SubUrban Legend - Tiburon Ghoulishness

In the spirit of the Halloween season, we thought you should know that mummies did exist in the late 1800s in Marin--specifically in Tiburon. (No, not soccer mommies--mummies.) And these creatures were doing all kinds of ghostly, ghoulish things--you know, like scaring people half to death. Still today, an eerie sound emanates from the local lagoon (unless, of course, it's an ol' swamp creature suffering from algae indigestion).

Well, as far as we know, King Tut or Boris Karloff didn't have much competition in this latitude. But there was a gentleman who engaged in an embalming practice deemed revolutionary at the time. Benjamin Franklin Lyford was a land developer, inventor and physician who contributed many things to the Tiburon landscape. (Don't rush me--I'll be getting to the mummy part soon.) Married to Hilarita Reed, who inherited some 1,500 acres from her family, Dr. Lyford had land to play with. There was his "Utopian" health spa, which never quite gelled, although Lyford's Tower still stands. The good doctor also donated property for an insane asylum, and then for Old St. Hilary's Church. And that beautiful Gothic Victorian house you see at the Richardson Bay Audubon Center and Sanctuary? Yep, that's his (relocated from Strawberry). Alright, alright--the mummy part! Stop slobbering on the keyboard! It seems that in his spare time, Lyford had developed embalming techniques in his laboratory (or, if you prefer, laBORatory) that preserved the body in a "most lifelike state, gradually petrifying." Indeed, it was reported that Dr. Lyford had embalmed the body of a woman from Alameda County, leaving her with a complexion "bright and normal." (Take that, Revlon.) But try and wrap your head around this one--apparently this was a legacy he wasn't about to leave behind. When Lyford died in 1906, his formula died with him.