By Brandi Smith

EUGENE, Ore. -- Late at night in Pioneer Cemetery, it's easy to get a little uneasy. Kent Goodman would tell you, you're getting chills for a reason. "This is one of the places that's haunted in Eugene," says the author of "Haunts of Western Oregon," a book documenting the ghosts who call this region home.

"They're all over the place," Goodman adds, "I think every town has its share of ghosts."

Pioneer Cemetery's share, according to Goodman, is at least two. Back in the 1970s, a group of students was walking through the cemetery on the way back to the University of Oregon when one of the students was struck dumb, staring at a form. Goodman says it was a woman whose floating head rose 15 feet off the ground.

Another UO student from that era claims that he saw a bagpiper in full regalia marching through the cemetery late one night, but the Scotsman quickly vanished into thin air.

But, Goodman points out: "You don't have to be in a graveyard to have hauntings." He says South Eugene High School's auditorium also has a bit of the supernatural.

"Robert Granke was actually a student there in the 60s and he had fallen through the roof in the [auditorium] onto a chair and died," recounts Goodman. "From then on, this chair's been haunted. [It] has a really uneasy feeling to it and the whole theater's been haunted."

Theaters seem to be pretty popular among the dead. According to Goodman, the actor Charles Laughton haunts the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland.

"He was pretty famous in the old days and he'd always wanted to play King Lear," says Goodman. Laughton was offered the part in Ashland's world-renowned theater and Laughton accepted. But, Goodman says, "he died one week before he was supposed to [begin the role]. So, ever since then, people have heard his laugh; they can hear him laughing out in the audience."

Oregon's most famous ghost is better known for her scowl. Rue is said to haunt the caretaker's cottage at Heceta Head Lighthouse. Goodman gets animated telling the story of a workman there. "He had to go up in the attic and when he did, he saw this lady coming toward him and she was just floating," recounts Goodman. "He was in this enclosed space; there was no way to get out. She came closer and closer to him and -- suddenly -- he just had to make a decision. He dived right through her and ran off."

That's the same reaction most of us would probably have, but not Goodman. "People consider it supernatural," he says with a chuckle, "but I think it's a natural part of everyday life."