Cat Murphy, The Murfreesboro Post, October 27, 2015
CAT MURPHY/The Murfreesboro Post
“My name is Diana, and I’m going to be your storyteller tonight.”
The founder of Boro Tellers wears a black cape to warm her through hours of tours this chilly October evening. After a course on storytelling captured Diana Hague’s attention at MTSU, she formed a group dedicated to the art of spinning yarns. For the first Haunted Murfreesboro more than a decade ago they planned to fabricate frightening, but fictitious tales – until they started talking to business owners, asking “Does anything strange ever happen in your shop?” The not so surprising answer in a town this old, host of the Civil War’s bloodiest battle, was often an emphatic yes. Books flying from shelves, the same mysterious smells without apparent sources, black-clad apparitions – the Tellers recount accounts from both skeptics and believers while sharing some of the stranger bits of Murfreesboro’s history. Because, as Hague is quick to explain, she does not chase ghosts, explore hauntings or investigate things that go bump in the night. “Instead, I’m going to tell you why they might be happening and who might be doing them,” she explains, beginning with the three sisters in black – also known as the three witches, or the odd, murderous women who ran Soule College into the ground. Many of the stories illuminate Murfreesboro’s more eccentric community members. “You can be eccentric here in the South,” says Hague. “In fact, we’re quite proud of it.”
Though Haunted Murfreesboro tours have wrapped for the season, there are legends and lore galore in historian Greg Tucker’s “Remembering Rutherford,” “Rutherford Ramblings” and “Rutherford . . . for Real,” available to check out from Linebaugh Public Library or for purchase from Rutherford County Historical Society.
Staff writer Cat Murphy may be reached at [email protected].