Travel Blog - Visiting the Real Town Where Beetlejuice Was Filmed
East Corinth, Vermont is a small simple town. There are no sidewalks anywhere, the only public property is the small town library and small post office, and the majority of the town itself is on just one road. However there is one important reason to visit the town... it's the place where Beetlejuice and it's upcoming sequel were filmed!
To be clear, this town isn't designed for tourism. There are no hotels in or near the town, and no real walking paths or sidewalks anywhere. In fact, very little of the town has changed since the filming of the first Beetlejuice movie 35 years ago. However that's not to say the town hides it's association with the classic film. The building that was used as "Miss Shannon's School for Girls" was purchased by a fan years ago, and has been preserved as a fun tourist spot to check out and stop at.
Also, several spots where the movie was filmed have been marked with photos for intrigued people passing through town to see. Although with the exception to the "school for girls", the public library, the post office, and the roads themselves: everything else in town is private property not open to the public. Many sites, including the location where the famous Beetlejuice house was: are located behind drive ways with very explicit "stay away" signs planted by the home owners. I did try to go to the local cemetery, hoping to maybe get some shots of it (as I'm not sure if they used part of this cemetery in the upcoming sequel movie). However there was a real funeral happening when I arrived, so aside from getting the one shot seen above, I quickly left.
One important fact worth noting is that the famous bridge where Adam and Barbara died at the start of Beetlejuice was never a covered bridge. The red cover was added for the movie. However the cover was given to a nearby ski resort (that uses it just for storage sadly and bizarrely enough). So the bridge seen in the movie still survives, albeit in pieces.
One fun fact I discovered though (after rushing across the street from the nearby library), was that the water under the famous bridge is not that deep. If a car did go off that bridge, any individual in the vehicle would indeed get hurt... although it be hard to imagine them getting so wet they'd immediately freeze to death. Also, the road Adam and Barbara were driving on doesn't even lead to the property where the Beetlejuice house was located. So it would seem that Adam and Barbara must've been a little lost in their new hometown in the movie, as they were driving the wrong way home before they died in a creek that must've been filled with ice poison that month. Sorry to ruin the illusion for everyone.
However, during my travels in Vermont: I did travel to other covered bridges not too far away; and it's these bridges that Tim Burton years ago may have been inspired by. I also learned that in parts of the New England area, there are local legends about covered bridges. There's silly folklore tales about how these bridges have mystical properties, and that spirits inhabit these bridges. Some bridges even encourage people to be "bridge fairies" and leave gifts at the bridge for the spirits (with bad fortune coming to those that don't respect the bridge). The strange folklore surrounding these bridges and their unexplainable link to a realm beyond ours could very well have perhaps inspired Tim Burton to make the covered bridge the location where two characters in his movie would enter the strange realm of the afterlife. It's an intriguing thought I never would have had if I hadn't explored this little town and the surrounding areas first hand...
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A thought occurred to me, via the musical, that the various high schools JD attended could be playfully expanded on for the AU as a larger 80’s nod.
In order, in the schools Jason attended before he met Dan and Veronica.
Ridgemont High (Fast Times At Ridgemont High)
Niles East High (Sixteen Candles)
Shermer High School (The Breakfast Club and Weird Science)
Glenbrook North High (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off)
San Pedro High School (Some Kind of Wonderful)
Hawkins High (Stranger Things)
The high school in Lucas (Incidentally Winona Ryder debuted in this picture.)
Tucson High Magnet School (Can’t Buy Me Love)
An unspecified high school in East Corinth, Vermont (Beetlejuice) (JD has an encounter with the ghost with the most. Had JD stuck around a day longer, he would’ve reunited with Dan sooner as Dan was on vacation in the same town with his cousins, and he too encountered Beetlejuice during his trip. BJ figures out quickly Dan and JD knew each other, due to the boys referencing each other, but says nothing directly to Dan about it at the time. The boys and Veronica summon Beetlejuice in Sherwood later on in an offbeat adventure that requires a supernatural touch to deal with. Beetlejuice affectionately calls Veronica “babes” to her annoyance as she reminds him of Lydia.)
Hubert Humphrey High (Pump Up The Volume) (A technical cheat since it’s a 90’s film, but Christian Slater is the star also, and you know JD would be a huge fan of Hard Harry. Had some friendly encounters with Mark, but they never became proper friends.)
Sherwood High (Heathers)
Hawkins remains the most significant part of JD’s backstory, though when asked about his other schools or just reminiscing to himself, he’ll mention some something that happened in the movies that he happened to notice or overhear. When at his apartment, JD will sometimes be listening to Hard Harry’s channel trying to drown out his own problems, at least up until Mark was arrested.
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Who were you, Mary Jane?
For a class assignment, I had to go to the local cemetery and choose a grave to research. I ended up picking a broken, weatherworn grave that just said "Mary Jane". There was clearly more, but the break was part way through the words, and so much of it had worn away that even a gentle pencil rubbing couldn't bring it out. Something about her seemed sad and lonely.
