March 29, 2012

Trippy Tales #64..."Time Slip Trips"...Part One

IS IT POSSIBLE??

Reader Report by Ronald at about.com:
"The year was 1992 and I was 17 years old," reports Ronald. "My mother lived in South Bend, Indiana and my father lived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I had made this trip a half dozen times by myself in the past. I always chose to drive at night because there was less traffic, less road construction, too.
"This particular night, I was driving from my mother's to my father's. I had called him on the phone just as I left, as always. When I arrived at his house he had a look of disbelief on his face and said, 'What are you doing here?' Until then I had not noticed that I had made the 370 mile trip in less than 4 hours. I drove an old Pontiac four-door that was not capable of the well over 100 mph that would have been required for that time. Also, I do not remember stopping to get gas, and that car would not make that trip on less than 1½ tanks of gas. Needless to say, I have always been puzzled by this event."

These stories of apparent time slips always are puzzling, Ronald. According to Google Maps directions, the trip should have taken you about 6½ to 7 hours -- and that's without stopping for gas, food, and bio breaks. Seems impossible, and if your start and arrival times are accurate, it's hard to find an explanation.

But here are more weird stories of time slips:

Missing Time and Out of Place
by Cher
"I was leaving my driveway to drive one mile to town. There were woods and few houses along the way. I had just pulled out and there was a thick fog rolling in. Very creepy at night. I had only gone a half a block at most, and very slowly, when I saw a very bright light through the fog. This was really strange since there was nothing near my house.
As I drove closer, I saw a Phillips 66 gas station that wasn't there the day before. I pulled into it in shock, and a man came out. I asked him how a gas station could have been built so fast and he looked at me strangely. He said it had been there for eight years!
I asked him where I was and when he told me, I began to shake uncontrollably. I was 300 miles from home! I looked at the clock and I had left my driveway only two minutes before! It took all night to drive home and I shook most of the way!"

Blip in Time
by Glenn
"This incident happened to me when I was a university student in Nova Scotia, Canada in about 1991. I decided to take the express bus to my home town one night to visit my parents for the weekend. I sat at the back of the bus and there was nobody around me, but there was a family sitting behind the driver in the front. The bus ride was uneventful until we came close to my parents home town.
I was looking out the window and I looked at the Michelin tire factory as we went by it going uphill. When the bus reached the top of the hill, I got a strange feeling and for some unknown reason I started to imagine many people on the bus laughing at me!
Right then there was a blip in reality and the bus was suddenly about a mile back on the highway! I then had the experience of watching the bus drive by the tire factory again! This kind of scared me and I noticed that the family sitting in the front, who were talking loudly before, were now dead quiet.
I approached the bus driver when we stopped and told him what I thought happened. He looked really nervous and he said something like, "Things like that happen." It was like a distortion in time and space."

I'd like to thank you for visiting the playhouse and I hope you'll join me for part two, as I investigate the mysterious phenomena of time slips!
That's all for today folks...see ya next "time" ! ;)











~Queenie~

March 24, 2012

Trippy Tales #63..."Spooky Surrency"...The Conclusion

Howdy folks!

Thanks for joining me for the conclusion of  Spooky Surrency, and spooky it is!
If you've been following my blog for the past couple entries (and if not, shame on you! ;) then you know that I'm referring to the town of Surrency, in Baxley, Georgia. And being that I live just a hop, skip & a jump from Baxley (not to mention the fact that I'm a sincere ghost-enthusiast) I've heard quite a bit of "front-porch talk" about the mysterious events that have taken place in & around Surrency over the course of my life. 
I still like to do my homework though, so I've posted an eye-witness account below, from a man who's experienced the Surrency ghost up close and personal.
So come and set a spell y'all...pull ya up a rockin' chair or park yourself here on the porch swing...kick your shoes off, grab a cold ice tea and get comfy, while we explore the strange & spooky world of Surrency, way down south in the thick Georgia pines... 

From Augusta Chronical Columnist, Randall Floyd, a chilling tale told by lifelong Baxley resident, Mr. Herschel Tillman:    (Originally created 05/10/98)

