Sep 27, 2018 5 min read

Riverboat Capitan David Longwell died from a fall in his Monongahela home on March 7, 1912. His obituary in The Daily Republican reads, in part: “Captain Longwell was seemingly in his usual good health yesterday and during the morning supervised some work on his premises. When he entered the house, it was noticed that he staggered slightly but claimed that he was alright. A few minutes later, however he started down the steps leading into the cellar and tripped and fell.”

The obituary goes on to say that Longwell, nearly 86 years old, regained conscious and seemed entirely recovered, but then, that night, “Mr. Longwell had answered the call of his Maker and had slept peacefully away.”

On Oct. 19, guests at the Monongahela Area Historical Society’s “The Captain’s Last Descent” murder mystery dinner will have to determine if Capt. Longwell indeed died from a staggering fall down those stairs, or if he was pushed. Full disclosure: that the captain fell down his steps and later died is, indeed, factual. However, the clues that the guests will unravel and the story that will unfold are the brainchild of historical society vice president Susan Bowers.

This time of year, Bowers capitalizes on the Halloween spirit with Cpt. Longwell’s story and with the event that she came up with some two decades ago – the Annual Candlelight Ghostwalk.

“Twenty-two years ago, when I came back from a trip from Williamsburg, I was on a bus and I thought, ‘We have all these beautiful homes down along Chess Park from the 1800s, surely there has to be some stories there.’ I was always looking for fundraisers, and I started to ask around, and no one would tell me at first,” she says of the town’s haunted tales. “Then, once I got one story, it just snowballed. Back then, I thought that this is either going to be a big flop, or we were going to be on to something. And I think around here, we were one of the first to do that. So, 21 years later, we still sell out.”

While the standalone event featuring Capt. Longwell is new, his house on Main Street has been on the tour, as Longwell has been known to look out the back window of the historic landmark, toward the river where he used to dock his ship, the Hawk. That story also made its way into Bowers’ 2016 book “Haunted Tales Along the Mon.”

The Ghostwalks will still be taking place this year, and will feature other Monongahela landmarks, including the Blythe House, the Acheson House, the abode that Main Street Antiques calls home and more. These types of events introduce Monongahela history to folks who otherwise might not be interested or willing to set aside a Friday or Saturday night to do it.

“The real young people want the haunted houses – these are people who want to be scared in a different way,” Bowers says. “The millennials are interested in knowledge, more so than being scared. It’s another way to bring people to our wonderful town, this little jewel that sits in the Valley – it gets people to recognize us.”

Over the years, people have had frightening experiences along the tour. Bowers says that a doctor from New York went on one of the tours, and once he got home, he sent her a photo of what he captured at the Acheson House. It was a very elongated figure that Bowers at first thought was an owl or a cat in the window. On another tour, while inside one of the homes, a guest on the walk captured the images of three “shadow people” in a bedroom mirror.

“There are some people that come and they see things that they want to see. The ones that I question are the ones who take pictures and who see orbs – they’re iffy because they could be dust,” says Barb DeMunes, who is another historical society vice president. “The ones that are actual figures, that’s kind of hard to dispel.”

Bowers says it takes about $10,000 to keep the doors of the historical society open. The group applies for grants and other funding, but grants are for specific initiatives and do not pay the rent or utilities. She said that if the murder mystery dinner is a success, they’ll do it again.

“We would love to establish a genealogy center here. We’re going to do a big makeover of our museum. We want to make it more conducive to rotating displays,” Bowers says. “We’re always looking for new membership and volunteers. We want this to be open.”

”The Captain’s Last Descent” takes place Oct. 19 at Rippels on the Creek in Monongahela. The Annual Candlelight Ghostwalks take place Oct. 12, 13 and 20 beginning at Chess Park. For tickets or more information, call 724-258-6432 or visit monongahelahistoricalsociety.com.