Media Reports

Tour guide writes book on local hauntings

By Bonnie Burch, May 7, 2008 Williamson A.M.

Those who've taken Franklin on Foot's ghost tours now can bring the spooky happenings to their bookcase. Margie Thessin, co-founder of the local walking tour company, is the author of a new 140-page book, Ghosts of Franklin, Tennessee's Most Haunted Town. Within the 10 chapters of the book, possible spirits are uncovered at battlefield sites and historic properties such as the Harrison House and the Lotz House. Many of the ghost stories circle around Carnton Plantation, Widow of the South mistress Carrie McGavock's home that was turned into a Civil War hospital.

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Did you see that? Franklin's ghosts revealed in new book

By Carole Robinson, May 1, 2008, Williamson Herald

According to credible sources, soldiers haunt the grounds and buildings that were used as hospitals during and after the Battle of Franklin. "I don't know how to explain these mysterious phenomena people describe in such detail, but I do know what they're not. They're not the delusions of the insane, the product of an overactive imagination or the power of suggestion," said Margie Thessin, author of Ghosts of Franklin. "Most of the time we really don't know who the ghost is. Sometimes it's just a sense--a smell out of place or time, or a noise when there shouldn't be one. "

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BOO! is big business

by Bonnie Burch, October 28, 2007, Williamson A.M.

Clad in a hoop skirt and carrying a lantern, Rene Evans leads her group through the darkened streets of downtown Franklin. Soon the foot-travelers will end up on Third Avenue--reportedly the city's most haunted street--and in front of an old home that now houses Shuff's Music. There Evans will tell the story of beautiful Franklin socialite, Sallie Carter, a spy for the Confederacy.

"We don't just throw a whole bunch of dates at you. We tell stories. What used to happen in this town is quite compelling....In Franklin, you have a wonderful mixture of old and new. I think that has a lot to do with why people think it's haunted. People who are into ghost hunting will tell you that tragedy creates spirits. And in Franklin's history, we've had a lot of that."

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See Franklin on foot, from underneath

by Paul Erland, June 22-28, 2007, OnePaper

Franklin in renowned for its wonderful homes, which are apparently so wonderful that even the deceased are reluctant to leave them. The incidence of ghosts in the downtown district is startlingly high, even if all of them have been more mischievous than malicious. Even today, lights and ceiling fans turn on by themselves and mysterious footsteps are sometimes heard in the city's most respectable buildings.

Franklin on Foot presents the real, the compelling history behind the textbook history-- the true stories of Sally the Spy and Miss Fanny's black book--and tour-goers who want to know come away wondering: Does Peggy Eaton roam the earth forever?  

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Franklin Goes Bump in the Night

by Dan Copp, October, 2006, Franklin Life

The lovable Franklin of today wasn't the Franklin of yesterday. Hiding behind Franklin's quaint and genteel facade of clothing stores and cozy coffee shops lies a sordid and downright gruesome history punctuated with a bloody Civil War battle, public floggings, hangings, prostitution and lynching. 

These long and violent histories leave plenty of fertile ground for ghost stories, and Franklin is filled to the brim with many things that go bump in the night.

"I get 70-year-olds on these tours who know all these stories," Rene Evans of Franklin on Foot said. "All these gory stories come from newspaper clippings, personal accounts, diaries and court documents. Many of our ghost stories come from word-of-mouth. These are things people have seen, heard or experienced. We don't make them up. My imagination isn't that good."

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At peace with the past: Franklin, Tenn., at center of one of Civil War's bloodiest battles, today is a sweet, attractive city

by Paula Crouch Thrasher, July 9, 2006, Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Between roughly 4 and 9 p.m. on the last day of November, the ground ran with blood and bodies piled one upon the other at the Battle of Franklin: "The most important Civil War battle no one has ever heard of," says Rene Evans, who leads walking tours of downtown through her company, Franklin on Foot.

The town's history comes alive as Evans points out places and tells stories of its former residents--some locations figure prominently in Robert Hicks' book The Widow of the South.

The tour ends at St. Paul's Episcopal Church, which remains the Mother Church of the Diocese of Tennessee.

"The church was used not only for barracks and stables during the Union occupation, but as one of three Union hospitals after the battle.

