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Fort Detmerring is a military fort that later served in part as a tourist destination. However, it was plagued by a ghost for quite some time.

History[]

Primary Canon History[]

On one occasion in 1984 when the Ghostbusters were resting in their sleeping quarters still in their flightsuits, Ray Stantz had a dream. He was laying in an ornate bed with period clothes on. The ghost of a beautiful young woman hovered above him then vanished. Ray looked around. Suddenly, an invisible force unbuckled his belt and unzipped his pants. Ray's eyes crossed and his head knocked back in pleasure. The dream ended as Ray fell out of his real bed.

Primary Canon (Expanded Universe) History[]

In 1984, Ray Stantz and Winston Zeddemore stopped at Fort Detmerring after a park ranger called a couple weeks ago. They split up in the Gunner's Corridor - Ray descended downstairs and searched the Officers' Quarters while Winston covered the armory.[1] Ray eventually found the Dream Ghost in a unique encounter.

Location[]

The exact location of Fort Detmerring, in-universe, is never disclosed but Ray and Winston did drive north along the Henry Hudson Parkway. Also, in the final shooting script, the description of the main gate from early drafts is retained. When they arrived at the fort, Ecto-1 pulled up to "a pair of massive parapets and a hewn timber gate set in a thick redoubt on an escarpment high above the river," implying the fort could be near the Hudson River.[2] Earlier drafts explicitly state it to be on the Hudson. The July 6, 1983 draft mentions on page 77 that Ecto-1 is are on the Hudson Parkway then on page 78, Ecto-1 crosses over to New Jersey by the George Washington Bridge and arrive at the fort on page 81. On page 88, the final Detmerring scenes opens with "The sun is up over the beautiful Hudson River country."[3][4][5] The August 5, 1983 draft also states they drive north on the Hudson Parkway.[6]

Trivia[]

  • At the end of the July 6, 1983 script, Ray went to Fort Detmerring again to visit the Dream Ghost. The fort decided to advertise it was haunted to attract visitors.[7][8]
  • Filming took place over three days and cost several hundred thousand dollars a day.[9]
  • The exterior of Fort Detmerring was a standing set at the Columbia Ranch. It was only redressed with a sign and guard shack.[10]
  • The interior shot was a small set adjacent to Dana's apartment on Stage 12.[11]
  • Ivan Reitman came up with the idea of treating the Fort Detmerring deleted scene as a dream in the montage sequence.[12][13]
  • Ray and Winston pulling up to Fort Detmerring appears in a photo on Cover B of Ghostbusters Year One Issue #1.
  • On Cover A of Ghostbusters Year One Issue #2, there a deleted scene from the first movie of Ray in a period costume from Fort Detmerring.

Appearances[]

Primary Canon Appearances[]


Expanded Universe

Secondary Canon Appearances[]

See Also[]

References[]

  1. 10/7/1983 script p.88 via Spook Central
  2. Aykroyd, Dan & Ramis, Harold (1983). Ghostbusters (October 7, 1983) (Script p. 83). Line reads: "Ecto One pulls up to a pair of massive parapets and a hewn timber gate set in a thick redoubt on an escarpment high above the river.""
  3. Aykroyd, Dan & Ramis, Harold (1983). Ghostbusters (July 6, 1983) (Script p. 77). Line reads: "EXT. HUDSON PARKWAY - SAME NIGHT Ecto-One speeds northward, strobes lit.""
  4. Aykroyd, Dan & Ramis, Harold (1983). Ghostbusters (July 6, 1983) (Script p. 78). Line reads: "EXT. GEORGE WASHINGTON BRIDGE Ecto-One crosses over to Jersey.""
  5. Aykroyd, Dan & Ramis, Harold (1983). Ghostbusters (July 6, 1983) (Script p. 88). Line reads: "The sun is up over the beautiful Hudson River country as Stantz and Winston say good-bye to the Park Service Rangers at the main gate.""
  6. Aykroyd, Dan & Ramis, Harold (1983). Ghostbusters (August 5, 1983) (Script p. 91). Egon says: "No. He went up to Fort Detmerring on the Hudson.""
  7. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 203. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Paragraph reads: "The old historical sign as been augmented with a commercial sign that reads VISIT THE HAUNTED FORT."
  8. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 203. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Paragraph reads: "Stantz enters the gateyard with a bouquet of flowers and a bottle of wine and hears for the Captain's bedchamber where he had his delightful encounter."
  9. The Containment Unit YouTube "Stuart Ziff and Mark Bryan Wilson (Boss Film Ghost Shop, Ghostbusters) Interview!" 17:29-18:31 6/1/2023 Stuart Ziff says: "They end up on this Civil War museum. They're asleep at the Columbia Studios. They build this incredible set of the museum. They shoot it for three days. They have all the film in the can. They start editing and they realize that as they're going to this climatic and their original plan, they were going to spend a lot of time in the museum with ghosts floating over Dan Aykroyd and doing that dangerous stuff. Well, when they edit it, they realized that if we go like that, we're breaking that very exciting thing to the end so basically most of the footage ends upon the cutting room floor and if I remember correctly, it was costing them several hundred thousand dollars a day for shooting and that one and because we want to make a film, we don't want to put the shot in that everyone thought was going to be so wonderful."
  10. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 130 annotation. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Paragraph reads: "In a scene deleted from the final film, the Ectomobile arrives at Fort Detmerring -- a standing set at the Columbia Ranch, dressed rather simply with an identifying sign and a guard shack."
  11. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 135 annotation. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Paragraph reads: "Ivan Reitman and Dan Aykroyd discuss an upcoming shot in the truncated Fort Detmerring sequence, filmed on a small set adjacent to Dana's apartment on Stage 12."
  12. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 137 annotation. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Ivan Reitman says: "We were well into the main plot at this point -- Dana and Louis were possessed, the apartment building was starting to go -- and it just didn't make sense to suddenly cut to this irrelevant scene of Dan getting a psychic blowjob. It wasn't until we realized that we were a little bit short on montage material that I thought about resurrecting it. For the one key shot, Richard Edlund had already filmed the floating ghost element; so even though he was totally overloaded, I was able to talk him into putting it together."
  13. Shay, Don (November 1985). Making Ghostbusters, p. 137 annotation. New York Zoetrope, New York NY USA, ISBN 0918432685. Ivan Reitman says: "Getting the fly undone was just a mechanical trick that had already been built, so all we really had to do there was shoot it. I've done that sort of thing often in my films -- taking material out of its original form and reworking it into something else. Invariably, it seems to work better than originally intended, because in postproduction you can manipulate things until they're just right. So it was a great finish for the montage. If you look carefully, though, you can see that Dan has on a strange costume -- a tip-off that the scene was originally meant to be part of something else. Fortunately, no one seems to notice -- or at least no one seems to care. After all, it is a dream sequence."
  14. Dramatis Personae (2017). IDW Comics- "Ghostbusters Annual 2017" (2017) (Comic Dramatis Personae). Line reads: "In love with a ghost (but not the one from Fort Detmerring)."
  15. Narrator (2016). Insight Editions- "Tobin's Spirit Guide" (2016) (Book p.22). Paragraph reads: "New York's own Fort Detmerring is host to such an entity, rumored to be the sweetheart of an officer who was posted at the fort back when it was a fully functioning military stronghold."


Gallery[]

Primary Canon (Expanded Universe) Images[]

Secondary Canon Images[]

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