The Lady in the Lake of Durand Eastman Park

by M.P. Pellicer | Stranger Than Fiction Stories
The White Lady is said to be seen only on foggy evenings in Durand Eastman Park in Rochester, New York., and her sightings date back to the early 1800s. She is said to be the specter of a woman looking for her daughter who was murdered nearby. 

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Construction o fDurand Eastman Park c. mid 1900s

​In the early 1900s Dr. Henry S. Durand and his friend George Eastman bought property in the area. In 1907, they mysteriously donated a 502-acre tract with nearly six miles of lake shore to the City of Rochester to be used as a public park. Some speculate if they knew something about its ghostly lady, which was said to pre-date their occupancy of the property.

Extensive construction went into making the swampy, almost treeless, farmland into what is now a beautiful park. Prior to this Dr. Durand would vacation on a summer camp situated there.

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Dedication of the Eastman Durand Park c.1908

​Two smaller lakes that are situated next to Lake Ontario were named in their honor. Deer, buffalos and elk were eventually introduced into the park. There were toboggan rides and concerts were held in the spring and summer.

The story goes that a woman possibly named Eelissa lived on the land which is now the park. There are different versions as to why she haunts the land. In one story, she murdered her husband and his mistress, and in another her teenage daughter disappeared. 

​The woman was convinced she had been murdered by a neighboring farmer. Without her daughter's body she was unable to prove that she had been abducted and murdered. She would search the grounds with her German Shepherd dogs, until one day in despondency she leapt to her death off a cliff into Lake Ontario.

There are other versions of how she lost her daughter. In one the teenager elopes with her lover, who instead murders her, in another she's abducted and killed by a group of marauders as she walks by the lake.

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Refectory at Eastman Durand Park c.1911

In a third version her husband was a merchant shipper, who died while serving on a boat on the Great Lakes. Unable to find peace in life or death, she haunts the grounds as The White Lady.

She is sometimes seen with her dogs and other times alone. At times she is described as a thin, ugly woman, other times as a young woman who materializes out of the mists that coalesce on the surface of Lake Durand.

She is said to have a predilection for chasing men into the lake or out of the park altogether. Some say there is a connection between this ghost and the ruins of a hotel still found there called the "White Lady's Castle". This dates back to t911 when a refectory was built to offer refreshments to tourists visiting the park.

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After a storm in March 2017, a tree trunk savaged by the windows show what many say is a form of the Lady in White who is said to haunt the grounds

If Eelissa ever did live here, any remnants or foundations for her home have disappeared, or are buried beyond finding. Like many local legends of white ladies, many believe there is no historical truth to this ghost, however there are those who claimed to have seen this specter.

Amid the stories of the White Lady, camping facilities were added in 1925 to the park, and in 1931 the golf course was extended to 18 holes. In 1948 the beaches were closed, and the grand bathhouse was demolished in 1974 after being unused for many years. Swimming was allowed until 1966, when pollution forced the closure of the beach again until 2006.

In March of 2017 fierce winds blew through the park, splintering a tree trunk with what many say is the form of the ghostly lady.

In 1988, the horror film Lady in White, starring Lukas Haas and based on this ghost story was filmed in the area.

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The White Lady of Eastman Durand Park is said to walk the grounds in search of her lost daughter

There were no sinister occurrences in the park to explain the origins of the White Lady. In 1914, two men died, one by drowning in the lake, and another when his vehicle skidded and overturned at the entrance to the park.

In 1974, park officials denied the existence of the White Lady saying it was only an urban myth. Their problem was that a rare pine tree was painted with the ghostlike image of the lady. The foreman, John Delenola who had been with the park service for 26 years remembers a story told to him about a man driving on his way home along Lake Shore Boulevard. It supposedly happened around 1944 near the bathhouse between Three Lakes Camp and the old Police Athletic League cabin. It was after 11 p.m. when the man slowed down to take the curve by the bathhouse when he saw a woman floating through the shadowy pines. She was dressed in what appeared to be a wedding dress with veil and a long train. Walter Sassman, a town historian found references to the White Lady as far back as World War I.

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