 "Georgia haunted house was world-famous" 
Herschel Tillman was only 8 the first time his daddy took him to see the ghost.
"It was on a Sunday, right after church," the 85-year-old retired postal carrier recalled in an interview. "My daddy drove us out to the old Surrency house in an old buggy. We went inside and saw and heard things not of this world." Some of those things included a clock that chimed 13 times, then spun mysteriously backwards, boots that marched around the room, plates and cups that jumped off tables and soared through the air and an eerie, scratching sound that seemed to come from within the old walls.
The biggest shock came when a shower of "hot bricks" fell onto the front porch from out of nowhere.
"That place was haunted. There's no two ways about it," Mr. Tillman concluded. "There must have been at least a dozen ghosts inside the Surrency house."
The rambling, two-story structure that once served as a railroad hotel in the tiny town of Surrency in south Georgia's Appling County was reputed to be the most haunted house in America. In its heyday, from 1885 to 1925, some 20,000 curiosity-seekers, including newspaper reporters, clergymen and scientists, flocked there to observe the strange goings-on.
After watching several ink bottles leap from a table and listening to unearthly screams inside a bedroom, a reporter from the Savannah Morning News wrote: "The whole house is clothed in darkness and . . . bears the spirit of the supernatural."
That same reporter said he watched the hands on a clock "move around with exceeding rapid motion. . . . It would pause and strike oddly, and this went on for 17 minutes."
A reporter from The Atlanta Constitution said that logs kept rolling out of the fireplace and that books mysteriously fell off shelves. The reporter fled the house when several hogs and chickens suddenly appeared in the living room from out of nowhere.
Stories about the Surrency haunting appeared in newspapers as far away as Russia and Greece. Dozens of books were written about it.
Phillip Dukes, who ran a local grocery store, remembers stories handed down by his grandmother about the house. "She used to spend the night there often because she was Mrs. Surrency's sister. A lot of times when she put her shoes under her bed at night, she'd wake up next morning and find them out in the hallway. That happened so many times she came to expect it every night."
According to the late Rev. Henry Tillman, the supernatural forces haunting the Surrency house rarely disappointed visitors. The Rev. Tillman said his father often described how objects in the house would dance on the table at mealtimes, bedcovers would roll up and down at night, and glowing red eyes would hover over the railroad tracks directly in front of the house.
"My daddy was one of the most honest men who ever lived," Mr. Tillman said. "When he said he saw those things, he really saw them."
Eager to rid their home of their unnatural guests, the Surrency family -- for whom the town is named -- sought the help of scientists, ministers, mediums and psychics. But efforts to drive away the ghost -- or ghosts -- were unsuccessful. If anything, they seemed to make matters worse. Windows suddenly began to shatter at random, doors refused to stay closed -- even when locked -- and scissors and irons flew across rooms.
Tradition has it that a murder was behind the Surrency haunting. One story says that a railroad worker was killed outside the home and that his spirit plagued the house and its occupants until the house went up in flames in 1925.
Another version holds that owner Allen Surrency was rumored to be in league with the devil. One witness recounted how Mr. Surrency once demonstrated his arcane powers by running a stick completely through his hand without spilling a drop of blood.
According to tradition, the ghost -- or ghosts -- continued to torment the Surrency family long after they moved to another home.
"That thing haunted Old Man Surrency until the day he died," said one old-timer. "But when he was buried, the haunting stopped."

Well folks...in conclusion, I just have to say that there are some things in this world that we may never understand, and I believe Surrency, Georgia is one of those things.  We may get closer to the truth, but who really knows for sure what caused the crazy disturbances in that town? Scientists and researchers of many kind are still searching for the answers. It's not just the ghosts and the spook light that fascinate them, but the geological differences as well. Surrency has made them have to re-think the way they thought the earth worked. And one thing is certain...it's sure keepin' them on their toes, whether they're studying a seismic graph...or runnin' from a spook light! ;)

Till next time...this is lil Queenie saying... "Stay safe and keep those night lights burnin' bright!" 

March 23, 2012

Trippy Tales #63..."Spooky Surrency"....Part Two

A bright yellow ball of light was first seen along railroad tracks near the small town of Surrency in the early 1900s. According to one website, it is theorized that the phenomenon is caused by "a geologic anomaly deep under the town of Surrency. The anomaly, discovered in 1985 during a regional seismic survey, is theorized to be a convex shaped pocket of liquid about nine miles underground, unlike anything else in the world. Scientists are puzzled by the anomaly, since liquid is not supposed to be able to form so far underground."  But sometimes...even scientists don't have all the answers!

 

Below is an eye-witness testimony from "Vidaliasweetonion" at "ghostsofamerica.com"
(edited by yours truly:)

"I saw the spotlight ghost on the Railroad tracks in Surrency, Georgia when I was a teenager in high school. It was my best friend and I, and our boyfriends out together one night, trying to decide on something different to do.
We bravely decided to drive to Surrency and park under the bridge, then walk down the tracks in hopes of seeing the spotlight ghost. So many of our friends had done it and they said it was for real! We lived about 30 minutes away from the town, so by the time we got there, (even though we were all a bit creeped out from driving that dark, lonely highway for so long) we had to go through with it.

