Eccentric Tales of Boring, Oregon - Left Overs
There are many interesting stories that didn't make the final cut for Eccentric Tales of Boring, Oregon. Stories were cut for various reasons. This story, while I find it interesting didn't make the book because it is a bit too short to be featured as a stand alone story.
The Spiritualist of Boring, Oregon
Boring once had a mysterious man who lived in town for only a short time. He moved to the little logging community in the winter of 1912 but was gone before the Spring of 1913. His name was Albert Kercam, nobody knew where he came from before arriving in Boring. People did ask the stranger where he had came from but when he was asked he would not tell.
Albert was working in Boring as a wood chopper but that is not all he was, he considered himself to be a Spiritualist. He told people in town that he was a spiritualist medium and he had told many of the locals that he had messages to give to them from the other side, from their dead relatives and friends who has passed.
The townspeople didn't believe that he was a medium, they thought that he was insane. So they reached out to local authorities. Deputy Sheriff Emmett Donahue was the one that showed up to arrest Albert. Emmett was not only a deputy, he ran a stage line that operated out of Boring and he was also a member of local Odd Fellow's lodge.
While researching this story I found plenty about the deputy but I couldn't find much on this mysterious man, his name does not even appear in the census record. That last name, Kercam is rare and only seems to exist in the census record in 1500's England.
Albert was taken into the county court room. In his cell beforehand he was seen praying. In the court they judged him to be a lunatic. The specifics of his sentence was not listed and I could find no other references to this man. But I image his sentence meant a trip to the Oregon State Hospital which had just changed its name. Until 1913 it was called the Oregon State Insane Asylum.
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