In 1906, Ted Smallwood opened a shop that functioned as a general store and trading post.
It was supposed to serve the community.
Now a museum and time capsule of the bygone pioneer age, it also serves the dead.
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An Outlaw Killed in Chokoloskee
Updated 2/10/2020 – Rumors are abundant about notorious outlaw, Edgar Watson.
Chokoloskee locals say he had a bad temper and a penchant for murder.
People whisper that he killed the workers in his sugar cane fields so he didn’t have to pay them.
No one knows exactly how many deaths he was responsible for.
Rumor is, the souls of his victims trailed him around town and never let him rest.
Finally they tormented him enough that Edgar Watson tried to do one good deed.
When a woman was allegedly killed at Watson’s Chokoloskee home in 1910, he wanted to avenge her death by killing the man responsible.
The story goes that he went to the Smallwood Trading Post to buy some ammunition for his gun.
There, he ranted and raved about how he was going to kill a murderer.
Allegedly, the the locals of the town had had enough of Watson’s behavior, and they were sick of seeing him kill every person he had a disagreement with, so they took matters into their own hands.
It is rumored that Edgar Watson was gunned down by a mob of angry locals in the trading post, and since then, he has never left.
Edgar Watson never managed to do good in his life, and now he is punished forever in his own version of hell.
Those who claim to have seen him say his chest is full of gunshot wounds, and his face is twisted into an eternal scream.
The Wraith of Smallwood Trading Post
Photo credit: whicdn.com
Gossip tells of the spirit of the woman whose death Watson was trying to avenge.
They say her ghost followed him to the Smallwood Trading Post.
If he had succeeded in buying some ammunition and killing her murderer, maybe she would have been able to rest.
But when he died, his spirit joined hers in torment.
Now they are both stuck near the trading post forevermore.
There are more sightings of this woman in Chokoloskee than there are of Edgar Watson.
One patron of Smallwood claims she is barely recognizable as human anymore.
Her body has rotted through to the bone.
Skin and flesh hang off her skeleton.
In front of the bedroom dresser mirror, she combs what little of her hair is left, and she cries.
When one Chokoloskee visitor saw her reflection standing behind him in a mirror, he thought he was about to come face to face with a real zombie.
But he turned around and there was no one there.
No one knows what the woman’s spirit could be.
Perhaps she is a zombie.
Perhaps she’s a deformed ghost.
Perhaps she’s some kind of wraith.
Either way, if the rumors are true, she is a creature straight out of nightmares.
Address
360 Mamie St
Chokoloskee, FL 34138
United States