In 1975 we were surveying a quarter section to be developed as a residential development. The 160 acres was owned by the grandson of the original owner that had obtained it in the 1889 land run, except for a 10 acre parcel smack dab in the middle. Deeded as an aliquot (SE/4 of the SE/4 of the NW/4 I believe) the tract had a beautiful native stone home upon it. The home had been built by the original owner for one of his daughters, Mrs. Cherry, who’s husband-to-be did not return from WWI. The elderly Mrs. Cherry still occupied the house. Our plat showed the 10 acres as a “less and except” but planned a removal of her old winding gravel drive to be removed and access provided by a new residential street.
The property had a wonderful old native stone wall fence all the way around it. It measured 660′ x 660′ almost exactly. As it would be determined the boundary was “technically” somewhat smaller than than and the stone wall was generally outside of a “by the book” determination of the boundary. The engineer originally had us locate the four corners of the wall’s exterior and the dimensions were used to prepare the plat.
The engineer suggested just acquiescing the boundary to let the old stone fence remain. The greedy developer realized the area of land surrendered would give him one more lot. Against my boss’s wishes he sued the elderly Mrs. Cherry. He actually won his suit and the old stone wall was to be removed. We all thought it was both a moral and legal travesty, but what could you do?
Before the wall was dozed Mrs. Cherry passed away. We all imagined it was from a broken heart. Through some money wrangling the developer purchased her entire 10 acres and we changed the plat. The old stone house and property would be destroyed and become part of the subdivision.
The excavation contractor was the first victim. Within a month over half of his equipment had broken down and he was going broke. Someone vandalized his remaining equipment and he eventually quit the project. A HP gas line was hit by the sewer contractor and two workers lost their lives. We had “weird stuff” happening all the time with our bench marks and had to rerun our loops several times. It was apparent that the ghost of Mrs. Cherry was exacting her revenge.
The final blow came when the developer was found on site in his car, close to Mrs. Cherry’s old house and dead from a heart attack. We all knew the ghost had won. The developer’s partners downsized the project to about half. This allowed Mrs. Cherry’s stone house and fence to remain intact. The new road we planned to the property was adequately named “Cherry Lane”.
Years later the house was eventually razed and it’s all residential homes now…but we all knew we had witnessed Mrs. Cherry’s ghost get her revenge from beyond the grave.