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Find your walking shoes and your history books.

The Troup County Historical Society’s Strange LaGrange walking tours are returning for their fourth season this Friday night. Each tour, which will take place each Friday night until November, will be filled with ghost stories galore of some of downtown LaGrange’s most prominent locations.

Led by Troup County archivist Lewis Powell, IV, the estimated hour-and-a-half to two-hours-long tours explores some of the more ‘stranger’ and creepier aspects of downtown LaGrange’s history, such as the Art Museum’s gory history as a jail and asylum, or how Lafayette Square has been the scene of several historical happenings.

Powell, a writer and researcher who has studied the paranormal South throughout his career, said the tours have grown exponentially in the last year due to it being one of the few ghost tours in the area. Participants are local and come from Newnan, Atlanta and Alabama.

“I frequently hear from people on the tour with their own stories from the places we visit,” Powell said. “I had a lady once who was a manager at Venucci’s who had experiences, so I talk about her. I talk about a [former] electrician who worked at the church [that is now] Pretty Good Books. He had some really interesting stories. I try to take note of those stories even if they’re not on my tour.”

This year participants of the Strange LaGrange walking tours will visit locations such as Taste of Lemon, the LaGrange Art Museum and City Hall to learn about the locations’ eerie history. Previously, the tour would lead guests to areas like LaGrange College. This location will not be visited this year to keep the tour focused more on downtown.

While visitors have various degrees of belief when it comes to the paranormal, Powell noted that visitors will leave each tour with at least an appreciation of local history, and might even tweak their skepticism.

“Most people come on the tour with some semblance of belief,” Powell said. “Some tell me they’ve never thought about [ghosts,] and some tell me they’ve had their own experiences but they’re still not sure what they experienced. Some of their stories are perfectly plausible as ghost stories.”

The tours will take place each Friday night until November. Tours will pause in October for the Historical Society’s October tour events, which are separate events from the walking tours, Powell said.

The tour will begin at 7 p.m. from the Legacy Museum on Main. Tickets can be purchased online by visiting the museum’s Eventbrite page at https://www.eventbrite.com, or at the Legacy Museum on Main’s front desk. Tickets are $15 for adults and $12 for students.

While the tours are relatively family-friendly, Powell suggests participants be 12-years or older due to some of the graphic material that may be discussed on the tour. Tours are usually kept to 15 to 20 participants.

Participants are encouraged to wear comfortable shoes and bring their own water and umbrellas in case of rain.