From David J. Pitkin's 2005 book,
Haunted Saratoga County

The Weed House

In the early 1800s, David Weed built a frame house near the present Cramer Road. It was difficult ground to farm and Weed had to struggle. Only with the help of Louisa, his wife, and two sons could he make a go of the operation. One of the sons died in the 1830s, and then Louisa shortly thereafter. The loss of loved ones and helpers was too much for Weed. He deeded the property to hid daughter in law, Fannie Brown, and moved to a new life near Oswego. He prospered there after remarrying and starting a new family, so he never returned to Saratoga County.

Fannie appreciated the inheritance but was unable to work the farm, and chose to put the property up for sale. At the time, women were legally unable to sell property in New York State, and the law stipulated she have a man serve as her agent or guardian in legal matters, and the judge appointed a Mr. Thomas Anderson to fill that role.

Curiously, there seems to have been no ghostly phenomena in that house in the 1800s; perhaps Anderson was still alive. It has only been in the 20th Century that modern residents in the old Weed house have experienced the guiding hand of the ghost. In the early 1980s the present owners relaxed on the old house’s sun porch. The day was warm and sunny, and breezes were gentle. The relaxing spell was suddenly broken by a resounding crash from inside the house. The family members scrambled inside to survey what must be great damage. They were astonished to find no disaster, no objects moved, and nobody else within the house. After that introduction, the ghost began to manifest more frequently. The daughter was puzzled on two occasions to hear a male voice call her name. In the first instance she believed it to her father calling and, as is typical of teenagers, she did not respond. After the second, more insistent call, she responded, “What?” At first there was no response, then from another room, her live father said, with a shaking voice, “Did you hear that too?”

The son had an old car, which had broken down in the driveway and had not been drivable for a month or so. One day, the mother noticed that the car had moved some twenty-five feet along the level driveway. The vehicle was too heavy for the son to push, and she knew her husband and daughter weren’t responsible. She stood stunned, holding wet clothes in her hands, and a clothespin in her mouth. How could it have happened, and who did it? She could only ponder the unthinkable—the ghost of Tom Anderson had been the culprit!

Many times it is the female members of the family who are the beneficiaries of Tom’s assistance. One snowy evening, the daughter, Lillian, sat studying on her bed, having raised the window a bit to let fresh air into the room. When she completed the studies for the next day’s test in school, she turned out the study light and dropped off to sleep hoping for a ‘snow day” on the morrow, and unmindful of the open window. She pulled the electric blanket around herself and dozed. A few hours later, her dream state was shattered by a loud noise. She awoke and realized that her window shade had had suddenly and noisily zipped to the top of the window casing. She snapped on her study light and was stunned to note that snow had blown through the window and onto her electric blanket, which was now wet. She might have been electrocuted had she not been roused by the noise!

Tom seems to have taken special care of Lillian, awakening her one morning with a loud voice calling “Lillian, it’s time to get up!” Figuring the voice was that of her father, she sleepily obeyed and headed for the bathroom. As she passed her father’s bedroom she spotted him fast asleep in his bed. Who had awakened her?

It seems that Tom Anderson, having taken the oath to aid Fanny Brown over a century ago, is determined to remain on the job, helping all the women residents almost two hundred years later.