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Brookside, the mansion John H. Bass built above the St. Joseph River — the ironmaster's country seat, with its artificial lake — passed after years standing empty to the University of Saint Francis, which renovated it and made it a library. Its ghost is the friendliest in the current literature. Haunted Rooms' Fort Wayne guide reports that Bass himself is "said to help people find books" in his old house. Fort Wayne Magazine's list tells the same story with the polish worn differently: "If you are in the library, Bass will help you find the book you desire. Sounds innocent enough except Bass will literally throw the book at you."
The two versions — a librarian's ghost who fetches, and one who throws — mark the telling as living folklore rather than reportage; no named witness, date or incident is attached to either. Bass the man, his foundries and his fortune are treated in the Business and Wealth chapters. His afterlife as a library assistant is a creation of the list era, and it is recorded here at exactly that weight.
Sources: Haunted Rooms, "Haunted Places in Fort Wayne" (revised November 2026); Fort Wayne Magazine, haunted-places list (fortwayne.com); the Business and Wealth sections of this history (John H. Bass).