The Gann Museum, Benton, Arkansas - Old Ghost Stories

Benton calls itself the heart of Arkansas and one of the central and most beautiful buildings in Benton is the Gann museum. The building is in the historic district and located at 218 South Market Street. I call it the historical district although I am not sure the city actually calls it that. The museum is the office of one the most prominent citizens to have ever lived here, the respected and beloved Dr. Gann. It is the only building in the world to have ever been constructed out of pink alumina block. This area was once one of the worlds largest aluminum mining operations.

The neighboring city of Bauxite was actually a company town. It was completely owned by Alcoa Aluminum Company and Reynolds Aluminum Company also mined here. The ore of aluminum is called bauxite and it is pink with little round metallic beads and streaks of white running through it. In gratitude to Dr. Gann the citizens of Benton in the 1800's carved out the bauxite-alumina blocks and built Dr. Gann an office out of it. He also had a home that is now painted in Victorian colors. His residence is just beside the Gann museum, it is what I call a cookiecutter house. It has elaborate carved wooden turrets and embellishments. To get to the museum you pass by the source of some of Benton's good fortune.

The old Royal theater was purchased by Jerry Van Dyke from the T.V. program "Coach". He bought up the entire city block, renovated it, turned part of it into an old fashioned ice cream parlor that served some of his favorite comfort foods. One of Jerry Van Dykes comfort foods was something like a Whitecastle hamburger that he called a Wimpy burger. Then came the attacks on September 11th and Jerry fled the country to his ranch in Mexico. I sure do miss his ice cream parlor. Once you get to the Gann museum you notice how incredibly small it is. I have been to several very nice events there including one that featured the Rackensack Society which is a group of musicians that play dulcimers and sing very old songs. That event was outside in the courtyard on a beautiful day. There have been persistent rumors about the museum being haunted. One of the stories was related to me by my former wife - we'll call her Ms. Ratpuke. She said that she and a friend had been hired to do some typing in the 1970's when mysterious things began to happen. She said they heard things and felt cold drafts of air. I asked one of my favorite teachers Mrs. Holicer about the stories. She was a supporter of the museum and on the board of directors I think. She confirmed that there had been incidents reported by various people.

I didn't think anything else about the stories until I myself visited the museum in the 1980's. The museum was opened and there were displays of Niloak from the world famous Niloak pottery here in Benton, things from the aluminum mining operation, and displays of the personal possessions of Dr. Gann and his children. As I was looking into one of the display cases at some croquet balls and tops and other little toys and dolls belonging to Dr. Ganns children, an unruly little boy actually reached behind the case and touched one of the toys. I knew something was wrong when I felt the cold feeling beside me. An electric current seemed to touch me and I could feel a definate presence of something, it caused me to have goosebumps. Before I knew what had happened something pushed the little boy down off the case and onto his rear end. I don't know that much about ghosts but I think this one had to be a child and it was still acting like a child. Those toys were his toys given to him by his daddy - and they always will be.