As we pulled down the lane to park under the bridge, scary, satanic-looking graffiti jumped out at us as the car's headlights hit them. We parked and my best friend shut off the car. We all got out and set out down the tracks, making a promise that no matter what we saw, we wouldn't run. The night was very still and dark with no stars and no moon, but as our eyes adjusted, we could see that the track seemed to go on forever with dense, tall, pine forests starting at about 25 feet from the track on either side. 
As we got to about the 200 yard line, we had relaxed by then and were laughing and cuttin' up when suddenly, my best friend said ''Look!'' and we all looked up to see a tiny white/yellow light a good 100 yards ahead of us.
We froze in disbelief as the light grew brighter and appeared to be moving toward us gradually down the tracks. As it swayed and hovered (all the while coming closer) it started to turn greenish, then bluish, then purplish, then red, and that's when she said ''Y'all, it looks like its moving faster now! '' That's when I looked behind me to see that my brave boyfriend and hers had just turned on their heels and were high-tailing it back to the car!
I didn't need any more convincing either and grabbed my friend's hand. We were turning and running after the boys as fast as we could, without tripping over the cross-ties. We all made it back to the car and piled in, locking the doors behind us. She cranked up, kicked it in reverse and we backed out of that spot with the headlights once again lighting up the devilish faces and symbols of the local graffiti artists work under the bridge.
We freaked out the whole way home, and my friend's boyfriend was unusually quiet. He did not want to discuss it at all! It scared him that bad!  I couldn't explain it, but knowing it's there is enough for me! I will not be back to those tracks again!"

I hope you enjoyed today's entry and that you'll join me for the conclusion of "Spooky Surrency".....materializing sooooooon!
 
 ~Queenie~


March 21, 2012

Trippy Tales #63..."Spooky Surrency"...Part One

Hello & thanks for visiting the playhouse!
Today's tale is about a town that is very close to my own hometown of Brunswick GA. It's a little place on the map called "Surrency", in Appling county, Georgia.  Some crazzzy things went down in this town, and are still going on today. For example, the Surrency "spook light" that's been sighted along the railroad tracks. It's kind of a long story, so sit back...get comfy...and enjoy!

From americanghoststories.com:
"Way down south in Georgia, in a railroad settlement on the edge of the Altamaha River Swamp, people talked about the Surrency ghost as if its reign were only yesterday. But it was more than a century ago, in the late 1870s, that the hotel of the Allen Surrency family – the family for whom the town was named- became center stage for one of the most spectacular hauntings in American history. In less than a decade, news of the strange happenings at the Surrency home had spread all across the country with thousands of journalists, scientists and curiosity-seekers pouring in to investigate.
Diaries, books, newspaper and magazine reports and hundreds of personal accounts vividly describe the unearthly activities that occurred in that house:
tables and chairs flying through the air, mirrors exploding in hallways, clocks running wild, hot bricks raining from the sky, mysterious noises ranging from sorrowful weeping to sadistic bursts of unexplained laughter.
Only a handful of oldtimers are still around who actually saw the house; fewer are alive today who witnessed the spooky manifestations before the structure went up in flames early one Sunday morning in 1912. Those who remember speak nostalgically of their town’s infamous ghost, pleased at the attention their community once received.
Phillip Dukes, who ran a local grocery store until his death in 1985, did not believe in ghosts. But in an interview with an Atlanta newspaper right before he died, the elderly Surrency native said he didn’t “doubt for a moment” the veracity of accounts handed down to him from his grandmother. “She used to spend the night at the house often, because she was Mrs.Surrency’s sister. A lot of times when she put her shoes under her bed at night, she’d wake up next morning and find them out in the hallway. That happened so many times she came to expect it every night. She never figured out what caused it, so she thought it must have been the ghost.”
The late Hershel Tillman, a longtime postal carrier for the Surrency district, was also convinced that ghosts were responsible for the haunting. As a boy, he visited the Surrency house many times, but it was stories related to him by his father, uncle and other relatives that convinced him there was more to the Surrency ghost than just talk. “No doubt about it, a ghost was involved,” Tillman said. “I wasn’t old enough to understand, but the poor people who lived in that house always had trouble going to sleep once the ghost invaded the place.”

And from about.com:

In the early 1870s, a Georgia family was at the center of a whirlwind of bizarre and sometimes violent poltergeist activity

"That place was possessed by something evil."
That was the opinion of Herschel Tillman when he recalled his many visits to the home of Allen Powel Surrency when he was a boy in the early 1870s. He was just one of the thousands of witnesses to the strange and sometimes violent paranormal activity that plagued the Surrency home, making it one of the most well-known and witnessed cases of this kind in American history.
Allen Powel Surrency, a saw mill operator, was the founder of the small town of Surrency in southeastern Georgia. When returning home from a trip to Hazelhurst in October, 1872, he found his house beset with the haunting. In a letter he wrote to the Savannah Morning News he said:
"A few minutes after my arrival, I saw the glass tumblers begin to slide off the slab and the crockery to fall upon the floor and break. The books began to tumble from their shelves to the floor, while brickbats, billets of wood, smoothing irons, biscuits, potatoes, tin pans, water buckets, pitchers, etc., began to fall in different parts of my house. There have been many other strange occurrences about my house. These facts can be established by 75 or 100 witnesses."