I found her last name, Hathaway, on FindAGrave, where you could see slightly more of the grave and where it was before it was broken. It reads, "Mary Jane, wife of Hiram Hathaway" with the rest sunken into mud.
I found her on Ancestry, but her profile was strangely empty. So was her FamilySearch and her Genie. Her husband's was equally empty. Three sources total between them. Eventually, through manually searching through records, I discovered her parents Enoch Aiken and Mary Bailey.
I expected information to start flooding in now, it had been two hours and I finally had enough to do some cursory searching, but the only thing I found was death records, and things on her parents. Eventually, though, things started to reveal themselves.
Mary Jane Aiken was born in 1837 in Cornith, Vermont. Her mother was from Hartford, Connecticut, and her father was from Cornith. Enoch had been a blacksmith all of his life and looks like his father was one too. She had three older brothers, two older sisters, and one younger brother.
(East Cornith, early 1900s, via Cornith Historical Society)
Mary somehow managed to elude the census all her life, so she disappeared from the historical record for a while. She probably spent the time before her marriage with her family in Corinth.
Her mother passed away from pneumonia in July of 1863. She was 69.
When the Civil War rolled around, (at least) two of her brothers and her father were called to war. The house would have been just her and her sisters. Her father was a blacksmith, part of the First Cavalry Regiment, Company D. He would have seen the Battle of Gettysburg, and came back to tell the tale.
You can read more about his unit here:
One of her brothers though, her little brother William, did not make it back from the war. He was shot and killed in the Battle of the Wilderness, on March 5th, 1864, in Spotsylvania, Virginia. We are lucky enough to actually have a photograph of him publicly available (though the image quality isn't great):
Her father would come back to Cornith, presumably for the funeral, and would pass away the next month, April of 1864 (his records say he died of dropsy).
I can't imagine the amount of loss that Mary and her siblings were feeling, losing both their parents and their little brother in a little over a year.
On April 27th, 1872, Mary appears again, marrying Hiram Hathaway of Bennington, Vermont on April 13th. Depending on when the wedding was, it would have been a rather chilly wedding.
Her husband, Hiram Hathaway, was born in 1837 and had grown up in Bennington. He had several siblings. He had been a farmer most of his life, though he also managed to elude the census a few times so he may have had other jobs.
Hiram had also had a rough 1860s. In 1863, when he was 26, his father took his own life using opium. In 1866, he lost his sister, Mary, though I can't find how she died. In 1868, he lost his mother to old age. After that, the rest of his siblings scattered to the winds. One to Wisconsin, one to Florida.
In June of 1872, her husband would appear in the paper, as putting up no trespassing signs for seemingly no reason. You can read the whole clipping here:
In 1874 and 1875, Mary Jane would write wills that had the executor of her estate as her friend, Abraham Gardner. I couldn't find anything on him, it seems like there were several Abraham Gardners running around Bennington at the time. She notes in her will that she wants all of her money to be put the the benefit of her husband, giving him monthly allowances. She wanted to give everything but the house, furniture, and one set of bedding, to her sister Aphia. We also get to see her signature:
On February 15th, 1875, Mary Jane Hathaway passed away from cancer. In 1876, due to her debts, her entire estate had to be sold off.
As unfortunate as that is, it gives us a very interesting look into her life, as an inventory and appraisal had to be made of all her things.
Among her items, she had:
A stereoscope (though no stereoscope cards were noted)
Many many sewing notions (it seemed to be a hobby of hers)
Numerous photos of family on her walls along with (at least) 3 photo albums.
A room full of books, especially on the history of religion and geography books.
Painting supplies
A box of "trinkets" (probably sentimental items she kept)
Her school book on grammar.
And a much clearer picture of what she was like starts to develop.
She's an avid reader, was very sentimental, and cared quite a bit about her family. She enjoyed sewing and painting, and maybe scrapbooking with the things she collected (though that part isn't confirmed).
In 1880, Hiram remarried to Ellen Thurber, a local Bennington woman. He moves into her parent's house, where he works as a farmer. One family tree says that he died in 1889, but I can't find anything to prove or disprove that. As far as I can tell, Hiram has no death records (at least none digitized). He is also not buried with his parents and first wife. He does not appear to be in the cemetery at all. His story ends with his marriage to Ellen.
Mary's sister, Aphia, died in 1901 due to paralysis in Keene, NH. Her brother, Enoch, would die soon after in a debtor's house.
After finding this all out, I went back to the cemetery looking her Hiram and to visit Mary again. I searched all over that section, but I think if Hiram was buried here, his grave has been eaten by the hill.
Hopefully, Mary's story can be reunited with the rest of her family, and maybe one day some more information will surface about her or Hiram.
I hope so. She deserves to be remembered.
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