By Staff Writer (media@latinospost.com) | First Posted: Oct 30, 2014 01:06 AM EDT

Want to have your own village? One in Johnsonville, Connecticut is up for sale, along with its ghosts and secrets.

The small town's "jewel in the crown," as The Telegraph puts it, is the Emory Johnson Homestead, which was built in the 1840s and served as the residence of the Johnsons at that time. It was later bought in 1970 by the Schmitts, whose ancestor, Raymond Schmitt, strove to make Johnsonville a "top-class tourist attraction."

Talk has it that the said Homestead is haunted, with Schmitt's ghost reportedly still stalking the place, "lamenting the fact that Johnsonville never really took off."

"Ohers say that the Emory Johnson Homestead is alive with the spirits of mill workers, whose bodies were always laid out in the parlour before burial," the news source added.

Aside from rumors of ghosts, the town has a colorful history, thanks to the Schmitts' various efforts to turn the place around and make it a tourist destination. The final straw that ended the long campaign to make the place worth visiting was "an argument over Schmitt's plans to dig another pond, which the local council felt might upset the environmental balance."

So in 1994, the place was shut down, with the patriarch later dying in 1994.

"The mill, unfortunately, stopped production after a lightning strike and fire in 1972," explained Jim Kelly, private brokerage firm RM Bradley's senior VP. "At that time it was the third oldest, continuously operating manufacturing enterprises in the U.S. Mr. [Raymond] Schmitt held the estate from the mid-70s through 1998 and it has been uninhibited since 1998 and sold to the current owner in 2001."

The owner, a real estate firm, had planned to turn the property into "a residential development with a potential bed-and-breakfast and hotel and to restore the village," according to ABC News.

However, financing became "tight," with the firm finally deciding to sell the place and let someone else do the developing. Kelly also revealed that he wanted this ghost town listing "to fall into the Halloween season to pique interest."

Apparently, it's working. The auction site on which the 62-acre property has been listed reportedly gained 650 hits. Starting bid is $800,000.

"The winning bid will likely come in a lot higher than the starting bid. After all, the town was on the market last year for $3 million. There is a reserve price but it's unpublished," CNN noted.

The auction ends October 30 at 1 p.m. Eastern time. To participate in the bidding, register at www.auction.com and make a $10,000 deposit. You'll also need to contact Meredith Coleman at 001 646 640 1899 (mcoleman@auction.com), The Telegraph said.

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