On the face of it, it sounds as if Surrency's house might have suffered an earthquake. In fact, that theory has been offered to explain the phenomena at the house. But that explanation does not hold up to scrutiny: the strange activity lasted weeks, even years off and on; the Surrency house was the only one affected; and an earthquake could not explain all of the bizarre phenomena described below.
And although the Surrency phenomena is usually referred to as a haunting and was attributed by witnesses to ghosts, the case actually has the earmarks of poltergeist activity, which is a psychic phenomenon rather than one that is caused by a residual or intelligent haunting. In fact, there seem to have been no reports of an apparition at Surrency.
Most poltergeist cases center around an "agent," usually a female of the age of puberty. At the time, the Surrency family had eight children ranging in age from 3 to 21.
News of this "haunting" spread like wildfire, and soon Surrency was the center of a media frenzy. Reporters and curiosity seekers from all over the country (and even England and Canada) descended on the little town in hopes of seeing the activity first-hand. Few were disappointed.
Like the famous Bell Witch case, the poltergeist activity at the Surrency house was extreme and diverse. Here are just some of the reported phenomena:
  • Unexplained screams were heard
  • Voices came from an empty bedroom
  • Plates, platters and books flew from their shelves
  • Ink bottles leap off a table
  • Doors opened and closed by unseen hands
  • The hands of clocks spun fast and even moved backward; a chime clock struck 13
  • Hot bricks fell from nowhere and landed on the roof and in the yard
  • A pair of boots trod across the floor on their own
  • At mealtimes, objects on the dinner table would "dance" around
  • Logs rolled out of the fireplace
  • Several hogs and chickens appeared in the living room, seemingly from nowhere, frightening one reporter out of his wits
  • Bedcovers rolled up and down at night
In an effort to rid his house and family of the terrifying activity, Surrency sought the help of the clergy, scientists as well as spirit mediums and psychics - all to no avail. Even after the house burned down in 1925, the activity followed the family to their new home on the other side of the county.
It wasn't until Allen Surrency's death in 1877, it is said, that the haunting finally stopped. Some, however, say it continues to this day around the town of Surrency. In fact, there is a famous ghost light there - a bright yellow ball of light that appears along the railroad tracks.
Stay Tuned For Part Two, Coming Soon!

March 16, 2012

Trippy Tale # 62..."The Old Wallpaper"

Hello & thanks for visiting the playhouse! 

Today's tale is one of my favorites. I may have posted it before, but it deserves another round of reading, because this one is a really fascinating story! It comes from Mary C. at about.com:

 
"My grandparents grew up in England and moved here after they got married. Both are very intelligent and are not prone to bouts of idiocy or live in a fantasy world. But my grandmother told me of something strange that happened to her when she was a little girl. She swears it really happened, and I believe her to the fullest.
When she was around the age of 8, her family moved into a rather run-down neighborhood. The house next to hers stood vacant and she never remembered anyone living there at all the entire time her family lived next door. The kids in the neighborhood would make up stories, as kids do, and call the house haunted. She said that even at one time, there was a family of squatters that resided there, but they didn't stay long, only a couple weeks and seemed to leave in a hurry.
One day, for reasons that she cannot recall, her older brother took her into the house to explore. There wasn't much to it, but she says she distinctly remembered a room upstairs that had yellowed wallpaper. On the wallpaper were vertical lines of vines and leaves with doves or pigeons sitting in them. For some reason, the room felt eerie and they left soon afterward. She said that when her parents found out that they had gone in there, they were very angry with her brother and told them never to go in there again in case they fell through the weakening floorboards.
Some days later, my grandmother and her brother were walking home from school. As they neared their house, they heard a strange fluttering sound, and to their astonishment, what seemed like hundreds of doves or pigeons were flying out of one of the upstairs windows of the vacant house. The next day, curiosity got the better of them and my grandmother and her brother again went into the house. But they couldn't find the room with the yellowed wallpaper and doves. They checked everywhere twice over, yet never found the room.
Confused, the children left the house, and that's when her brother noticed he had accidently dropped his toy truck somewhere. He told her to wait while he dashed back in the house to look for it. A few minutes later, her brother returned, looking very pale. She asked him if he found his truck and he simply nodded, but didn't say anything, and they walked back to their house.
Later in the evening, my grandmother asked him if she could see his truck and he said that it was back in the vacant house. Miffed, my grandmother demanded to know why he didn't retrieve it and her brother turned to her, wide-eyed, and stated that the truck was on the wall in one of the upstairs rooms. On the wall? What did that mean? He tried to explain that it seemed to be painted on the wall and got angry when my grandmother continued to ask him to explain. He never did truly explain what he meant and soon got so angry with her frequent questions that she stopped asking them.
Whether he was telling the truth or not, she wasn't sure, but it seemed like he had been. They never returned to the old house and eventually moved out. My grandmother told this story to me when I was younger and I have always associated England with this story."

