Hello again, Story Club members. I'm Ivy, your ghostly host with the most, and

keeper of the stranger's spookiest tales on earth. Today is another Ivy's chilling tale. This

ghostly tale story club members might make you never go on a camping trip again.

It's one I call the legend of pickax jack.

Let me tell you the story of pickax jack.

Ryan Fleming said to us around the campfire on a chilly autumn Saturday night.

It was a group of us campers from town up for the weekend.

He used to live around here.

Ryan continued. Right in this area, Jack was a miner who

stocked his claim for gold. This was around 100 years ago. Nobody knew his real name. They just

called him pickax jack, which made sense as he always packed his trusty tool. In fact, he kept

that pickax sharp as a razor. Jack was from Portland and had

many gambling debts. He fled the city out here to the Oregon woods and part to escape his

debtors and to find gold that he'd heard rumors about. Well, Jack didn't have much put the shirt on his

back and an old pickax that some crusty miner had given him because he'd

recognized the gold fever in Jack's icy eyes. The legend goes that Jack dug all over this

area for a year, nearly worked himself to death from the physical labor and lack of food. Then one

day he miraculously found the mother load. Jack mined as much gold as he could from his find and headed to a local

trading post. There, he was able to buy himself proper mining supplies, food, and even a burrow to

help paddle sack everything back. Well, Jack was a little paranoid, and word got around that he'd

hit the jackpot, so a lot of other down-on-the-luck miners took out after him to find where his claim was.

Being suspicious, Jack would lead his pursuers on wild goose chases until he lost them, and only then

...