"The Union Army totally trashed this church.," Evans says. "The church was saved because the congregation couldn't afford to demolish it." Wealthy families who joined the church after 1900 made possible the eight Tiffany stained-glass windows as they played a game of one-upsmanship.  

Click here to read the whole story.

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Tour allows visitors to explore seamy side of Franklin's history 

by Alexa Hinton, April 14, 2006, Nashville City Paper 

When Rene Evans announced she was starting a business giving historical walking tours through downtown Franklin, residents were eager to share their personal stories and generation-old tales of local folklore.

"People would say, 'Are you going to talk about the brothel, and the prostitute that sat in front of the courthouse, and the murders on Main Street?" Evans said.

Evans and her friend and business partner Margie Thessin quickly realized that underneath the exterior perception of a "picture perfect" Franklin lay a sordid and titillating past.

"The thing about Franklin is that you don't have to make it up because it's so good!" said Evans. 

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Walk on the Weird Side of Franklin

by Paul Erland, September 19-23, 2003, OnePaper

Each of the quaint and charming buildings in historic downtown Franklin has a tale to tell--even if those tales could have straight from the lips of a drunken pirate.

"The 'good old days' are never really the good old days," says Rene Evans, whose two-person company, Franklin on Foot, offers a lantern-lit tour of the city's "seamy underbelly" most Saturday nights through October. Their Ghosts and Gore tour covers a six-block area of downtown Franklin and 200 years of racy and riotous local history.

""Somewhere around this spot a man was killed in the early 1800s, when he fell into a vat of boiling water while attempting to kill a hog.," says Evans, addressing the group. The wiry, diminutive guide wears  hoop skirt and bonnet; her innocent demeanor belies the lurid chronicle she's about to unfold. Over the next 90 minutes tour-goers are regaled with stories of murder and mayhem from the pages of true history, as sweet and charming Franklin begins to take on the hues of sweet and charming ancient Rome.

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  A Trail of Terror in Franklin 

by Will Jordan, May 30, 2003, Nashville City Paper

Franklin is a historian's paradise. This picturesque city is filled with distinctive architecture, Civil War sites and expansive farmlands. It seems impossible to believe this charming city had its share of grisly and criminal acts, from public hangings to bootlegging. 

"Looking at the quaint and genteel downtown Franklin of today, it's hard to imagine the town's seamy history, but murder, rape, lynching and public hangings were a common part of life here," said Margie Thessin, Franklin on Foot partner and guide. "In addition, some of Franklin's oldest buildings reportedly have ethereal visitors from time to time." "There's definitely a seamy underbelly of Franklin's past," added Thessin's Franklin on Foot partner Rene Evans.

Thessin and Evans started Franklin on Foot a little over a month ago, due to popular demand. 

"We've been doing walking tours for the Heritage Foundation for about seven years, but found that many of the parents wanted to know when a trip would be available to them," Evans said. "We decided we should both go into business and make this available to the general public."

"Evans and Thessin have spent a lot of time in the Williamson County archives researching old newspaper clippings and court transcripts..

"These are true stories. We're not making these stories up," Evans said.

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The Main Street Tour--not just for Fourth Graders anymore!

May, 2003, Heritage Magazine

Want to know some of the fascinating things that have happened in downtown Franklin's buildings over the past couple hundred years? There's a new guided tour of Franklin's Main Street available to residents and visitors who want to know more about the history behind the landmarks of Franklin.

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Street Talk: Franklin on foot will sample new tour guide service during this weekend's Main Street festival

by Peggy Shaw, April 23, 2003, Williamson A.M.

Ever wonder what the old iron stars are on the sides of many 19th-century buildings in Franklin? Why the hat is chipped on the statue on the Public Square's Confederate soldier, what the original "Tennessee volunteers" volunteered for, and if there have ever been any ghostly sightings in Franklin, a city with more than two centuries of history?

The answers to these and other questions are now readily available, not at your fingertips but on your tiptoes, from the new guided walking tour, Franklin on Foot. 

Margie Thessin and Rene Evans like to say they don't just give facts to tour guests. They tell stories to bring Franklin's "colorful and illustrious history" to life.

"We're not really big into dates. We're really big into telling stories about some of the most interesting things that went on here," said Evans. "Margie likes to say when you tell stories about people nowadays, it's gossip, but you tell stories about people back then, it's history!"

Call 615-400-3808 for more information or to make a reservation.