TRIPPY HUH?!

Stay Tuned For More Trippy Tales!
 ~Queenie~

March 7, 2012

Trippy Tales # 61..."The Death Knock Phenomena"

There's a mysterious phenomena known as the "death knocks" that is sometimes said to occur when a loved one has either died, or is close to death.  They have also been heard during crisis situations.  But no matter when they choose to "come knockin"...they certainly get the attention of all who hear them!
 From Derry Ghosts.com:

The Death Knock


"There are several stories of ‘The Death Knock’. The following one is authenticated. It was told by a woman who married into a family that apparently heard the three death knocks shortly before the eldest member of the family died.

Three years ago on New Year’s Eve, she and her husband were in their sitting room watching television when they heard three almighty knocks which shook the house. They both jumped in alarm and the woman said that she felt weak and ill. When she looked at her husband, he was as white as a sheet. However, seeing her alarm, he tried to laugh it off as the wind playing tricks. She was not convinced and her husband persuaded her to go out for a run in the car. She was still quite upset and just before they left, his brother came to tell them that his father had taken ill very suddenly and died. Their father was a big strong man who was apparently very healthy and his death was quite unexpected."

And here's another story of the death knocks, coming from "about.com"...
"This happened in my hometown in Illinois. It was November 2008, Thanksgiving, to be exact. We were having Thanksgiving dinner at my aunt and uncle's house. My aunt, who is a very straightforward, no-nonsense woman, told us about what she had been experiencing. This was in a offhand manner; clearly she thought it was silly and a bit ridiculous.
She told us she had been hearing knocks, always just three in a row, always loud, always at night. They were always on the back sliding glass door in the kitchen. She would hear the knocks from the living room and get up to see who it was, but would never see anyone.
She said it was strange because the knocks were evenly spaced, not just random knocking. This happened three different times on three different nights. Each time she heard it she would run to the kitchen and straight to the sliding door -- and no one was ever there. She told us it had to be kids just messing around, even though her entire backyard is fenced in with a lock on the gate.
A few weeks later, my uncle -- her husband -- was having surgery. It was about 6 p.m., already dark at that time of year, and my aunt was sitting in the waiting room at the hospital waiting for my uncle to come out of recovery. There was also another woman in the room with her that my aunt did not know.
All of the sudden, three hard knocks came from the window directly behind her. She instantly turned around to see no one! Nothing!  She looked at the woman and saw that she too, had heard the knocks. The bit that is really strange is that they were on the 7th floor of the hospital! No ledges were on the outside of window, no walkways or deck of any kind.
She said this surprised her a little, but again, she is a no-nonsense kind of woman and dismissed it. After telling us all this, she said it was silly and gave us all hugs as we left.
Five months later, my cousin -- her son -- was killed in an accident. This was her only son. It was devastating to the entire family. He was only 35 years old. At that time, I had not heard about the three knocks of death, so that was never in my thoughts. Grief blocked out many thoughts at that time.
Only later, did I read on this website about the "three knocks of death"...and now I believe that's exactly what they were. I have not told my aunt this and don't plan to, as she does not need to be reminded of her son's death again. Also, a little strange is the fact that my father, my older cousin, my uncle and now this cousin, all from the same side of the family, were all killed in accidents. All of them in their 30s." 
 And another... 
Death Knocks
by Neal

"First off, I have never heard of "the three knocks" prior to today, but went online to do some research. The story begins back in the 1920s when my grandmother was in the kitchen and heard three loud knocks on her front door. There was no one there, but three days later learned that her mother had died back in Germany.

In 1973 my parents were awakened with three loud knocks on our front door. Upon inspection, there was no one there, but received a phone call about an hour later that my uncle had passed away.

This was never brought up again until I was telling my uncle about the story at my father's funeral in 1979. He and his wife froze and said that they had heard three loud knocks on their storm door about the same time my father had passed away (they lived in Arizona, thus the three-hour time difference). We have never looked into this.

Two weeks ago, my mother awoke to three loud knocks or bangs on her front door. Again, she got up and found nothing at the door and was immediately scared because it reminded her of the 1973 incident. Three days later, my brother was murdered in Louisiana in the early morning. The strangest fact is that in all of the times a family member heard the knocks, it corresponded to the time of death (give or take an hour) of a family member.

