Haunted Wisconsin

The Restless Servant Girl

Dr. Gerhard Bading and his wife lived in a rental house on Upper Wells Street between Twenty-Fifth and Twenty-Sixth Streets, on Milwaukee’s west side. It was a large clapboard house with double stairways typical of the era. One staircase connected the front of the house to the upstairs hallway; the other descended from the same hallway to the kitchen in the rear. Rear staircases often led to a sleeping room for the maid or cook and were used by that staff to reach the kitchen without going through family rooms. The hallway and both stairways were carpeted. That year, the Badings decided to take a short trip, and, not wishing to leave the house unattended, they asked their friend Dr. E. J. W. Notz to live there in their absence. Notz moved in on the appointed day and that night went upstairs to bed and promptly fell asleep. Shortly after midnight he was awakened by a thundering crash followed by footsteps in the hallway. He sat up in bed, then he thought he heard someone going down the rear stairway. He felt certain he was not alone in the house. He got up quickly, turned on lights, and searched the attic, second floor, first floor, and basement. There was no one anywhere, nor could Notz find evidence of anything else that might have caused the disturbance. Satisfied and much relieved, he went back to bed and fell asleep, until . . . A sudden crash, then hurried footsteps across the hall and down the stairway awoke him again. He got up, searched the house for the invisible prowler, but again found nothing. 202 The Restless Servant Girl The commotion erupted a third time before morning; the same sequence occurred during Notz’s second night in the house. When the Badings returned, Notz told them of his experiences, but they showed no surprise. They said they had heard the same thing so often that they weren’t greatly disturbed by them. Later, Notz learned that people in the neighborhood believed the ghost of a servant girl who had committed suicide on the premises haunted the house. She had been sent to the house early one autumn day to open it up and get it ready for its owner, the proprietor of a resort hotel in the Waukesha Lakes area. The girl was apparently suffering from depression and, upset at not being able to complete her work, killed herself. It was her restless ghost that roamed the hallway and staircases, terrifying each family who has lived there ever since. The Restless Servant Girl 203 ...