This image is the cover for the book Haunted Aurora, Haunted America

Haunted Aurora, Haunted America

The fascinating ghost stories behind Illinois’s “City of Cemeteries”—photos included!

Aurora was the first Illinois city to have electric streetlights, but a dark history has resisted illumination as stubbornly as the chilly corner of the old roundhouse repels the summer heat . . .

Learn why Aurora counts “City of Cemeteries” among its nicknames as Diane Ladley describes the nineteenth-century doctor suspected of trading bodies between his cancer center and a neighboring graveyard. Other eerie legends and strange stories revealed in this book include the marauding brave brought to justice in the Devil’s Cave by his own tribe, the sweet legacy of NFL great Walter Payton, and the elephants that saved a circus from a tornado.

Diane A. Ladley

Diane Ladley is the founder and president of Historic Ghost Tours of Aurora, Historic Roundhouse Ghost Tours, Historic Ghost Tours of Naperville and the Haunted Hometowns Corporation. Her first book, Haunted Naperville (Arcadia Publishing, 2009), was widely acclaimed and praised by critics for its highly readable style and in-depth scholarship. Ladley is a nationally award-winning storyteller, local folklorist, public speaker and writer, renowned as "America's Ghost Storyteller." Her coast-to-coast reputation for masterfully told, spine-tingling tales is hailed by critics, peers and ghost story enthusiasts alike. She was a State of Illinois ArtsTour Artist for 2001, 3 and again in 2003, 5. In 2003, Ladley's own adaptation of a classic folktale, "The Liver," from her Late Night Fright: Tales of Supernatural Terror and Macabre Mirth audio CD won a national Storytelling World Honor Award for "Best Story of the Year for Adolescents." Ladley is the foremost authority on local supernatural lore, and after two years of dedicated research and personal interviews, she is proud to be the first to offer the authentic, comprehensive haunted history of Aurora.

Haunted America