This last case is the only time the knocks came three days prior to my brother's death. It was only last night that a cousin and I were discussing the events and decided to do some online research and came across this post. We are definitely not what you would call paranormal, but are looking into any information on the subject and why our family has had so many occurrences."
But is the mysterious knocking always a bad sign?  Not according to the story below...
 "A few years back, my daughter was to have emergency surgery on her intestine and the doctor said that her temperature was high and that things "didn't look good for her". I was beside myself, thinking I might lose my only child.
In the middle of the morning, a loud knocking woke me. It seemed to come from the front door, but the knocking occurred again, rocking the entire house. I got up and walked through the hallway and the third set of knocks became a bit lighter.
Finally, the sound vanished. The next morning, the doctor told me that sometime during the night, my daughter's temperature went down and that the surgery would be successful. I feel the knocking was a good sign to me, alerting me that things had changed."

Stay tuned for more trippy tales about this freaky phenomena in part 2!
~Queenie~

March 3, 2012

Trippy Tales #60..."The (Partially) Polite Poltergeist"

 (Originally titled "My Poltergeist Story" by Jamie @ "Phenomena log.com)

"I'm researching for a book on living with ghosts and I wanted to share my poltergeist story, which is the reason why I got into this field.
My parents divorced in the 1970s and my mom bought a house that had been built into the side of a hill in the mid 1800s. The activity started as we were fixing the place up before we even moved in.
First, a brief discussion on poltergeists. The common thinking, at least here in the states, is that poltergeists are usually associated with an adolescent or pre-adolescent girl (the agent), and involve psychokinesis. More current studies acknowledge that there's often another child involved and that one child is often epileptic. Additionally, there are usually high levels of emotional stress in the family. I was on the young side of what is considered the age range for being an agent when we moved in, just turning 11. I had a younger brother who, unknown to us at the time, was eplieptic. Add the stress of my parents divorce and the move, and you can see why my mother blamed all of our poltergeist activity on me.
However, as much as our haunting was very poltergeist in nature, it had some aspects that were very different. Most poltergeist activity is violent in nature, involves "non-purposeful" noises and moving objects, and happens when the agent is around.
In our case, no one needed to be around, and the poltergeist remained just as active for years after I move out (and I'm betting he's still there today). Our ghost was also rarely violent, and the things that happened were highly intelligent attempts at interacting with our family.
I finally found the research of a man named Ian Stevenson who founded The Division of Perceptual Studies at Virginia University. After reviewing all of his poltergeist cases he identified two types of poltergeist hauntings. Some were attributed to an agent. In these the activity was "without purpose and often violent". The other cases involved the spirits of the dead and "featured intelligent communication, purposeful movement of objects, and little violence." Ours was the second type. So, with the understanding that this poltergeist may be different than other poltergeists you've heard of,
here are a few of my stories:
When we first moved in, we bought three cans of paint, a light purple for my room, a light blue for my brothers room, and gold for the hallway. We painted my brother's room first and under each faceplate we removed, we found the walls had previously been the exact same shade of light blue.
When we went to do my room we took the light switch plate off first. I remember all of us staring at the light purple under it. Then it struck us to check under the other switch plates and they were all light purple too. Finally, my mom suggested we try taking off the hall switch plates. I think she was really hoping it would just take some of the weirdness away when she saw they just had off white under them. But, the didn't. They were all removed to show the same shade of gold we were about to paint the hall.
The poltergeist generally kept to it's name with being very noisy. We'd all be downstairs and hear footsteps upstairs. Or my brother and I would be asleep and my mother would hear footsteps coming down the stairs. The sounds were frequent and constant.
Our dog slept in my brothers room and would wake up in the middle of the night barking and snapping. We later found out that the stairs used to be circular and the dog's bed would have been right at the bottom, just where those disembodied footsteps were heading.
Other times the dog would stare at something not there in the hall and bark and growl incessantly. In my room I had shelves that went from the floor to the ceiling and at one point I had them filled with nothing but stuffed animals. I woke up one morning and every stuffed animal was on my bed, carefully placed so that they made a complete circle around me - even over my head.
