Local History
B
Cal Bingham's Ghost
The following story occurred in the isolated parts of Muhlenberg County near Paradise. Joan Roberts, 28, of Philpot, says her mother told this story - a tale she had heard as truth during her childhood in Muhlenberg County.
On a stormy day or night, there's one place most people will avoid. That's the house on Walnut Hill in Muhlenberg County, near Paradise - the eerie cabin where Cal Bingham died.
The story goes that about seventy-five years ago, Cal Bingham, an ornery cuss disliked by most everyone, was out cutting trees along with two hired hands when a storm blew up.
Folks say there hadn't been one like it before or since. Lightning flew at the ground in jarring bolts while the wind raged viciously, tearing at all things standing.
Witnesses say that old Cal Bingham raised his fist and cursed the sky for causing him delay. Almost immediately, a white-hot bold appeared from the clouds, and seconds later Cal lay pinned beneath a lightning-felled tree.
The two men drug him from under the tree and over to an abandoned cabin, where he lay on a cold stone hearth for hours. While his blood seeped into the rough plank floor, he cursed and ranted against the heavens until his dying breath.
Some people say the two men didn't go for help - not many folks cared either way.
But ever since that day, whenever the clouds blacken and the thunder rumbles, any poor souls who have taken shelter there will testify that the old house shakes with an inner fury, and the angry curses of Cal Bingham can be heard over the moans of the wind.
Perhaps the most chilling and perplexing fact of all is how the gray plank floor once again appears to run wet and red.
Source: “Cal Bingham's Ghost.” Messenger-Inquirer [Owensboro, KY], 30 Oct 1980, p. D1.
Updated July 13, 2022