History & local legend
At the Milford Theater on East Catherine Street, performers once kept a seat for former owner Thomas C. Pitney. A contemporary newspaper report places his death in the theater in March 1935, when the building was no longer operating. Later stories held that he had never entirely left it.
When Sunflower Hill Productions performed there, the company reserved the middle seat in the fifth row for Pitney. A small stuffed figure wearing a black cape occupied the place on his behalf.
A 2008 Pike County Courier account also described footsteps on the steps of the right-hand aisle and a projectionist's experience of passing through a sharply cold area followed by a warm breeze.
Sources
- Pike County Courier, October 30, 2008, transcribed on Cinema Treasures, alongside the 1935 Middletown Times Herald report and a 1984 performer’s account
- Connections Magazine, The Hauntings of Milford, October 2005, printed page 9 (archived)
- Milford Theater, venue history and address
- OpenStreetMap, Milford Theatre
- Allison Mowatt, “Do You Love the Chills?”, Connections, February 2012, printed page 7
