A Headless Horseman Halloween on this Washington City’s Street
Talk about a head-turning tradition.
Nancy Avey has lived in the small fishing community of Chinook, WA (Pop. 289) for 17 years with an assortment of ducks, chickens, a couple of rabbits and her 26-year old horse, Comanche. It's a satisfying, simple, normal life, until Halloween.
Nancy and Comanche (hey, there's a movie title or at least a TV show right there) have saddled up for the past dozen years on Halloween to take a leisurely holiday stroll. It started off kind of as a silly idea, but Nancy says Comanche really likes the attention. She has to make sure and take him out for a couple of walks prior to Halloween, as the big guy doesn't get much exercise anymore.
The one-of-a-kind costume has morphed and been modified over the years to become the sleek suit it is now. Nancy loves it when kids come up and try to peek under her getup to see how she pulls off the trick, even asking if she can talk. A slow, pronounced head shake in the negative is all she'll give.
It took people a while to figure out who it even was on the mount, but now 12 years later, town folk have come to expect the very odd, slow promenade of a headless horseman (woman) down the middle of Hwy 101 on Halloween in the little hamlet of Chinook.
After a dozen years aboard her mount, she's developed a "colt" following in this "one-horse-town." And it's just about time to ride again.
It’s a treat that neighbors around these parts have come to expect, and what is downright eerie and creepy, Washington Irving, headless horseman lover and the author of the story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", actually spent some time in the Astoria area, right across the bridge from Chinook, in the 1800s.