More info on the Walnut Girl of Armona

Seems there's a bit of a theme developing lately here at Weird Fresno. Last week I had written about how I had received some information regarding one of the ghosts of Roosevelt High School. As I was working on that, Ken Summers (who contributes to Who Forted?, one of my favorite paranormal sites) sent me some information which he believes might related to the tale of the Walnut Girl of Armona.

Scan of the June 16, 1942 post from the

San Jose Evening News.

According to the San Jose Evening News while driving along the Last Chance Ditch Canal, which is located about five miles northwest of Hanford, a car blew out a tire and ran off the road into the ditch and overturned. Four out of the seven in the car drowned, including 9 year old Gloria Castillo. Could this somehow be the Walnut Girl?

Ken was kind enough to send me both a copy of the article and a map of the area that shows the location of the canal and it's proximity to Armona. One could theorize that the ghost of the girl, for some reason, moved south until it reached Armona. And given that her and her family were fruit pickers, perhaps that is why she is said to have been seen in orchards and packing houses as she had hoped to find them there somehow.

Map of the Hanford/Armona area. The canal is in blue

and the red X is the presumed location of the accident.

Still this doesn't explain in the legend how it took place in the 19th Century (Armona was founded sometime in the 1880's), the fact that she always appear naked and only to girls around her own age. But the fact that in the news article a little girl drowned in a body of water that was nine years old can't be coincidence. Or can it?

The truth is, no one will ever know. There will be those out there that claim the 1942 crash to be the genesis for the story and someone added changed the date and details to make it more "romantic". Others will claim that it did originally occur sometime in the late 1800's and the setting is accurate. And then there will be those that say it's just complete bullshit. Honestly it doesn't matter. The more and more I research these stories the less I care about proving their factuality. For whatever reason stories compel us, everyone has one and they allow us to relate on a humanistic level. And that's why I share them.

I have to give credit where credit is due. If Ken hadn't sent me an e-mail, this bit of information would still be unknown to me. Like I said, he writes for Who Forted? (check out his latest article here on why ghosts are always seen nude) and you can find his website here and link to his blog here.

The Walnut Girl of Armona

The ghost of a young girl is said to wander through walnut orchards in Armona,

similar to these. Photo courtesy of boboroshi from Flickr

Note: I had originally written about the Walnut Girl when I first started Weird Fresno. I decided to revisit the story as I had found a new part of it and wanted to share it and the original with those who may not have read it the first time.

In the small California town of Armona, there is a legend of a nine year old girl that met a tragic end and her restless ghost haunts the area to this day. Sometime in the nineteenth century the girl and a few of her friends were skinny dipping at a local waterhole outside of town. A group of boys showed up and threatened to come into the water after them. Most of the girls ran into a nearby walnut orchard before the boys could get them. One little girl was to scared to follow the other girls and instead she dove underwater to try and trick the boys into thinking she too had followed the other girls. Unfortunately the poor girl drowned.


Legend says the restless spirit has roamed the area for years. The townsfolk named her the Walnut Girl because she was always seen in locations that contained walnuts (orchards and packing plants mostly). No male has ever seen the ghost, but stories say that girls around the same age as she were most likely to see her.

While researching this legend I came across a first hand account from a woman who saw the ghost of the girl in the old Armona Southern Pacific Depot. The Depot itself was built in 1931 and was used for several decades before it was abandoned and today stands derelict. According to the witness strange events would happen there such as strange lights at night, compass spinning around and not pointing towards north and whenever a photo was taken there would be bright spots on the pictures.

The witness continues to state that when she was about nine years of age she snuck out and went to the depot late one night. She was shining her flashlight around when the light fell on a girl similar in age to her with a Victorian hairstyle and completely nude. Startled she dropped the flashlight. When she picked it up again the girl was gone.

She later told her mother about the encounter. Her mother said she had seen the same little girl in an orchard when she was a child herself and others had seen the ghosts, always nude and usually near a large concentration of walnuts. The story the mother had been told was the same story that I initially found, but added this interesting tidbit. Apparently the ghost of the little girl has a vendetta against boys as the witness said several boys in her neighborhood suffered “ill fortune” that was attributed to her. Whether this is true or not is hard to say, but the fact that two women both saw the same ghost leads me to think that this legend may have some truth to it.

But why does her restless spirit only haunt walnut orchards? Perhaps she thinks if she can get to an orchard she will be safe from the boys she still thinks are chasing her. This is obvious as she will only appear to girls near her age. It appears even in the afterlife she is still looking for safety.

The Walnut Girl

This is an old story I came across years ago. I had posted it on another blog and had completely forgot about it until today. So I thought I'd repost it here for anyone who hasn't read it yet. More than likely it's another urban legend. But it's one of those strange stories that refuses to go away. Perhaps there is some truth to the legend after all.

In the small California town of Armona, there is a legend of a nine year old girl that met a tragic end and her restless ghost haunts the area to this day. Sometime in the nineteenth century the girl and a few of her friends were skinny dipping at a local waterhole outside of town. A group of boys showed up and threatened to come into the water after them. Most of the girls ran away before the boys could get them into a nearby walnut orchard. One little girl was too scared to follow the other girls. Instead she dove underwater to try and trick the boys into thinking she too had followed the other girls. Unfortunately the poor girl drowned.

Legend has it the restless spirit roamed the area for years. The townsfolk named her the Walnut Girl because she was always seen where walnuts were grown. No male has ever seen the ghost, but stories say that girls around the same age as she was have seen glimpses of her.

Why does her restless spirit only haunt walnut orchards? Perhaps she thinks she will be safe if she can get to an orchard she will be safe from the boys she thinks are still chasing her. This is obvious as she will only appear to girls near her age. It appears even in the afterlife she is still looking for safety.