With the Summer Solstice just a few days away here at the Ghostvillage.com world headquarters, I can’t help but think about summer days, warm winds, and water. No matter the summer, most of us end up around a lake at some point. We think boats, fishing, or dipping our toe in off of some picturesque dock. But we also think mystery.

So many lakes have some kind of paranormal mystery dwelling from the depths. Whether it’s the most famous Loch Ness Monster in Scotland, the Ogopogo of British Columbia, or some other creature from the deep, there are spirits to these bodies of water.

I went to college at Hofstra University in Long Island, New York. At the time, I remember hearing many legends about Lake Ronkonkoma in Suffolk County. One legend is that the lake is bottomless. That one is pretty easy to dismiss, but there is another story that isn’t as easily set aside.

The story goes that there was a Native American princess named Ronkonkoma who fell in love with an early European woodcutter who lived near the lake. But their love was forbidden. So Ronkonkoma would paddle her canoe to the middle of the lake and float messages to the woodcutter on the other side of the water. One day, the anguish of not being allowed to see her love was too much to take, so she took her own life. When the white settler saw his love’s body, he too took his own life and a curse was born.

Here’s the tricky part: the story goes that each year, Ronkonkoma’s spirit drags a man down in the lake and drowns him. The crazy thing is this: the legend is true! Sort of… Dozens of people have drowned in Lake Ronkonkoma over the last 200 years, and the vast majority of them were men. But statistically, most drowning victims are men anyway. Though a decade will go by with no deaths at the lake, when averaged, it sure can look like one per year.

Should someone drown there this summer, the curse of the lady of the lake will be brought up again and her legendary lease will be renewed for a long time to come.

Maybe she’s there to remind us to swim carefully. Maybe she’s there as a reminder that love should never be forbidden. Or maybe she’s really there… lurking in the wakes of the boats and the shadows of the trees.

Last month I told you about my New England Legends show being nominated for an Emmy Award! I wish I was telling you all about how we won and my ego is so big it won’t fit on the planet anymore. But sadly, the night wasn’t ours. You can read all of the details on my personal blog here. But I will say this: not winning motivated me in a way that winning never could. Our very first episode was nominated for an Emmy! We know we can do better. This summer we aim to prove it by producing another episode for PBS. I can’t wait to show it to you this Fall!

Speaking of Fall, my lecture and event schedule is filling up fast. Check out the dates below. I’ll be adding more in the coming weeks. Hopefully I’ll be near your haunted neighborhood soon!

Enjoy the rest of the newsletter below.

Supernaturally yours,

Jeff Belanger
Mayor of Ghostvillage.com
Twitter: @THEJeffBelanger
Facebook: Jeff Belanger
YouTube: www.youtube.com/legendtripping

In the deepest, darkest woods of Carver, Massachusetts, lies a park unlike any other--known for daytime fun and nighttime fright.

Ellis D. Atwood laid the groundwork for Edaville Railroad back in 1946, when he began purchasing two-foot gauge rails that were being unused in Maine and shipping them to his 1800-acre cranberry plantation in Carver. He used them to run a 5 1/2 mile track around his bogs, initially to transport cranberries but he soon began moving people around with them as well...and within a few years, the Edaville (named after his initials, E.D.A.) Railroad family fun park was born.

But long before Atwood began plucking cranberries from the grounds, the Native Americans knew there was a strange power over this land. Many of their spirits still roam the Edaville bogs and swamplands, and their spectral fires are often reported from those riding the Edaville train...

Click here for more information: http://www.legendtrips.com/Edaville-Railroad-2014.shtml

Jeff Belanger's Upcoming Events

This is the place to find out where author and Ghostvillage.com founder Jeff Belanger will be speaking on the subject of the paranormal. If you're interested in booking Jeff for a conference or other event, please visit: http://www.jeffbelanger.com/lectures.php for more information.

Events Scheduled:

2014 MENSA North American Annual Conference - Boston, Massachusetts - July 3, 2014
The Spirits of the Murdock-Whitney House - Winchendon, Massachusetts - July 12, 2014
A Weird Massachusetts Evening with Jeff Belanger - Norton Public Library - Norton, Massachusetts - August 12, 2014 6:30PM
Time Travelling with Jeff Belanger - Berkley Public Library - Berkley, Massachusetts - August 14, 2014 7:00PM
Riding the Haunted Rails of Edaville Railroad - Carver, Massachusetts - August 30, 2014
Fantomfest - San Antonio, Texas - September 27-28, 2014
A Supernatural Evening with Jeff Belanger at the East Bridgewater Public Library - East Bridgewater, Massachusetts - October 6, 2014 6:00PM
Paracon 2014 Shooting Star Casino - Mahnomen, Minnesota - October 10-11, 2014
A Supernatural Evening with Jeff Belanger - Hudson Public Library - Hudson, Massachusetts - October 15, 2014 6:30PM
A Supernatural Evening with Jeff Belanger - Hudson Historical Society - Hudson, New Hampshire - October 16, 2014 7:00PM
A Supernatural Evening with Jeff Belanger at SUNY Genesee Community College - Batavia, New York - November 7, 2014 7:30PM
Old Mill ParaFest - Dundee, Michigan - November 8, 2014
The Afterlife Paranormal Conference and Film Festival - Chicago, Illinois - November 21-23, 2014

Ghostvillage.com Advertising Opportunities

Each month Ghostvillage.com reaches tens of thousands of people interested in the paranormal. We offer the most effective and best-valued advertising and sponsorship packages of any paranormal media outlet. Please visit: http://www.ghostvillage.com/advertising.htm for details.

If you're ready to put Ghostvillage.com to work for your company or organization, send us an email to get started.

New Articles Since Last Month

30 Odd Minutes: Mission 160 – Spooked in New Zealand with James Gilberd

Encounters: Held in Gram’s Bathroom

30 Odd Minutes: Mission 161 – Reality Shifts with Cynthia Sue Larson

Encounters: The Old Pitman

30 Odd Minutes: Mission 162 – Growing Up Haunted in New England with Mike Bouley

News: Tour 99 – The First Ever All Eastland Haunted Tour in Chicago

30 Odd Minutes: Mission 163 – Haunted Artifacts and Freaky Sideshows with Calvin Von Crush

Hot Threads and the Ghostvillage.com Community

In the past month, tons of new people registered for free to join our supernatural discussion! Have you?

If you have registered for our message boards but haven't validated your account yet, it's simple to do! Look for the email that was automatically sent to you when you registered and click on the account activation link in the email (note: some bulkmail filters may block this email, so you'll need to check your bulkmail folder if the validation email didn't immediately come through). There are always great discussions going on in our huge message board community. We hope you'll get involved. It's free to register if you're not already a member. Here are some of the hot topics this month:

Religion and Spirituality
http://www.ghostvillage.com/ghostcommunity/index.php?showtopic=33318
Mystic Kaballah.

Spirit Communication
http://www.ghostvillage.com/ghostcommunity/index.php?showtopic=33572
How to self-protect.

General Board
http://www.ghostvillage.com/ghostcommunity/index.php?showtopic=33603
Are ghosts stealing things?


Board of the Month -- Lake Spirits
http://www.ghostvillage.com/ghostcommunity/index.php?showforum=27
What are your favorite legends of the lakes?

Ghostvillage.com Quick Stats:

327,081 Posts in the Town Square Message Boards
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1,148 "Personal Encounters" published on Ghostvillage.com
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