HAUNTINGS OF CUBA ROAD

WHITE CEMETERY AND OTHER CHICAGO HAUNTINGS

A secluded roadway near Barrington, called Cuba Road, has gained a rather strange reputation in recent years. Along the roadway is a small graveyard called White Cemetery, which is located just east of Old Barrington Road. It dates back as far as the 1820’s, but no records exist to say when it started to gain the attention of those with an interest in the unexplained.

For many years, it has been reportedly haunted by eerie, white globes of light that have been seen to hover and float among the tombstones. Witnesses to these anomalies have ranged from teenagers to average passersby, many of whom have gone to the local police and have described not only the glowing lights, but hazy figures too. The lights are said to sometimes float along through the cemetery, drift over the fence and then glide out over the surface of the road. The hazy human-like figures have been spotted along the edge of the fence and lingering near stands of trees. They tend to appear and then vanish at will. Both types of the phenomenon have been investigated and studied by ghost hunters and researchers for some time, but no explanation has been discovered as to their source.

Most of the stories though seem to involve Cuba Road itself. The tales involve a phantom black automobile that appears near the cemetery and an old house that is seen and then vanishes nearby. The house is believed to have actually existed many years ago and legends say that it burned down under mysterious circumstances. It has been repeatedly spotted over time, often by people who have no idea that the house no longer exists. Some of the sightings also involve a spectral old woman that carries a lantern and flags down passing motorists. When someone stops and tries to help her, she disappears along the edge of the roadway.

According to local historians, the nearby towns of Barrington and Lake Zurich were often visited by Chicago gangsters during the Prohibition era. Looking for a little peace and quiet, they would come to the small towns to rest, fish, sun and often, to cause a little trouble. Local folks were afraid of these Chicago tough guys and some believe that this unease remains in one of the ghostly encounters said to occur along Cuba Road. The stories say that the spectral image of a cigar-chewing gangster sometimes appears in the rearview mirror of drivers who pass along this roadway. Who this mobster might be is unknown, but those drivers who have seen him can testify to the fact that he was there. Could these long departed gangsters also be the explanation for the mysterious black cars?

Just off Cuba Road is another narrow and wooded roadway called Rainbow Road. Here, amongst the large homes of the wealthy is a closed off gravel track that once led back to an old building that has long since been abandoned. Local legend has it that was once an insane asylum and that it was very haunted. Dozens of reports have emerged over the years that tell of ghostly lights burning in the windows of the empty building, strange figures and moaning and crying sounds that cannot be explained. How much truth there is to these stories is anyone’s guess but when combined with all of the other tales of the area, it’s hard to imagine that the legends don’t have at least some small kernel of truth to them.

Weird things, as they say, happen along Cuba Road.