The "legend" began in 1917 when Wisconsin native Louis "Gus" Roy, author of The Candle Book, and his mother moved to New Hampshire, looking to purchase a home with "history." He soon learned of how Mary Wallace had been born at sea and how the ship had been beset by pirates. He quickly purchased the colonial once owned by Ocean-Born Mary's son, Robert Wallace. Mary had lived in a different house a mile away with her son William, but Roy didn't let a little thing like facts stop him. He invented a fascinating story of Mary and her pirate benefactor, buried treasure, and a haunted house.