Description
This 25-cent cupronickel coin is the first in the Royal Canadian Mint’s chilling new series of coins, Haunted Canada and includes the matching Canada Post stamp. The coin features a two-image lenticular design, which depicts an interpretation of the ghost bride: the lenticular image shows one image with the brides eyes open, with the candles that would be her ruination floating eerily behind her, while the ominous-looking Fairmont Hotel in Banff is displayed below. When you tilt it, the candles go out and her eyes close…a chilling effect! The series highlights some of Canada’s spookiest ghost stories, and this inaugural coin is a great example! The “Ghost Bride” coin is a tribute to the haunting story of a young woman from a wealthy family, whose wedding day was marked by tragedy. In 1926, in the Banff Springs Hotel which sits nestled in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta, it is said that a bride was descending a curving stone staircase when her dress caught fire from an open torch on the side of the stairs. In her panic, she tripped headfirst down the stairs and broke her neck. Since then, guests at the Fairmont Banff Hotel have reported seeing the ghost of this doomed bride waltzing in the ballroom of the hotel, or moving slowly down the staircase. Employees at the hotel have often felt a cold breeze on this staircase, or heard strange noises coming from the unoccupied bridal suite. The hotel is rife with other ghostly tales, too, such as a phantom bellhop, a headless bagpiper, spinning bar stools and musical devices gone haywire.
