VANCOUVER, BC
Anyone familiar with haunted locations throughout the Lower Mainland will almost certainly have heard of The Old Spaghetti Factory, arguably one of the most haunted buildings in Vancouver. To include it here is a must.
Located on Water Street in Vancouver’s historic Gastown neighbourhood, the building dates back to 1907. The structure served as a grocery wholesaler before becoming a restaurant in 1970.
There are at least four spirits known to inhabit the building.
THE CONDUCTOR
The most well-known is that of the conductor, who’s known to haunt the restored 1904 trolly car, which is a central fixture in the restaurant. The car, a restored tram from the now defunct British Columbia Electric Railway Company, features tables both in and around it. Throughout the years there have been many sightings of the spectre, dressed in full conductor’s garb, sitting at one of the tables in the car. He’s often witnessed by staff at night after the restaurant has closed. There’s even a black and white photo hanging on the trolly itself, taken during the restaurant’s early days, showing the spectral figure in the supposedly empty coach.
Rumour goes the man was killed in an accident on a line running beneath the restaurant. However that’s not possible, as Vancouver never had any underground trolly lines. More likely it seems the conductor is simply attached to the car itself, which was decommissioned in the 1950’s.
THE LITTLE RED MAN
The next spirit is known simply as “the little red man.” He’s described as a small, dwarfish looking man with red hair and a beard, donning a red shirt and long johns. He’s often seen in the women’s bathroom, surprising patrons before laughing mischievously.
One account, relayed both in Greg P. Mansfield’s Ghosts of Vancouver and Barbara Smith’s Great Canadian Ghost Stories, tells of two women who once witnessed the strange little man exit one of the washroom stalls. Upon noticing him, the man laughed at them, before exiting through the washroom door. Nobody else claimed to see the man [who would’ve been very had to miss] leave the restroom area. Allegedly one of the women even snapped a picture of the spirt with her phone but caught only a dark, “swirling” image. The red man is also seen in the kitchen and seems to enjoy calling out staff member’s names.
EDWARD
The most active ghost seems to be a boy named “Edward,” who a visiting psychic once claimed his name to be.
One sever had a particularly frightening encounter with Edward one night back in 2012. As she was in the dining room closing up, she suddenly caught sight a small boy run past her. Confused, as the restaurant was closed and supposed to be clear of patrons, she followed the boy, who she watched duck under a table in the very back of the restaurant. Bending down to confront him, one can imagine her horror when he looked up at her with empty sockets where his eyes should’ve been! The server quit on the spot.
Edward is a somewhat of a playful spirit, with a penchant for messing with cutlery. In 2015, another server, after checking her place settings for the next day, again saw the figure of a boy run towards the back of the restaurant and duck under a table. Instead confronting him though, this server went to get the manager. When they returned a moment later, there was no sign of the mysterious boy. However the table she’d seen him go under now had all of its the place settings piled in the centre.
Another server, yet again, while checking that the tables in the rear dining room were neatly set, was perplexed when he saw the cutlery on one had all been bent upwards. After summoning management, they returned to see the cutlery back to exactly as it should’ve been.
A diner seated in a booth once claimed to see the reflection of a small boy spinning around on an interior column with one arm in a nearby mirror. When she turned to look, there was nothing there.
A chilling account in Smith’s book, tells of one waitress who pursued the young phantom and asked him flat out what he wanted, to which he instructed her to “put on some music so the other ghosts will come out.” According to the account, he vanished right in front of her as he spoke.
In yet another encounter with Edward, as senior vice president of Old Spaghetti Factory Canada, Chris Kanuka, told The Daily Hive in 2021, a staffer doing a sweep of the back dining area before opening, witnessed a boy crouched under one of the booths. Kneeling down, a sudden loud bang came from behind her. Startled she turned to see some old books had fallen from a nearby display by themselves. Turning back, she saw the boy she’d seen mere seconds before was gone. She too, quit that day.
According to Kanuka, who claimed in the article he’s had “dozens” of staff abruptly quit after having experiences over the years, the descriptions of Edward are all very consistent. He is described as having parted blonde hair and wearing blue overalls–though at least one account described the spectre as wearing a cap and wool jacket. Is it possible there’s more than one spectral boy haunting the premises?
LITTLE GIRL WITH THE BALLOON
The final spirt seems quite tame compared to Edward’s many shenanigans. She’s described as a young girl holding a balloon, who’s seen at a front table by the window. Once, a friend of the manager’s, witnessed the girl sitting there alone and struck up a conversation with her, which lasted for several minutes. She told the man that she was waiting for her mother. The witness, seemingly oblivious that he was speaking to a ghost, decided to tell the manager about the unoccupied child, only to return shortly after to an empty table.
What is it that makes the Old Spaghetti Factory such a paranormal mecca? The same psychic who provided Edwards name, claimed there’s a portal located in the back of the restaurant: an opening between the spirt world and ours. The psychic also claimed that several of the period artifacts that make up the restaurant’s Victorian décor, hold otherworldly attachments. There’s even speculation that the area’s history could have an influence. Gastown is the original city centre of Vancouver, most of which burned to the ground during the great fire of 1886, resulting in several deaths. Furthermore, the building itself was once owned by William Harold Malkin, who served as Vancouver’s mayor during the turbulent times of the Great Depression. Could it be all these things together that make The Old Spaghetti Factory such a magnet for the otherworldly?
Those are questions we, the living, will probably never know the answers to. But if you happen to be in Gastown with an appetite, why not drop by and order up a dish? Your chances of encountering something otherworldly with your meal are probably the best in the city!
AUTHOR’S PERSONAL ACCOUNT
The stories of The Old Spaghetti Factory are ones I’ve known since I was a child. I remember my grandmother telling me the stories of the little red man and how women in the bathroom would see him in the mirror and being positively freaked out! It shows just how long these stories have been making the rounds.
When I was 13, I visited the restaurant for lunch with my uncle. We sat at a table against the trolly on the window side. I remember telling him about the stories of the place and my late-uncle, a hard boiled skeptic, teasing me for believing in something as ridiculous as ghosts.
Eventually we placed our orders and as we waited for our meals to come, I realized the cutlery, which I’d seen on the table when we’d sat down, was no longer there. We looked around the table, under the place mats, even down on the chairs but couldn’t find them. It’s only when I looked under the table, that I saw them lying there beneath the trolly on the ground. Not only would it have been very unlikely for them to fall down at that angle, but I seem to remember my knife and fork being crossed over one another, as if they’d been intentionally placed!
It’s a memory I always think of whenever I read a story about the place.
SOURCES USED IN THIS ARTICLE:
COASTAL SHADOWS 
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