Victorian Mourning Exhibit Opening
Friday October 13th, 4-7pm

Visit the North House Museum for an Open House of the Greenbrier Historical Society's newest exhibit, The Good Death: Mourning Culture in Victorian America! Learn about the fashion of mourning, zany Victorian death rituals, postmortem photography, Civil War deaths, and much more. You'll get the opportunity to mourn the Victorian way, try funeral cookies, and experience for yourself just how a corpse would have been displayed in the late 1800s.

​GHS staff will be in period dress (visitor participation encouraged), serving light refreshments and answering all of your curious questions about hauntings in the North House.

Candlelit Cemetery Tours
Mon. Oct. 23/Wed. Oct. 25/Fri. Oct. 27
Leaving at 7, 7:30 and 8 pm nightly

Enjoy a guided candlelit tour of sections within two of Lewisburg’s historical cemeteries, led by the staff of the Greenbrier Historical Society! Learn the fascinating history of some of Lewisburg’s well-known grave markers and interesting details of the lives - and deaths - of the interred. Tours conclude at The North House Museum with a private viewing of The Good Death: Mourning Culture in Victorian America exhibit. Period dress encouraged. 

Interested in being part of our tours? Learn more below!​

Tickets

Sharyn McCrumb Lecture & Book Signing
Friday, October 27th at 7 pm

The Greenbrier Ghost is renowned in American folklore, but Sharyn McCrumb is the first author to look beneath the legend to unearth the facts. Using a century of genealogical material and other historical documents, McCrumb reveals new information about the story and brings to life the personalities in the trial. 

Want to continue the fun? Join the guided candlelit tour of Old Stone Cemetery to visit the graves of some of the historical figures involved in the Greenbrier Ghost story, and visit the Greenbrier County Courthouse to  discuss the details of the trial. **Separate ticket required.

Lecture & book signing Tickets

Greenbrier Ghost Tour Tickets

Get Involved - the Ghostly Way!

The Greenbrier Historical Society is seeking volunteer actors for our Candlelit Cemetery Tours in partnership with Carnegie Hall. This event will take place at the Old Stone Church & Dick Pointer Cemeteries on Church Street in Lewisburg on October 23rd, 25th, and 27th, with tours from 7:00-8:30 PM on Monday & Wednesday and 7:00-9:00 PM on Friday. Volunteers will tell the stories of those resting in the two cemeteries and make their tales come back to life!

Casting

The Greenbrier Historical Society is seeking volunteer actors who are available to participate in all three evenings of the event. Additional rehearsal times will be scheduled on an individual basis with each actor. Volunteers will be expected to memorize a roughly 1.5 minute monologue to be read to tour groups of around 15 people. Costumes will be provided for most roles.

​The available roles are as follows:

• 1. Dick Pointer: Age 50+, a freed Black man and hero of Fort Donnally, after whom the cemetery is named.
• 2. John Bowyer: Age 50+, a freed Black man who served as the sexton of the Old Stone Church for 31 years.
• 3. Annie Perkins: Age 15-25, a Black woman tragically killed by a C&O train while on her way home from visiting friends.
• 4. Alexander Pryor: Age 25-35, a Black man who died by drowning after being knocked into the river by a passing train.
• 5. Nancy Perkins Callender: Age 60+, a freed Black woman who ran Callender's restaurant in downtown Lewisburg for 52 years.
• 6. Charles Lockard Donnally: Age 35-45, a white man who committed a murder and was later murdered over a dispute involving $10.
• 7. David Creigh: Age 50+, a white man known as the "Greenbrier Martyr," notorious for killing a Union soldier and subsequently being hanged.

​Note: Roles will be removed from this list as they are filled.

Contact

​​For those interested in volunteering for one of these roles or for more information about the casting process, please call (304) 645-3398, email marketing@greenbrierhistorical.org, or fill out the form below. GHS will reach out to schedule a time to do a read-through of the script for your chosen role(s). We will be accepting volunteers until all positions are filled.