Bernardo
Ternali's Theatre Macabre
Bernardo Ternali, 1899-1951
The son of
Italian immigrants who achieved considerable
success in Santa Rosa’s early 20th century cannery
operations,
Bernardo Ternali leased the 6th Street Warehouse from 1941
until his
untimely death in 1951, when he was crushed by a large rolling door. He
used
the warehouse for running a largely-
unsuccessful theater company for the last ten years of his life.
Bernardo opened
his theater in 1941, the year America
began fighting in World War II. As Americans rolled up their sleeves
for the
war effort, Bernardo struggled to get his fledgling theater company,
the Rose
City Players, off the ground. Money was tight, as the country struggled
to
emerge from the Great Depression, and resources were scarce due to the
war
effort. It was not the best time to begin a new venture.
The building
Bernardo had chosen also had a problem with
ghosts. The site was reputed to be located over a Pomo Indian
graveyard, and
many claimed the ancient spirits were unhappy with its new industrial
usage. A
series of busy cannery operations adjacent to a bustling railroad
freight yard
and woolen mill embodied a number of grisly industrial accidents and
deaths
over the years, and those spirits were also reputed to linger around
the old
warehouse.
At first, the
manifestations were few and barely
noticeable, but the ghosts seemed to feed upon the energy of the actors
working
in the space, and the manifestations steadily intensified over time. A
series
of inexplicable accidents and small fires always seemed to offset the
meager
earnings of the box office during the venture’s early years.
By
1950, the
theater was beginning to emerge from its shadow of poverty. The war had
ended,
and more and more people were going out. Emboldened by better box
office
numbers and tired of dealing with the high turnover rate of actors
fearful of
the ghostly reputation of the warehouse, Bernardo decided to deal with
the
matter by employing a medium, in the hopes that through communication
with the
other side, he might persuade the spirits to depart.
But the medium
he found was unprepared for the task. Over
the course of several sessions employing a Ouija board, the medium
established
contact with countless entities, but the spirits were decidedly
unfriendly and
adamantly refused to relocate. Moreover, the medium suffered a heart
attack
during the intense final session, which was never properly closed. More
spirits
poured through the portal, and the theater became a playground for
ghosts.
During its final year of operation, Bernardo’s theater saw a steady
reduction
in both cast and audience due to constant ghostly disturbances during
rehearsals and shows.
It was a
depressing October night for Bernardo when he
decided to close the theater’s doors for good. He stayed late,
consuming an
entire bottle of wine by himself as he wandered through the theater
alone,
saying good-bye to his dream. As he prepared to close the heavy,
gravity-mounted rolling door at the front entrance, something went
wrong, and
he was crushed to death as the door came crashing downward. Newspaper
accounts
of the tragedy the following day mentioned that Bernardo’s body was
found
bisected, half inside and half outside the rolling door.
Over the decades
since Bernardo’s death, the building has
housed many businesses, but reports of ghostly manifestations have
prevented
any business for operating within its walls for very long. Tales of
ghosts
enacting their own grisly scenes on a sidereal stage have persisted
over the
years; the reports indicate an acceleration of sightings during the
month of
October. Many have said Bernardo himself still wanders the warehouse on
cold
October nights.
In February 2005
the 6th Street Playhouse
opened its doors, after extensive remodeling of Bernardo Ternali’s old
warehouse theater. Ignoring the building’s troubled history and rumors
of
spiritual infestation, the 6th Street Board bravely pushed
forward
to bring a state-of-the-art theater to the Santa Rosa community.
Although
ghostly sightings have been few since the theater’s opening, this will
be the
first October in the new theater, and our staff has braced itself for
possible
manifestations this month. In honor of Bernardo Ternali’s dream, we
offer a
tour of our facility to all interested parties.
©
2005 Darknician