The Story Behind Holy Family Orphanage

All the way at the highest edge of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in the United States lies great natural beauty, the one of a kind experience that comes with encountering all four seasons, wild and beautiful deer running about quietly in the snow, and of course—an abandoned orphanage that is the site of some of the highest amounts of paranormal activity in the entire state of Michigan.

Photo Source: Pixabay

A Brief History

In 1915, the Holy Family Orphanage was finally constructed and ready to help foster and raise displaced children all around the Canadian border. The very first children that the orphanage ever housed was sixty Native American children between the ages of about eight and fourteen. Eventually, this number expanded by leaps and bounds and began to include children of all ages, including babies and even older teenagers. It is believed that the children housed there were predominantly Native American because of the social constraints put on Native American families at the time. Many of them were forced to move, parents became casualties of the recent war that took place, and some parents were left so severely disabled that they could not properly care for their children.

Holy Family Orphanage was initially seen as a beacon of hope for these children, but it wasn’t long until the children were eventually subjected to terrible living conditions and even worse treatment from the attending staff. The effects of this abuse are still felt today.

A Turn for the Worst

The discrimination that came raining down on Native Americans in the early 1900s was abusive enough without dragging orphaned children into the mix. As stated previously, many Native American parents were not only unable to care for their children as a result of the war, but it was almost impossible for a Native American adult to get a job or even be paid as much as a regular, Caucasian worker at the time.

These displaced children then were entered into the orphanage which was mostly staffed by nuns and their curriculum included vehement Catholic teachings. To say that punishments for children were severe would be a gross understatement. Nuns would often publicly shame and paddle the resident children in front of others. They were forced to adhere to an overly strict daily schedule and many of the very small children had chores to complete that were often too difficult for them such as carrying heavy buckets to and from the stables, intense landscape upkeep, and the like. Since the children had difficulty completing these tasks, they were almost always subjected to awful punishments.

In one instance, a small girl that lived there was outside in the dead of winter where she was given the task of shoveling snow as a type of punishment for something she had done previously. She ended up getting pneumonia and died. As macabre as it sounds, the funeral held for her took place in the main front room of the entire establishment. The idea here was to create a spectacled example to the other children of what happens when they decide to act disobediently. The only people allowed to attend the ghastly funeral were the little residents and attending staff. Perhaps the most horrific fact about this event is that the little girl’s family wasn’t even notified until a few months after she had been buried.

Not long after that, a little boy mysteriously drowned and not even a funeral took place for him. The little boy remains nameless because of the institution’s careful regard to cover up the death, but many people who lived there at the time and are still alive can recall the terrible situation. They claim that he had been severely beaten as a punishment, but because he was so small, he ended up dying from it. The staff then wrote him off as a drowning victim and then hid is body in the basement of the building until the situation cooled down. That alone definitely makes one reconsider what we’ve been told about the previous story about the little girl with pneumonia and the fashion in which her burial was carried out.

Present Day Hauntings

In 1965, the orphanage closed permanently due to lack of funding, but a few of the offices on the campus still operated until 1981 when the entire property became classified as abandoned by the department of the city of Marquette. In present times, the property has been purchased by a private buyer and is undergoing renovations to become a theater. However, within the thirty-six years that it was dormant, it was a highly popular place for paranormal investigation groups from around the country. The main verdict is that the basement houses the ghost of the little boy who was beaten to death; namely, the medical table that he was hidden on for so long. It is stated that he appears as a bright green orb and is harmless, but overwhelmingly sad. Many paranormal experts have also stated that the sound of children sobbing as well as words such as “help” and “hurt” can be heard in abundance throughout the entire institution, but mainly around the area of the main stairwell. People who have dared enter the grounds also report seeing ghostly apparitions and some have even documented photographs of such.