One morning my brother was getting ready for school and couldn't find his sneakers. This activity was so prevalent at that point with other things going missing that he remembers thinking "darned, now the ghost has my sneaker!" He missed the bus and walked to school in his dress shoes since my mom was already at work and couldn't drive him.
I was the first one home that day and went to get something from his room. I stopped dead as soon as I walked in. There were his sneakers, smack dab in the middle of his round rug, placed perfectly together with toes pointed directly at the door. I had the feeling that it was sorry to have caused so much trouble and was trying to apologize.
In the living room, there was a rocking chair on top of the corner of a rug. Sometimes we would find the rug pulled out from under the chair, folded forward over itself, and the chair sitting on the hard wood floor.
My mom used to look out at the barely paved one lane road between our house and the ruins of the mill at night and see a lantern going down the street. No one carrying it, just a lantern bobbing along...
Our ghost like to open all the kitchen cabinets and drawers when we weren't looking. It's a bit unnerving walking into the kitchen to see every single drawer and cabinet open when you were just in the room a few minutes before and they were all solidly shut.
We also had a bathroom with a very old door that required the original key to lock it. There was no reason for any of us to ever take the key out of the door, but somehow the ghost was fascinated with hiding it on us. Sometimes it would pop up back in the bathroon somewhere a day or two later, and sometimes it would show up somewhere else altogether.
One Sunday my mom was having friends over for dinner at 4.00. She had everything ready, but they showed up at 5 and she was pissed. They swore they were on time and finally talked her into calling someone to check. They were right - they had arrived at 4. Every clock in our house had been moved ahead an hour. even the one on the electric stove with the missing knob so you needed pliers to turn it.
The next Sunday every clock in the house somehow turned back to be an hour early. At first we thought maybe the power had gone out for an hour, but even the battery powered clocks had been turned back.
Again consistent with a good poltergeist was the throwing of small metal objects. In our case it was pennies. We'd all be in the family room and hear the familiar quiet thud-thud-thud down the wooden stairs and in the hall. We'd go out to find yet another penny had been thrown down the stairs. This must have happened at least 20 times. They were always older pennnies,too - from the 1930s and 1940s I think. We'd try to save them in one place so we could remember the dates, but somehow they had a way of disappearing.
And here are a few stories from the woman who had the house after us, a friend of my mom's;
In the family room there was a 10 gallon gold fish aquarium in the corner sitting on a large wooden packing crate. One night the woman heard a huge crach in the middle of the night and ran in there to find the aquarium on its side in the middle of the room, a good three or four feet from the crate, which was still standing and fully intact.
She told me how she would share the ghost stories with all of her guests, and if they didn't beleive her the ghost would convince them otherwise. She had a couple over one night who didnt't believe any of her stories, so she warned them it would make an appearance.
A little later she was telling them how safe it was there at night, because the old stone stairs you had to climb up the hill along the side of the house were impossible in the dark, and the porch creaked badly. No one could make it to the back door without injury or an alerting noise.
Just as she finished saying that thee was a knock at the door. She laughed and told her friends it was the ghost, as expected. They didn't believe her so she made them open the door. Of course there was no one there.
And finally, a missed opportunity to communicate. She had a glass jar of stones in the dining room and came home one night to find it empty. When she went into the kitchen she found them in patterns across all the counters. She scooped them right back into the bowl and called a friend to come stay with her.
Later she was talking to a local historian who told her that soldiers from the war that took place in the area used to leave stones in patterns on the trails as coded messages for other soldiers. That fit with the fact that we had found a cannon ball from the war in the ground right next to the foundations of the house. I think we finally learned a bit about the identity of the ghost!
It has been 35 years since I lived in that house. The one I live in now has some paranormal activity, but nothing like that one. As often happens with girls who grew up with poltergeists, I have had a few minor psychokinetic experience over the years, so maybe there is some sort of interaction between an agent and a spirit. But I know in my case there was a spirit and it wasn't just me!"

