About History and Haunts

When you sell images of historic sites online, you learn quickly that if there’s a ghost story attached to the site, that’s going to add a lot more traffic. So my history site, The History Trekker gave birth to the creepy site, A Gothic Curiosity Cabinet, and the need for History and Haunts was born.

What you find on all three sites are articles about travel, history, the macabre, the search for the best bacon cheeseburger in the U.S.A, where to go for a haunted hotel, where to find the best haunted restaurants. All feature my own glorious photography and are meticulously researched – and I’m not talking just Wikipedia here. I still crack open real books on occasion.

History and Haunts is where to go to find out about what’s happening across all my sites. You can show your love by ordering art prints from The History Trekker Shoppe, or buy me a beer next time I’m in your town. I love to hear stories – the haunted house on the corner you used to run past as a kid is forever fascinating to me.
History is in the details, and when you know about your your surroundings, you can find those moments when the 21st century cracks open and you can see through time to way things were. This is a guide to help you find those moments.

T.A.

About Todd

My work has graced the covers and inside pages of History and Lore of Sleepy Hollow and the Hudson Valley, by Jonathan Kruk, and Haunted Long Island II, by Lynda Lee Macken, as well as Gap Creek by Robert Morgan. My work has also resulted in a relationship with Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, Massachusetts and Historic Hudson Valley and the Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow. And I recently found myself telling the story of Lavinia Fisher in the book Haunted Charleston: Scary Sites, Eerie Encounters, and Tall Tales.

My work has appeared in the D.A.R. publication American Spirit, Civil War magazine Hallowed Ground, the New York Times, CNN, MSNBC, Broadway World, Indianapolis Post, and BBC websites, as well as travel sites for Plymouth and Gloucester, Massachusetts, Savannah, Georgia; Donegal, Ireland and Bath, England.

In addition, my artwork has been exhibited at the Mitchell Museum of Art in Mt. Vernon, Illinois, The Jungle in Evansville, Indiana, as well as numerous local exhibitions throughout the midwest and oddly enough, Germany. They love me in Germany, and I love them for that.

Recent client list includes:The Daughters of the American Revolution, a.k.a. the D.A.R,  The Civil War Trust, Plimoth Plantation, History Press, Algonquin Press, Black Cat Press, Historic Hudson Valley, Old Dutch Church of Sleepy Hollow, Philipsburg Manor, Horseman’s Hollow, Sunnyside, SmugMug, The Stony Brook Environmental Conservancy.

I’ve also worked freelance as an illustrator and graphic designer for major corporations, agencies and institutions, including Ogilvy and Mathers, Lintas/New York, Bristol Myers Squibb and Eli Lilly.

I’m the proprietor of the Green Man Design Studio in Carmi, Illinois.