The Man in the Yellow Slicker

The Man in the Yellow Slicker

One of Park City’s most infamous ghosts is that of a man wearing a yellow slicker with a darkened, indistinguishable face who haunts the hills and mines near the town. This ominous figure has been considered the harbinger of death, and residents reported seeing a man in a yellow slicker before an explosion in the mines claimed the lives of 34 men. Some legends paint the ghost as a helpful entity warning people of danger. Others say he is the ghost of a murdered miner whose body was cast down a 600-foot shaft.

According to Park City Ghost Tours, the ghost may be that of a man noted as “a friendly stranger” on his death certificate who died in the mines. The man had come to Park City to make a fortune in the mines. Like many miners, he wore a yellow slicker to keep off the cold damp, but it was later discovered the man had been cheating two mine companies, providing tools for rent to one company and then smuggling them through back shafts in the mine to receive payment from a competing company. The man’s body was later discovered in that back shaft with his head crushed in. The cause of death was listed as a mine collapse, though no other part of the man’s body was injured, and no one further investigated the incident.

In fact, Park City Ghost Tours shares the story of a local police officer who was called out one evening to investigate an abandoned car by the mines. After inspecting the car, the officer began heading toward the mines to see if the owner of the vehicle might be trespassing when he saw a figure emerge from the mines. It was a man in a yellow slicker, but where his head should have been was only shadow. The officer ran to his car and began driving back toward town, but in his rear view mirror he saw something yellow dart across the road behind him. Moving faster than was humanly possible, the yellow object continued to dart across the road behind the car, growing closer every minute. At one moment, all the officer could see in his window was a yellow slicker, and the image was so detailed he could even see the stitching and buttons on the coat. When he reached the lights at the edge of town, the ghost vanished.

Was the man in the yellow slicker warning the officer away from the mines and certain disaster? Or was the specter looking for revenge for his own unjust and cruel murder? Whatever the answer, it seems there is something supernatural haunting the mines of Park City.