891. Over the years it was at first the home of Mayor Patrick C. Haley. Then it became a funeral home, and rumor has it that Mr. Haley and the funeral director haunt the Patrick C. Haley mansion.

But I would like to add maybe a few more spine chilling entries in regards to this awesome home now used for weddings and special events.

In October of 1978,  I was on my way to the Haley funeral home. A very good friend of the family and my grandmother's best friend Margaret Ruddy passed away, and was being awake at the Haley funeral home.

I was quite late in arriving at the home, in fact it was after hours but the funeral director allowed me to come in and to spend some time with Margaret. 

As she laid there I can still remember exactly where she was, she was in the center room on the first floor the coffin was in front of the window there was muted lighting, and soft music. I felt honored to be there with her. Margaret was a wonderful kind and generous lady. She lived on Pine Street practically across the street from the West Pines Hotel. My grandmother and I on a Sunday afternoon would walk down there and have coffee and Archway cookies with Margaret and just talk about all kinds of wonderful things that I really enjoyed hearing about. These stories of my grandmother and Margaret as they grew up on the hill as they called it in joliet.

And as I was pondering on all those wonderful past memories at her house I started to drift off. And in that time of reflection I was going into kind of a dream mode. I felt like I was being lifted up and floating. I wasn't sure at that point where I was at, but I could hear people walking past me back and forth and back and forth. And suddenly I jolted and came out of the semi comatose sleep mode.

As I looked around the only people that was in that room was Margaret and myself, no one else. The funeral director then came in from the outside and said to me, I don't want to rush you but we really need to close up. So I said okay, and then I said,  were you here with some other people, and he said no there was nobody here you were by yourself I was watching from the close circuit TV, and I noticed that you were dozing off so I thought I'd come by and encourage you to finish up and be on your Merry way.

So I got up and went up to the coffin and said my final prayer over Margaret basically I said to her thank you for all that you had been in our life for my grandmother and for your family and friends, thank you for all the many gifts that you were for others and that we will always cherish you.

As I walked away from the coffin, and got close to the front door which was not very far from the coffin, I heard a voice say, thank you for coming. And I turned and I looked at the coffin and I'm not sure if it was my imagination or not, but the rosary she had in her hands was now on her lap. Could she have turned around and said thank you for coming and dropped her rosary?

Several people have made comments that they hear voices of two different men, some report visions of spirits, many people think again it is Mr. Haley and the funeral director that ran Haley funeral home many years ago.

One final note, it was very interesting, Margaret loved to sing, and as I was leaving the funeral home getting into my car I heard her voice singing one of her favorite songs, you are my Sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skies are gray. I knew at that moment that I had an encounter with my friend Margaret Ruddy, and I know now that my grandmother Edith and she are enjoying eternal life. 

Happy Haunts!

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