Lakewood

This Scarborough mansion, called Lakewood, was built in the 1930's and was home to the once prominent Pollock family which owned the Pollock Shoe Company. More recently, 87 year old Kathleen Pollock was living in a senior's residence, and her children had moved out of the home and left it boarded up. One February evening, she called a taxi, put on her makeup and best clothes and went to see her family home one last time.

She was found dead the next morning, laying on the doorstep, dead of natural causes.

Now the boards have been removed, and there are new owners for this once beautiful home. It will be demolished soon, and three houses will be built on the property. There were some people fighting to designate the home as historically significant, but the building is said to be in too bad of shape to save.

The entrance I used has since been boarded up and the current owners are patrolling more frequently.

I am not a superstitious person, but I did notice some strange phenomena. I had brought a small digital camera along as well as my Minolta 35mm camera which uses batteries for some functions but hardly so. As soon as I got in the place my digital camera was giving me trouble. First there was a "memory card error" and once that was fixed, the battery died even though I grabbed it off the charger that morning. I quickly stowed it and went for my film camera when it turned out that those batteries seemed almost dead too. I took a few photos and went back outside to take a look around and get some fresh air. Once outside, the film camera started working properly again and I took a bunch more photos, discovering the ruins of an old shed near the overgrown truck you can see in the gallery.

I decided to go back inside and when I did, the cameras were both working properly again. I didn't bother with the digital and stuck with the film to get all the photos I've uploaded. Not really that spooky but kind of a weird experience for me.