Illustration by Natasha Whitling By Natasha Whitling

“It’s those damn Yankees at it again!” construction worker Harry Hardhat said. “I’ve seen them with my own two eyes messing stuff up around here.”

Hardhat claims that the ghosts of Yankee soldiers have been wreaking havoc on the construction sites around Columbia for months. Hardhat’s construction site on Main Street has experienced many strange things during the evening hours.

Site manager Moe Scardey even spoke with one of the alleged spirits. “I had to go back to the site a few hours after sundown because I forgot my lunch pail,” he said. “I saw a ghostly figure leaning against a light post. He was in full Union uniform holding a rifle.” According to Scardey, the ghost told him he and his fellow soldiers were perturbed with all the digging and noise. He asked Scardey to stop the construction over his “grave” or else strange things would happen.

Indeed, strange things did happen. The next morning, October 19, 2004, Scardey and his crew arrived at the site early to find a backhoe missing. “I had the keys in my pocket, and I could see the tire tracks in the dirt on the pavement,” he said. The backhoe turned up across the river in the BiLo parking lot in West Columbia.

Missing equipment and moved traffic cones have caused massive delays in construction. “Everyone likes to blame the city for doing too many construction projects at one time,” Columbia Mayor Cob Boble said, “but it’s really these darn Union soldiers who are holding us up!”

The construction in front of the state capitol building has just recently wrapped up, but the workers at that site were not without their ghostly problems. “At the end of one shift I had dug this hole near the sidewalk and marked it with cones,” said former backhoe operator, Joe Digger. “The next morning the hole was filled in again and the cones were scattered on the steps of the capitol!”

Digger re–dug the hole but decided to wait around past sunset to see if anyone would refill the hole and move the cones. According to Digger, around 11:30 pm, two ghostly figures emerged from the hole and began to argue. “One of the ghosts was wearing a Union uniform, and the other was wearing a Confederate uniform,” Digger said. “They were hard to hear, but I think they were upset because they each thought the other was digging up their resting place.”

Digger said one of the ghosts picked up a traffic cone and threw it at the other. “Of course it just went right through him,” he said. “I guess that’s how they got thrown around that first time.”

City council has yet to reach a decision on how best to handle this situation. “It’s not like we can lock them up or pass an ordinance!” said council member I. M. Afeered. “We’ve talked about calling a priest or even those ghost hunters from the Discovery Channel.”

No one knows for sure how to deal with the supernatural sabotage. However, if something isn’t done soon the residents of Columbia are doomed to dealing with construction work and traffic jams indefinitely.

*These two stories are for Halloween fun only. They are not based on any facts.