 Now folks...I don't know a whole heap of information about this photo, but I have seen it enough times to know that it has been examined by many "professionals" and is believed to be authentic.

Which makes it perty dang scary to me!

I know I sure as shine-ola wouldn't wanna wake up to that woman, Alive OR Dead ok?!?! 
  Seriously.

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March 1, 2012

Trippy Tales # 59.....More Mysterious Stories!

Personal Experiences from around the web...

 Old Haunted House
   
By Erin @ www.ghoststories.ws

"I grew up in an old house in Durham, North Carolina. The house was once a hotel for the train station across the road. I was told it was built in 1776.
When I was little, my entire family -- my mom, dad, and sister and I -- used to sleep in a room upstairs. As a kid, I hated that room. My mom told me that when my grandparents were gone someplace, she and my dad would hear doors slam downstairs. When my dad would go check it out, he would find the doors wide open, the way my grandparents had left them.
One night, when I was five and my sister was ten, she and I were in the living room, dancing to the radio. My sister suddenly stopped and looked at the steps, her mouth hanging open. She ran into the kitchen where our mom was and I, being only five, ran after her. I heard her telling my mom that she'd seen an old lady with a long black dress and her hair up in a tight bun gliding down the steps. I never saw her, but my sister swears up and down that she saw the woman.
When I was 16, I slept in a room upstairs -- not the room we all slept in when I was little, but another room. I used to wake up every night between two and three a.m. to hear footsteps going up the steps toward my bedroom door.
One night, I had this dream: I was standing next to this old man who looked like he was in his early 60s, maybe early 70s. I stood there looking at this man with my mouth dropped like I couldn't believe what I was seeing, and then the dream changed to me standing at the foot of the stairs by myself, and I was hearing footsteps going up the stairs toward my door.
I woke up and lay there, thinking, "Why did I dream that?" Then I started hearing the footsteps getting closer and closer to my bedroom door. At the time, I had long hair, and was laying on my left side. I felt something pick up my hair and sling it over my shoulder.
I was so scared that I couldn't move or scream; I was frozen in place. A few years later, my boyfriend moved in with us, and one day I was in the dining area where we all sat to watch TV. My boyfriend came running downstairs, looking like he had seen a ghost.
He told me he was sitting on his bed, watching TV, when he saw a lady with long blond hair and a white dress standing in front of his bed. He said he got up and ran as fast as he could. A few minutes later, he decided to go back upstairs to his room -- he was braver than I was.
He came running back downstairs a second time, yelling that she appeared to him again, only this time he asked her what she wanted and her answer was "I want YOU!"
I have never seen him so scared before.
It didn't take the both of us long to get out of that house."   


The Ghost Runner 
  
By Krystal @ www.ghoststories.ws

"The night I first saw the Ghost Runner, it was just my brother and me in the house.
I hated being home alone with my brother, but it happened a lot when I was growing up. I avoided hanging around him as much as possible, even when I was little; he irritated me and I didn't like to feel young.
I was standing in the hallway outside of his room, the one place he never looked for me. At the other end of the hallway was my room, and next to that was my parents' room. All the lights were off except the one right behind me, my brother's, and I was gearing up my courage to head into my room. The darkness terrified me. I had to stare into it long and hard before I was sure I had the courage to rush in and flick on the light.
This time, though, there was something in my room. I couldn't tell my brother, so I stood and watched it. Whatever it was, it was darker than the darkness, a gray-black figure that rushed from my parents' room through the wall and into my room.
Choking on a scream, I bolted into the computer room, on the other side of the house, and curled up in the corner shaking. My brother glanced away from the computer screen long enough to snort laughter at me, then left me there for the rest of the night. I made sure the light stayed on and sat awake all night, thinking about the being I named the Ghost Runner.
A few years later, it returned. I was in the living room doing homework when I started to drift off. My eyelids were heavy, but not so closed that I couldn't see a gray-white figure dash across the walkway between the dining room and the kitchen. That jerked me awake, and I snatched up my homework and ran to my room. Something about my room felt safe.
I finally ventured out a few hours later to get a glass of water, because my throat felt dry enough to be a desert. My shaking hands managed to pour some water, and I went to put the jug back into the fridge when I hit the spot in the kitchen where the dining room can just be seen. A figure sprinted by in the corner of my eye; it looked just like a person, so I figured it was my brother, trying to scare me.
I whirled to yell at him. My jaw dropped. A gray-black human figure was running through our walls and doors, back and forth across the house. The water jug clattered onto the floor, spilling its contents onto the tiles; I ignored it and sprinted to my parents' room.
But I pulled up short at their door. They wouldn't believe me that I'd seen a ghost. So I kept the Ghost Runner to myself.
Through the years to follow, I did extensive research on what the Ghost Runner might have been, because although I never saw him again, he still haunted my visions and my nightmares. An obscure article I finally came across spoke about shadow people, supernatural beings that walked in and out of walls.
I figure I'd found the Ghost Runner."


Cindy's Revenge
 
By Lilli @ www.ghoststories.ws

"My cousin, Daniela, was always a very mean little girl. She would always break our toys and hit us. When she was about eight years old, her family moved to a little town called Sonora in Texas. They lived right next to a church along a creek called "The Devil's River."
It was Daniela's birthday, and she received a lot of toys. One toy, in particular, stood out – a very pretty doll. She called it ‘Cindy’. She decided she wanted to play school with the doll, her little brother and myself. Of course, being the mean girl that she was, she had to be the principal. She grabbed a ruler and would spank us with it, when we didn’t do what she wanted. The doll got most of the whippings.
That night, after her party, we all spent the night at my cousin's house. It started to rain, and the creek filled up. It was very dark, so I had trouble going to sleep. When I finally fell asleep, I was awakened by a really loud scream. We all ran to Daniela's room. She was on the floor crying that her back was burning. My aunt lifted her shirt to reveal a bunch of long, rectangular marks - like a ruler! We looked at her bed, and there was Cindy, sitting next to the ruler!"

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