Local historian and ghost tour guide Jeff Clarke stands in front of the Ware-Lyndon House on May 9. Clarke has believed since he was a child that history is much more than a series of dates and names, but a story that can be unraveled and connected to the present. “History is all around us, and we are part of that history. Part of the old way. It’s all intertwined. It’s all interconnected, interlaced, and it’s important to study history, because it gives us perspective. It tells us where we were as a nation, as a society, where we are now and then how far we have to go,” Clarke said. Photo by Violet Cantarella.
Jefferey Clarke, an Athens historian, expresses his love of history and ghost stories through his ghost tour.
There are centuries-old fingerprints baked into the bricks of an unassuming outdoor wall of The Foundry in downtown Athens.
These fingerprints were possibly left by enslaved people checking to make sure the clay was dry enough to fire. For Jeffery Clarke, who has found that no records were kept of those enslaved, they are the first page of a missing story.
In order to bring this story and others like it to light, Clarke has been hosting Athens Haunted History Walking Tours for 30 years.
“(The fingerprints) speak to me. (I want to ask) ‘Who were you? What was your life like? Did you make it through?’” Clarke said. “This is the hidden history.”
Clarke is a lover of history, a collector of stories. Some of his favorites are ghost stories. These are the tales he tells on his Athens Haunted History Walking Tours. For the past 30 years, he has led groups of the curious, skeptical and everything in between to locations in Downtown Athens which house history – and maybe spirits.
Historian and Tour Guide Jeffery Clarke (left) and Marketing and Tourism Assistant Joann Hubert (right) stand in front of the Eagle Tavern Museum in Watkinsville in 2018. Huburt often sat down and discussed history with Clarke, drawn by his knowledge and charisma in delivering the information in an engaging way. “I learned so much from him. It’s just amazing to watch him in action doing (the ghost tours).” Hubert said. Photo courtesy of Joann Hubert
“Athens is such a remarkable town, it would take three, four hours to cover (all its history). We really don’t even scratch the surface.” Clarke said. “I hear on the tour all the time people say ‘Oh I love Athens, I never want to leave.’ Some people ain’t kidding around. Once they die, they hang out here, and who could blame them? It’s a great town.” Clarke said.
Clarke’s connection with history was solidified early in his childhood. Despite growing up in the South, his mother loved New England style houses. Antique butter churns adorned the walls of Clarke’s childhood home, and even his cradle was over 100 years old.
“My cradle that my mom bought for me, we’ve dated it, (it’s from the) late 1700s early 1800s. I literally grew up with history surrounding me. I’ve always, always, always had a fascination with history,” Clarke said. “It’s just something about me. I just love it. It helps me make sense of the world.”
Despite his interest in ghosts, Clarke considers himself a skeptic. That is not to say that he refuses any and all evidence of the paranormal – his skepticism means that he asks deeper questions and strives to appreciate ghost stories beyond their spooky face-value.
“I like being a skeptic about (ghosts) because I’m not one of those (people) who are all ‘Ooh, ghosts exist and that’s the end of it.’ I would love to find the proof. I would love to find a way — I’m sure science will one day come up with a way to prove or disprove that (ghosts) exist, and that’s exciting for me.” Clarke said. “I think personally (ghosts are) energy.”
“(I love) getting people to tell their stories. We’re all a novel in the making, all of us have a great story in us. So it’s important to get people to talk about history, ghost stories (and) things that have happened to them.”
— Jeff Clarke,
Athens historian and ghost tour guide
What Clarke considers his first truly paranormal experience was when he worked at the Eagle Tavern Museum in Watkinsville, Georgia. The tavern’s building was constructed in 1801, and prior to its establishment as a museum, it was used for a variety of purposes, from a stagecoach stop, to an inn, to a mercantile facility.
On the Saturday that would change Clarke’s life forever, the Eagle Tavern staff were expecting a group of reenactors to visit the tavern in antebellum dresses and conduct a tea service.
Around 9 a.m., Clarke arrived for work. He was there to prepare the tavern for the guests that day, and, Jittery Joe’s coffee in hand, he unlocked the door. When it opened, the burglar alarm tripped, a countdown starting. Setting down his coffee, Clarke turned to switch off the alarm, which beeped as he punched in the code.
“I turn (the burglar alarm) off. I put my keys down, I go from the tavern room around the corner into the mercantile room in the Eagle Tavern. As I round the corner, about nine feet away is a woman standing there in an antebellum dress. It’s like looking at you. It’s not a smoky, ethereal (figure) like you see on TV. It’s a person in an antebellum hoop skirt dress.” Clarke said.
Unsure how to react, Clarke greeted her. Upon his “Hello”, the woman vanished into thin air. Clarke had no health issues at the time and was reluctant to take so much as a Tylenol. This experience was what Clarke considers the beginning of his relationship with the paranormal.
“I think once you open yourself up to (the paranormal), it really seems (like once) you’ve opened a door or you drop your shield (then) you will start experiencing things,” Clarke said.
An interactive map shows locations that are frequent stops on Athens historian Jeff Clarke’s Athens Haunted History Walking Tours. Map by Violet Cantarella
Clarke was drawn to Athens and its rich history, a history that has led him to sift through old newspapers and records kept in the University of Georgia Archives again and again. He did not begin giving tours for the money, but truly loves the work and the stories it brings with it. Clarke has found in particular that ghost stories can reflect the beliefs and values of a community or culture.
“(Ghost stories are) part of our culture. It’s part of our psyche, and it’s not just (Athens) culture, all cultures all through history have stories of the supernatural, the hereafter,” Clarke said. “I think a lot of times back in history, it was a way of making sense of things. It was a way of trying to figure out the world around us.”
Athens Haunted History Walking Tours Marketing and Tourism Assistant Joann Hubert has seen Clarke’s passion for history come through not only in a professional capacity, but also through personal conversations and interactions
Oconee County Executive Director of Tourism Sarah Cumuze (left) and local historian Jeff Clarke (right) stand in period attire on the front porch of the Taylor-Grady House in October 2023. Cumuze found Clarke to be impressively dedicated to his craft as a storyteller and historian. “Jeff is a riot in every way, shape and form. He is a fun engaging personality that is just captivating in every way,” Cumuze said. “He is probably one of my most favorite people to be around just because you just get enthralled in everything (that you talk about when you) have a conversation with him.” Photo courtesy of Sarah Cumuze.
“One of the things that draws me to Jeff is his passion, his love of history. He has a love of what he’s talking about,” Hubert said. “He loves to share (his passion) with people and he presents it in such a wonderful way.”
Clarke doesn’t close himself off to any ideas or stories, and has found that an open mind works not only with ghosts, but with people as well. When Clarke meets with a tour group, he hopes to create a discussion rather than a lecture, and looks for the story in not only the history, but the people who on the tour as well.
“(I love) getting people to tell their stories. We’re all a novel in the making, all of us have a great story in us. So it’s important to get people to talk about history, ghost stories (and) things that have happened to them,” Clarke said.
Clarke’s love of stories, history and ghosts has taken him all over the country, and continues to drive him forwards with his future projects, including a short film about a haunting and a movie about the Reconstruction era in the South. He continues to pour over newspapers and records from bygone eras to learn about the stories that meant something.
With Clarke’s passion, those stories are kept alive.
“(Margret Atwood said) in the end, we all become a story. And I think that really highlights this. We’re all a story. We are a generation that many, many, many years from now they will be talking about how we do things,” Clarke said. “History is all around us, and we are part of that history.”
