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The
Chesnuts are preparing to say farewell to all the strangers living
in their house in Dunwoody.
The
old man. The little girl in a dress and pinafore. The lady who
stares out the window. And whoever makes the Bible levitate around
the room.
"We
have ghosts in our house," said 41-year-old Caroline Chesnut Leslie,
the daughter who grew up there. "They're just part of that house.
They just don't seem to want to go on."
After three decades, the Chesnuts have sold their family estate. The
new owner: DeKalb County.
The
county recently spent $1.2 million under its green space program to
buy the Donaldson House -- named for the original owner, of the late
1800s -- and its 3 acres on Chamblee Dunwoody Road.
County officials plan to preserve the house, though what use it will
be put to they're still not sure. The grounds, with magnolia trees
and lots of roses, will become a county public space.
Ever
since voters approved a $125 million bond referendum in 2001, DeKalb
has acquired more than 2,200 acres to preserve parkland. But the
ghosts that accompany the latest purchase are a bonus.
The
Donaldson House is known for its wandering spirits, so notorious
that it's considered one of the top seven haunted places in Atlanta,
according to Citysearch, a popular Web guide to major cities in the
country. Other Web sites about paranormals also list the house as a
notable spook spot.
But
these Dunwoody spirits aren't nasty poltergeists. The Chesnuts --
David, Linda and daughter Caroline -- believe that the spirits
protected them during a tornado that swept through Dunwoody in 1998.
For
local preservationists, the house is a remnant of a purer period,
long before I-285, Jaguars and stockbrokers took over and helped
make the area in north DeKalb one of the priciest locations in the
South.
That's why the Dunwoody Preservation Trust lobbied to have the
county buy the property and protect the Donaldson House from
bulldozers.
County officials are considering how to use the house -- a community
center, maybe, a meeting place or museum.
"Whatever its use will be, it'll clearly be open to the public, to
everybody," said DeKalb Chief Executive Officer Vernon Jones.
That
invitation presumably also extends to the ghosts, who, according to
the Chesnuts, were there first.
From
Savannah to Atlanta, plenty of historic sites have paranormal
presences, said Bob Hunnicutt, founder of the Georgia
Ghost Society, a nonprofit group whose members -- eight active ones
at last count -- investigate such places.
"You
run into some hauntings in which the spirits themselves don't
realize that they are dead," said Hunnicutt. "I've never seen
a Linda Blair [of the movie "The Exorcist"] activity. Most hauntings
in Georgia, I would consider them non-harmful or benign."
Sometimes ghosts remain in their earthly dwelling because they loved
their home so much, said the Rev. Charlene Hicks, a psychic in
Dunwoody who was once invited to the Donaldson House to survey the
spirits.
"It
had peaceful feelings to the house. They're friendly spirits there,
no negative stuff. It's not like the spirits are trapped in that
house and can't go to the light. They like being there."
A
ghost is still a ghost to Fay Kemp, 61, a landscaper who worked on
the estate for the past 44 years. He heard a strange sound there
once.
"I
try to get out before the sundown," said Kemp, smiling.
Jim
Donaldson, the house's original owner, was attached to his land,
literally. The property includes a century-old farmhouse and a
backyard cemetery where Donaldson, who died in 1900, is buried.
Married three times, he had fourteen children. Some descendants
still live in the Dunwoody area.
The
house was built around 1870. Donaldson, an emigre from Great
Britain, came to Georgia in the mid-1800s at age 12. After brief
service in the Civil War, Donaldson farmed and amassed land. He sold
1,000 acres -- at $6 an acre -- and helped bring more settlers into
what is now north DeKalb County.
"He
had a massive amount of land during that time," said Danny Ross,
president of the Dunwoody Preservation Trust. "One time, he boasted
he could walk from Dunwoody to Chamblee on his own property."
Linda Chesnut, an interior designer, and her husband, David, an
attorney and former chairman of MARTA, had wanted a place big enough
for their daughter to have a pony.
In
1975, they found the house. That February day was bitterly cold, but
when they stepped inside the empty house it felt warm, as if the
furnace was on. They bought it.
But
they weren't alone.
Sometimes lights turned on and off by themselves.
"My
daughter would wake up and there would be a lady there looking at
her in the bed," said Linda Chesnut.
Relatives visiting the Chesnuts reported hearing a choir singing.
Then
a Bible started levitating. One time, David Chesnut says, he saw the
Bible rise from a table and slide to the ground. Wife Linda says she
too has seen it levitate.
Several years ago a television crew wanted to spend Halloween night
at the house, said Linda Chesnut. As the cameraman and a psychic
approached the cemetery, the camera stopped working, Chesnut said.
The cameraman slept inside his van.
"A
lot of people don't believe that kind of thing," said Linda Chesnut,
who teaches college courses in historical restoration. "We do."
Caroline Chesnut Leslie felt easy growing up with spirits. She once
told that to her high school classmates.
"I
got made fun of," said the landscape architect.
"I
wish, for their own sake, they [the ghosts] would go on, but they're
stuck here. There's nothing we can do."
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